As my free week draws to a close, I had a fun time yesterday on my touristy afternoon in San Francisco. Had lunch with Pam, Phuoc, and the working types (Seri, Wilma, and Vicky) at Gordon Biersch, a deli/sports bar kinda place a few blocks down from PAC BELL PARK! Yeah baby!

Sorry, had to get that out of my system. Anyhow, after noshing down some garlic fries and giving Vicky apparently her first chance to observe up close my glacial eating speed, Phuoc (my former fellow unemployed comrade in arms... I'll miss you! Find a job soon!), Pam (to whose apartment I went over EVERY week senior year... small group Bible study co-coordinators... it's a wonder that I didn't become even crazier than I already am), Vicky (who was able to get the afternoon off because of her stellar work as a production editor at her web magazine!) and I hung out in San Francisco. Of course, I drove. When you're the one who made the longest commute to get someplace, of course you're gonna get tabbed as the one to do even more driving. Heheh.

After quite a long discussion on the longest word that can be typed entirely with the left hand (Pam dwelt on this one for a LONG time... I believe that her best guess was "exaggerated" - but I just did a search, and it turns out that it's actually "stewardesses"!), we went to the Coit Tower. Here Phuoc revealed a deep, dark part of his psyche when he began ranting about the statue of Columbus in front of the Tower, something about horrid treatment of the natives... then pointed out that ever PC Berkeley celebrates "Indigenous Peoples Day" instead of Columbus Day.

At Pier 39 I had a senior prom flashback when we walked by the restaurant that the group I went with ate at before boarding our boat. Boy, was that night... magical? Nah. Memorable? Not really. Uneventful? I guess you could say that. But it was fun dressing up in the tux and doing the Bond thing.

At a 7-11 near Pier 39 and Fisherman's Wharf we saw an advertisement for the brand-new Mountain Dew Slurpee, but I'm not allowed to write about it because Vicky claimed it.

Ended up at Seacliff... took some pics of the waves, then hung out in the old-style arcade with the old mechanized fortune tellers (think the movie "Big"), motorized mini-carnivals, and other really quaint, nifty coin-operated games... video games just don't have the same craftsmanship.

Heading off to the slopes tomorrow... gotta squeeze every last second out of this week! Yeah baby!

Just read a blurb by fellow blogaholic Vicky Chao that dubbed Leigh Botts (from the Beverly Cleary (Berkeley grad!) children's book Dear Mr. Henshaw ) the original blogger. I would like to argue this case.

I believe that the original blogger was another fictional character, Doogie Howser, M.D. C'mon, admit it: the only things you remember from that show are the nasty hightops he wore to the hospital and the journal he kept on his computer. Let's see, keyboard medium, saved daily, generally attempted for deep meanings and observations on life and always having it end up just a tad ludicrous and absurd... sure sounds like a blog to me. Here, even you can try it. Move your face up REAL close to the computer screen and keep your head relatively still, then move your body so that you scan each of the lines of this paragraph. Immediate Doogie effect! Do you feel the rush?

Only have one week of blissful irresponsibility left before I join the rat race. I feel like there's all this pressure to do something spectacularly fun and memorable with the 6 days that I have left before reporting for work on March 12, 2001. Oh, for those of you who are reading this and didn't know, I finally went and got myself employed after nearly 3 months of hanging out, playing pool, reading, playing NBA Live, shuttling up and back from Berkeley, getting re-adjusted to South Bay life in general. I'll be working at Caw Networks - a small (~45 people) startup networking company in Mtn View, within spitting distance of my church, Canaan Taiwanese Christian Church . The fact that they're hiring in this economy counts for something, doesn't it? Yes, that's "Caw", as in the sound a crow makes. Check out the section on the website devoted to crows. When I visited the company they have stuffed crows all over the place. If the next time I see you I begin making bird calls, slap me around with a large trout.

Hung out with Jonathan Sun tonight, went to dinner at Uno's Pizza. Ordered the Numero Uno with pepperoni, sausage, onion, pepper, and chunks of tomato. Very tasty, but it's certainly not Zachary's.... on the plus side it doesn't make my eye swell up...

Still haven't figured out why people think I'm weird.

If you have any suggestions for what I should do with my last week off, feel free to email me with your thoughts, plus a check or cash to finance my exploits. Hey, I'm not making money yet!

Anyone seen that new Taco Bell commercial (seems like they've got a theme for guys taking bites out of their food and then grunting words) with the four dudes eating the steak taco then calling each other cowboy names? The Asian dude was actually pretty prominently featured in the commercial. I found it hilarious. Asian cowboy? Sounds like something straight out of a karaoke bar.

A light broke through the clouds, the trumpets sounded, strong men gasped, women sighed, children jumped up and down, ticker tape fluttered down from the heavens, a flight of fighter planes zoomed by in formation...

... as the Blindman came onto the web scene.

Gee, do I have a strong grasp of my ego or what? :-).

Test test test...