Flowers in our hair

I'm writing this from a hotel in San Francisco - partly 'cos that's the kind of hip, trendy and up to the minute person I am, but mostly 'cos S and the boys are in the hotel asleep (or comatose might be a better description for S) and the nude male revue up the road didn't really appeal.

I'm here taking a 3 day course, and S realised that as CoCE were coughing up for things like hotels and taxis, all we'd have to pay for was the flight, and we'd have three days hanging out in SF. Well, they would. I'd sit in a classroom and learn about Proc Mixed (if you don't know what Proc Mixed is, you don't want to know. If you do know what Proc Mixed is, it's cool, isn't it?)

Anyway, we booked S and the boys flights at pretty much the last minute, and the flight was completely full. So full that there were hopeful people hanging around to fill up the last seats, and they didn't all get one. Because we'd booked our seats late, and when you buy your ticket, you get assigned a seat, all our seats were in different places. So we asked the flight attendant if we could sit together.

The flight attendant asked if anyone would be willing to move so we could sit together, and a lot of people mumbled at stared at the floor. So, in a stern voice she said "You move, or you sit with THEM", and pointed at A and D. Who smiled sweetly, but had a little glint in their eye which just hinted at the evil of which they were capable. There was a flurry of activity as people rushed to give up their seats, colliding in the corridor and receiving only minor injuries.

The flight was all fairly uneventful (at least from my perspective, as I was sitting about 4 rows in front of S and the boys). Then we landed and got a taxi to the hotel.

The hotel is fairly swanky and new and sells itself as environmentally wholesome in lots of ways - there are three bins in the room for different sorts of recycling, and that sort of thing. (I kind of feel like recycling is such a minor gesture to make when, by building a hotel you are encouraging people to fly/drive to places they might not otherwise have gone, but then I can't complain, having flown here.)

In the morning, I strolled off to my course, while S had the fun of being with the boys in a strange place for a day. We met up for lunch, and then I got back at about 4:30, and we went out.

We got a cable car to the harbour sort of area - I'd try to read about cable cars, but the internet connection here is so crappy, that I can't. But I'd guess that they were pulled by a cable under the road - they look a bit like a tram. There seemed to be two people driving them, and I couldn't work out their roles. One at the back turned a handle, and one at the front pulled two levers. The one at the front seemed to pull a rope to tell the one at the back to do something. I've got a feeling it was brake, but that made me too nervous. The one at the front seemed to pull really, really hard on a big lever when we were going down hills, which made me wonder what would have happened if he'd collapsed or had a heart attack or something.

The cable cars seemed to be about 100 years old, and made of wood. The brakes (which I looked at after we got off) looked like they involved pushing a piece of wood onto the track. (We got a taxi back, it involved less walking and waiting, was quicker and more comfortable, and only cost a little more. Everyone else on the cable car seemed to be a tourist too.)

Anyway, we got to the pier, by which time the boys were tired and hungry, and it was windy and they said they were cold, but they wouldn't put their coats on (they said that that would make them colder), and we looked at the sealions. The sealions were impressive - apparently (I learned from reading the poster) they turned up in 1989, after the earthquake, and have been there ever since. Almost entirely males.

Then we went back to the hotel, S collapsed after having a day with the boys, the boys shouted a lot, had a bath (no bubble bath though :( ) and went to bed. I came downstairs, checked my email, and wrote this.