cshell

Fabulous weekend

I had a fabulous weekend. See extended for the gory details.

Friday night I had dinner at Sushi Tei (sp?) with Paul and Emily and Shane and Alyssa. Before I went to meet Shane and Alyssa I had some time to kill so for the first time in months I went to a Blockbuster. There are MANY movies I haven't seen that I need to catch up on. (I should actually try to watch some of my netflix movies.) Dinner was nice - we split a bottle of sake and most of us had sushi. It's actually been a long time since I had sushi, mostly because when I've gone out to "sushi" lately I've opted for hot food instead. But the sushi was good, the company was nice and I still got home and was able to get some stuff done around the house and get to bed relatively early. (Mmmm....sleep....)

Saturday was awesome. I drove down to a winery near Half Moon Bay to meet a friend. From there we sampled some wine (didn't buy any - not that it wasn't good, it just wasn't that interesting given that I don't drink much wine by myself). Interestingly they were pairing wines with edible flowers. Some of the combinations/flowers were more interesting than others (I hadn't known that nasturtiums and fuschia were edible, and I hadn't known the name of the other flower - borage - but have seen it before.) I think the pairings might have been more interesting with either more herbaceous wines or with stronger tasting flowers. But for presentation floating the flowers in glasses might be a nice touch for a dinner party. (Damn those Martha Stewart impulses.)

We walked next to the winery to a nursery but again didn't buy anything. Mostly because I'm too lazy to actually plant anything and keep it alive. I seem to do ok with keeping houseplants alive, and anything outside that doesn't require too much water (unlike my lawn), but couldn't commit to any large gardening projects.

From there we went to a late lunch at one of my favorite restaurants, Moss Beach Distillery. It has a great ambiance with a lovely view of the ocean, good food, awesome deck with swingy chairs with blankets to cuddle up against the cold and a full bar. What more could you ask? We shared a yummy polenta appetizer (it was fried and served over greens with a red and a white sauce - I think the white sauce was some kind of a creamy/cheese sauce, but couldn't put my finger on what) and some halved cherry tomatoes on the side. There were herbs (ok, green stuff I couldn't identify) in the polenta, as well as sun-dried tomatoes. The flavors blended nicely together (the tang of the sun-dried tomatoes nicely offset the creaminess of the polenta, and the crispy outer and creamy inner textures of the polenta were good too). I had the crab cakes for an entree (unusual for me as I'm not usually into seafood other than sushi). Those were good - served with a small amount of mango salsa, a creamy and slightly sweet sauce (teriyaki?) on the side (with a nice swirly presentation) and a small dollop of white rice and a warm corn and other veggie medley. We split a bottle of wine (I think it was a pinot but I can't remember the name of the winery). My friend had Coastal Pea and Smoked Bacon Linguini. That was pretty good (the bacon I can vouch for, but as for the peas - hate 'em).

Said bye to my friend, and then the next great part of the day started. I went for a nice drive. I went back up 92 to 35. It was overcast, gray and foggy in Half Moon Bay. Not really cold, but not warm either (probably high 60s). Driving up 35 you went from cold and foggy in the valleys on your right to warm, sunny and no clouds in the Valley on your left. For quite a way on the way up 35 toward hiway 9 it was kind of eerie with the fog rolling in crossing over the road from right to left. There were ethereal little wisps of fog, almost like the trailing hems of ghosts, just above the level of the roof of the car.

From the top of the ridge you go down a little way into the woods. I had such fun driving in the twistys. It was around 5:30 or 6 and there were very few people on the road. I had a pretty unfettered drive for the most part, so I just got to fall into the rhythm of the road. When you hit the twisty parts there is a rhythm - the road will tell you how fast to go. If you push then you have to pay attention in every corner and feel like you're just on the edge of control. But if you relax and just go with the flow of the road - it's easy, zen-like. There is no pushing - it's just fun and you feel like you're in synch with the car and the road. The car gives you feedback (little faster, little slower, watch the undulations of the road for unexpected bumps).

I opened the sunroof as I hit the sunnier parts of the drive. The sunlight filtered through the trees, forcing your eyes to adjust as you moved from light to shadow to light to shadow, sometimes in even little bursts as the trees grew evenly, sometimes in great gulps of shadow, great plunges of shadows. I could feel the warmth of the sun on my face and bare shoulder and the breeze slightly ruffling my hair and it was peaceful.

Once I hit hiway 9 there was a guy in front of me, but he knew what he was doing so we got to drive down pretty fast. He wasn't braking in the wrong places, he must have had a stick to let the gears do some of the braking for him. We overtook an RV who immediately pulled over. I waved my approbation with one hand out the sunroof, which he acknowledged with a mock salute. The trip down 9 is a bit less zen-like, you have to pay a bit more attention, but it's also more challenging and fun. We didn't hit any further traffic until the bridge right before Saratoga Springs. The cars were slow through the twistys right before Saratoga, but that was fun to let them wind out a ways by going slow and quickly reeling them in (I had to stay awake somehow). I got home and hung out for the rest of the evening with a great big grin on my face.

Today was another awesome day. Met the same folks from Friday dinner plus Carolynne for brunch at Cheesecake Factory at the mall. That was a massive amount of food - good fuel for shopping. Apparently if you get there at 11:00 on a Sunday you beat the long lines and can get a table pretty quickly. Everyone else left Carolynne and I to clean out the mall. I bought many things, some useful (dress for one of the weddings, not sure which one yet, and some shirts - finally!), some moderately useful things (camisoles for wearing under things I already own) and some completely useless things.

The useless things were one pair of shoes that I fell in love with that I have no idea when I can possibly wear. They are tan and off white - really high heels with a round 40's shape (small cutout in the toe area) with off white flowers on them. They have a strap low around the ankles, and make my legs look amazing. (I do not say this lightly - because they are so high they make it look as if I have defined ankles and actual calf muscles - joy!) I thought I might have something to wear them with, but I don't. I'll have to rectify that by finding an outfit to wear them with because I love them so much that I wore them around my house for half an hour just because I loved the look and feel of them. I am a sick person. A sick person with new shoes and a moderately new wardrobe. Happy, happy, happy.

Posted by cshell at July 25, 2004 09:39 PM