Aussie! Aussie! Aussie!

Oi! Oi! Oi!

G’day mates!  I have just returned from San Francisco where I attended the Australia Day Ball with my friend Julie, hosted annually by the Australian-American Chamber of Commerce – a group Julie got involved with when she was trying to move there.  Photos can be found here:   http://www.ofoto.com/BrowsePhotos.jsp?&collid=101982672203&page=1&sort_order=0

First though, I spent Friday night with Aimee which was very fun.  She lives near SFO in Burlingame, which is a cute little town.  I got in around 2:30pm, so after dropping my stuff off we walked into town to hit their shopping street.  Upon my arrival in the Gap it immediately staretd hailing – reminiscent of LA two weeks ago.  Apparently I’m not allowed to go shopping in California anymore or something (which may be a good thing, but not as fun…).  But we persevered, skipping past the seemingly countless amount of children’s clothing stores and ducking into all things Gap, Pottery Barn and the like, as well as the independents.  Aimee bought a very cool apple green sweater at the not so independent Banana Republic.

With plans to meet up with her friends for a late dinner & drinks we had some time to kill.  We headed home and quickly became obsessed with a snowboarding game on her playstation – it took me awhile to get the hang of it, and to be truthful I don’t think I ever really did – but I definitely found some creative ways to crash and wipeout.  We tore ourselves away long enough for a great mexican dinner and margaritas at Hola! with some of her Stanford buddies, but managed to get a few more races in before going to bed.

In the morning, we of course immediatly fired the play station up once more, but with stomachs growling, drove to the next town over, San Mateo, for lunch and wandering about.  Back home I packed up and we snuck in one more bouts of races and with my new character, Marisol, I finally hit my stride and even landed a new trick that no one else had yet, which will help Aimee earn extra outfit and board choices for Marisol - which is key, because currently all of outfits leave her with a bare midriff, which can’t be comfortable in the snow.  But I do beleive it made her more aerodynamic

Aimee then drove me into the city where we met up with Julie and strolled around her neighborhood, Noe Valley before splitting up.  Aimee left to work Men’s volleyball (not a bad gig as far as I can tell) and Julie and I dolled ourselves up for the ball, which was being held downtown at the very posh Mark Hopkins.  Everyone was so nice and we had a lot of fun.  I was seated next to a guy named Peter, who along with his business partner David staretd a company a few years ago called Sandwich Direct.  They were since bought out by Specialtys and still work for them – you can visit one at 3rd & Spring downtown Seattle.  Mar says they have excellent cookies.  Sadly, neither Julie nor I won either raffle (trips to Oz or Thailand), but I did win a couple nights at a hotel in Laughlin I thought I’d give my parents for when they go down to Lake Havasu.  Lots of good wine and champagne, a fun band, interesting people – a good night was had by all.

Slept late Sunday morning and stumbled up and over the hill to Tartine, a fabulous bakery/cafe in the Mission where we ate and read the paper – I had a grilled pecorino/almond sandwich and Scharffenberger hot chocolate, and bought some cookies for the road.  Once full, we hiked home then hopped in the car for Golden Gate park, ’cause it was a beautiful day out.  We decided to visit the Conservatory of Flowers, which was apparently destroyed in 1995 by 100-mph winds and has just re-opened about a year ago.  Then we camped out on the lawn outside for awhile, before driving over to Lincoln Park and through Sea Cliff where all the super fancy homes are.  Sadly, we did not see Robin Williams wandering around – only other tourists.  Next stop was Fillmore street for gelato and shopping, then home to grab my stuff and get dinner at Emmy’s Spaghetti Shack before flying to the airport.

It was a fabulous weekend away – thanks to Aimee and Julie for hosting me – I had a blast!