Surfers, Sand, Succulents, and the Ponzu Reduction: a San Diego Pictorial
The summer vacation to San Diego began on Sunday June 28th. Once we landed and were waiting for the Dollar Rent a Car shuttle, I sensed impending disappointment. Twenty minutes lapsed before a shuttle arrived, and when we were dropped off, there was a line snaking out the door. We then waited in line to get a car for an hour and 45 minutes. This was completely unacceptable, and was exacerbated by the subpar customer service of the cretins behind the counter. Do yourself a favor and go with another rental car company.
After the unpleasant experience of getting a car, we arrived at Porto Vista Hotel on Columbia, in Little Italy. Very quaint area next to downtown San Diego.
The hotel is a moderately priced, remodeled motel. The rooms are small, but the bathroom almost makes up for it. We had problems with the A/C unit in both rooms we were in.
The first early evening was spent on the roof, sipping mojitos and watching the leisurely bustle of the streets below, while the breeze was enough for me to don a cozy hoodie. We then wandered out to India Street, where a whole slew of Italian restaurants with outdoor patios tantalize passersby with decadent aromas. After perusing several menus, we randomly sat down at Trattoria Fantastica and shared an excellent brick-oven-baked pizza.
Very early Monday morning we hit three beaches in a row. Starting from the north and working our way down, we visited Windansea Beach, Mission Beach, and Ocean Beach.
Windansea at 8 in the morning was windy, gray, craggy, and secluded, save for a few middle-aged joggers and strollers with dogs, and some hearty surfers. Expensive beach houses loomed over the cliffs. The ocean sensed that I was tentative about its temperature, as I edged closer to the water line; so it reached out with gusto and hugged my feet with ice-cold water.
Came across this amusing scene amidst the rocks:
Leaving Windansea, we turned right on La Jolla Blvd., then left on Grand Ave., and the Purple Cafe caught our eyes, so we pulled in for a light breakfast. I had a Cali breakfast burrito, made “cali” by the addition of avocado and sprouts. As we ate, an aging hipster with a flute and guitar in tow discussed with us and nobody in particular the history of the framed cigar box art adorning the walls, while the mannequin in the window blankly looked on.
On to Mission Beach, still fairly early in the morning. The boardwalk here is a paved two-lane trail, crammed with colors and people. The sand is softer, and the gulls are surly. We walked through a souvenir shop as raindrops started falling, and meandered past the roller coaster and other dizzying-vomit rides known collectively as Belmont Park.
Ocean Beach is the last beach stop of the day. The laidback surfer atmosphere is almost overwhelming, redefining the term “beach bum.” It seems everyone is walking a dog. We park near the water and walk up on a huge pier with a cafe at the end. A closer look at the surfers lurking for the next wave show that they are mostly middle-aged dudes.
On to Newport Ave. We peek inside several head shops, surf shops, antique shops, and bars. We duck into the doorway of Hodad’s, a burger joint with the requisite “no shirt no shoes no problem” sign, and wait here for several minutes with a line forming behind us out the door. Soon a 10 year old girl approaches me out of nowhere and says, “Do you want to sit on the surfboard?” and gestures to a bench table in the middle of the busy dining area. We sit at the nose and take in the scenery while our tattooed server brought us ice-cold beverages. The menu informs us that a “hodad” is a surfer poser. It was a motley crew of diners : twenty-something douchebags dressed sharply for work, Hispanic women, Asian youngsters, suburban moms with teenaged kids, babies flinging fries on the floor. And it contained the world’s largest collection of novelty license plates.
Went to the ladies’ room, where messages of varying sentiments covered the walls.
Stopped for a glimpse of a steep drop into the ocean at Sunset Cliffs before heading back to the freeway.
After we left Ocean Beach, we headed back to the hotel. At this point the weather was still gray and cloudy. It was about 3 o’clock when we drove over to Balboa Park. Most of the museums were about to close at 4, but we just wanted to walk through, and take in some of the strange and beautiful foliage.
That evening, we dined at The Glass Door, a contemporary American cuisine restaurant within the Porto Vista hotel. I had the chicken, only the menu called it Roasted Jidori Chicken. The average person wouldn’t know what most of the items on the menu are, including a ponzu reduction. Our server was very amiable and knowledgeable, and looked a bit like Kiefer Sutherland.
Day 2 to be continued.
Such self-righteousness
He’s teaching me how to be
Holier than thou
The following is a poem from Jake, a fifth-grader, on scoring a date with a chick. It seems he could school hapless older guys who are lacking in the relationship department, with his straightforward philosophy.
1. Say you like the girl’s shoes or something.
2. Then walk away. If she says “Ha!” go and walk back. If not, that means she’s not interested in you or she is not the person who really likes boys.
3. Start a conversation. Ask what she likes or how she is feeling.
4. Tell her what you like.
5. Ask her if she has a boyfriend.
6. If not, ask her what she’s doing Friday or Saturday night.
7. If she’s free, then that’s when you move in. Ask her if you can take her on a date.
8. Take her to a fancy restaurant.
9. Take her to where they have lots of decorations and other fancy things.
10. If you have lots of things in common and she likes you, plan to make reservations for another date.
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Kate Bingaman-Burt’s site – "I make work about personal consumption."
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Besides being a beautifully designed site, designsponge gives me ideas for cutesy yet utilitarian crafts. Me: "Why didn’t I think of that?!"
tags: home, craft, decoration, design
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Drawn! The Illustration and Cartooning Blog
Awesome images and inspirational technique. Although I’m not a drawer myself, viewing these gets my creative word-juices flowing.
Posted from Diigo.
I love reading the Frugal Dad blog because it is just so damn simple. And simple is good – no more of this complicated stuff. Even though I’m not a dad, nor will I ever be (I’m a chick), this guy’s writing really speaks to me on a level that should be common to all humans – reaching for a sense of simplicity in a world gone bat-shit crazy.
His recent post, Living Off the Grid, got me thinking (again) about the material things I could easily go without, and save money and sanity in the process. First on my list? TV! Cable bill! Out the door. A friend of mine says she is TV-free, and I envy her. Since cutting back on my TV viewing, I have more time and energy to focus on more important things. Plus, when you stop watching TV news, you feel better.
The cable bill has been decreased recently, after a good long look was taken and some outrageous things were questioned. Still, it’s about 70 bucks a month for Internet and cable, which I’d like to reduce even more. Unfortunately, the apartment management charges a $30 fee of its residents that “goes toward Comcast.” In short, residents are stuck with Comcast, and have to pay the $30 regardless of whether we even want cable or not. Treacherous! Yay for Hulu!
Other things I could go without (and have gone without):
- eating at restaurants, which saved me $278 for the month of June 2008
- waxes – $85 a month – ouch!
- books – why buy these when you can borrow them from the library, or buy them dirt-cheap at Half Price Books, or a thrift shop? A coworker says she finds hardbacks for 25 cents at Houston thrift shops.
- Starbucks coffee – I’m making my own coffee at home. This is a big duh – $5 for a package of ground coffee that will last me for a couple months, or a $5 cup each day? Hmmm.
- car washes
What are you all going without to beef up your finances?
Neutrality >> Attachment >> Expectations >> Lack of reciprocity >> Disappointment + Disillusionment >> Neutrality
It’s easy to be nice to someone, isn’t it? Someone with whom you’re in a relationship. Courtesy and politeness are, I believe, the pillars of human interaction. It’s easy to say ‘thank you’ and ‘please.’ Those are great for days when you give a damn enough to say them. But what if your relationship is based on nothing but politeness? Is it normal to be merely polite to your boyfriend/girlfriend, as you would be to a stranger, and have zero expectations? A notion has settled over me recently, like a warm blanket, that I am in another one of those situations that requires the utmost finesse, something I don’t have. It’s a relationship in which there are ZERO expectations of me on his part, and my expectations of him have dissolved as well.
Spending any great amount of time with another person, you come to see patterns in behavior, and then you begin assuming things based on these patterns. That’s a logical, reasonable expectation. Throw in a personality trait that hinges heavily on goal-setting, future-planning, active participation in life, and you’ve got me. I spent a good deal of time and energy on a relationship that I mistakenly assumed was going somewhere great, because it was that way already. I had no expectations of him to do anything but be nice to me, and he was/is. A relationship is about more than that, though. It’s about being there when things aren’t going well. It’s about taking responsibility. It’s about taking charge. It’s about taking risks. I found myself at a point in which I’m thinking, "Ok this is nice, but where’s it going? What am I supposed to be doing? Am I wasting time?"
I’m a fairly blunt communicator. Small talk bores me. It’s the love child of fear and uncertainty. I understand that, when used wisely as an initial icebreaker, it could work wonders for opening the door to a lasting, mutually beneficial interaction. Beyond that, it blows. In a relationship that has lasted over 2 years, it almost certainly should have taken a backseat to a recognized, regular pattern of conversation.
I’ve realized I’m in a relationship with someone who hasn’t quite figured me out. Too bad for him, because I’m a fairly simple gal, with straightforward expectations. I don’t think it should take years before deciding whether or not to "move forward," whatever that means. I also can’t comprehend why someone would want to drag out decision-making on this topic. If you know someone, and you think you’d want to move forward, why not just do it? Why wait? Why hesitate? Why keep them hanging?
After months of disappointment, loss of respect, frustration, and boredom, I’m ready to move forward on my own. Life’s too short to waste on people who hesitate. Hesitation is contagious, and you want to avoid it like the plague. When I think of the past two years, and how I’ve wasted it on someone who’s so unsure of me, I feel like kicking myself.
I’m reading a book titled The Paradox of Choice. (Quick – what’s the plural of paradox? Paradoxes, paradoxi?) The author thinks that we Americans would be more satisfied overall if we paid less attention to the array of choices that bombard us, and learn to live like we don’t have many choices. This notion falls into place with an idea I’ve put into practice recently, namely, voluntary simplicity. For me, it’s meant cutting out some mundane things that have been a part of living for a long while, like watching TV news, drinking sodas, incessant shopping, etc.
- We’d be satisfied if we practiced voluntary constraints on our freedom of choice.
- We’d be satisfied if we sought “good enough” instead of “the best.”
- We should lower our expectations about the impact of our decision-making.
- We’d be happier if the decisions we make are non-reversible.
- We’d be more satisfied if we paid less attention to what other people do. (I LUV THIS ONE!)
The paradox is the fact that we now have so many choices available to us, in relationships, where to live, where to work, what type of shoes, cookies, or TV to buy, but that we are less satisfied because we spend too much time worrying whether we’re making the right choice. In order to make sense of all these choices, we tend to block out most of the background noise of second-guessing, hesitation, comparison, pondering, that we’re left feeling like we missed something important. It’s all a big mind-game.
I booked a trip online recently, and decision-making sank its teeth in. So what days do I want to be on vacation? Do I want to stay 3 days or four? In booking the hotel/flight/car package, could I change the departing flight time? Yes! Ok what time do I want to leave? Is this hotel really a good deal, or is there a better deal out there? Are the travelers’ opinions trustworthy? In what part of the city do I want to stay? Do I go with an economy or full size car rental?
I know I’m historically notorious for being hesitant in making decisions, and I’m almost certain that I’ve NEVER been 100% satisfied with the decisions I have made, right after I’ve made them. Self-doubt sets in, and then comes frustration. How have I been able to make progress?
- I limit the number of days that I allow myself to spend thinking and planning. Once that target date is reached, I better have made the decision or I have to let it go.
- I choose a small number of resources to help me in my planning, especially if it’s a topic with which I’m unfamiliar. In the vacation case above, I limited myself to perusing 2 online travel sites, and 1 travel book.
Decision-making gets dicey when you have a significant other who’ll be affected by your decision. It reaches new heights of hair-pulling, shrieking, cat-clawing frustration when that significant other is equally as indecisive, or refuses to lend any constructive contribution. What do you do in this sticky situation?
If you ignore their preferences completely, they’ll get pissed and you’ll have another mess to clean up.
If you consult with them, you’ve certainly tacked on another month or two (at least) of indecisive limbo. The flakiness and doubt fly back and forth: “Well what days do you want to go? I don’t know – August? I was thinking more like June. I don’t want to go in June. There’s too much other stuff going on in June.”
I haven’t smoothly mastered this interaction yet. Has anyone? It’s tricky. But if you’re a single gal like me, you’ve got more room to make straightforward choices, with less lollygagging, loitering, lagging, dillydallying, and dawdling.
Since I’m officially an Adult now, thoughts have turned away from crayons, puppies, pink hard candy, and bubbles to weighty issues like productivity, time management, distraction and attention, and personal finance. Here’s a quick zoom on some blogs I read that focus on these topics with consistently insightful commentary:
Now that I’ve cut out news-watching, including visiting CNN.com, MSNBC.com and icky, foolish local news, there’s more time to peruse these alternative avenues of idea-gathering.
Oh man, late 20s. Are they here already? The late 20s signify a time of extreme confusion, mixed with brief, electric flashes of brilliance and cognitive kick-assedness, with a heapin helpin of childhood memories that are so clear and GOOD that they just about bring tears to an icy heart and soul.
1. I’m still a stupid punk kid in my sisters’ eyes, and ALWAYS WILL BE. That’s ok. I’ve damn near perfected that role.
2. It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. (I’ve always thought that, but it’s never been more apparent than now.) Stop living for everyone else. That includes strangers with lives more sullied than they’ll admit, the audience that you have in mind when buying an expensive new car or having a big fabulous wedding to show off your catch.
3. Keep it simple. Get rid of the riffraff that’s keeping you from moving forward. The more possessions and bad habits you have, the tighter you’re bound. It’s all mental spam and it will weigh you down.
4. Be a good steward of the attention that anyone gives you. It’s a hot commodity, and not something to be taken lightly. In other words, don’t be a big meanie.
5. Take care of yourself first. Mind your business. Stop waiting for the perfect moment to take action. There is no such thing as the perfect moment. In other words, shit or get off the pot.
6. Eat simply. Cut out preservatives and artificial ingredients. No excuses. Yesterday I was tickled to discover Breyers Natural Vanilla ice cream, which has only 5 ingredients, all of which I recognize. These finds are treasures in a sea of corporate grocery shipwrecks.
7. Stop listening to the TV, including the noisy, glossy, fast commercials that urge you to buy crap you don’t need, and the ubiquitous news (local and national) that isn’t really news at all, but negative-emotional-nonsensical-filler that clutters your mind with background worry. Try it. I did, and now my dreams are 80% less unsettling. Feed your psyche well.
8. Forge ahead and leave trepidation behind. Learn from your past and revere it. If you ignore those lessons, you deserve to be called an ignoramus.
9. Say no to mediocrity but yes to moderation. Extremes are too extreme. Extremes beget labels, and you don’t want to be labeled, do you?
10. What’s number 10?
