San Francisco! Days 1 & 2...

Well it’s 9:55pm San Francisco time on Sunday night and I’m waiting to board my plane back home to Boston after a whirlwind 5 days in San Francisco. The trip however, did not start on the best foot…

My flight there was scheduled to depart at 8:10 Wednesday morning and arrive in San Francisco at 12 noon (6 hour flight – 3 hours behind). Well naturally Boston had to have a snow storm since I was traveling, but for some reason we actually boarded our plane at 7:45 and were ready to depart. Just kidding! We had to wait “probably half an hour to forty five minutes” for the freezing rain to turn to actual rain. To make a long story short, it took THREE HOURS – they twice de-iced the plane, etc. and we were finally on our way. Oh wait, why would I have such “luck”?!? As we accelerated for take off we had an “electrical failure” which resulted in us going back to the gate and sitting for another TWO HOURS. To make matters even better, they flight crew had no food other than some chips, but not enough for all the passengers, not even if we paid for it. The elderly and small children got priority. I say fuck them. I spent FIVE FUCKING HOURS in that plane before it even took off, then flew for SIX HOURS, all the time starving and wanting to die.

Well I made it to the hotel that evening, freshened up in the room, and called my friend Scott to meet up for dinner and then go out in the Castro. This of course ended up with me being a blackout shit show. I did, however, have a blast, particularly since I was getting free drinks for being cute ;-) I met some fun people including all of Scott’s SF friends, went to three different bars, and stumbled home with Scott around 2am back to the hotel where sober/sleeping Bryan was waiting – he had gotten in around midnight. The next morning I decided it would not be in my best interest to go back to the Castro without Bryan for fear that I end up getting blackout raped and end up with HIV and an empty wallet.

The next day was our first day of conferencing, but not until the afternoon (!), so we headed into Chinatown to find some tasty treats for breakfast. We ended up getting a few different types of buns which were all derricious. The rest of the morning/early afternoon were spent meandering all about the city – up to Coit tower, along Fisherman’s wharf, Pier 39 (and the sea lions). The landscape is truly incredible – so much fun and varying architecture, beautiful foliage, steep hills, a gorgeous waterfront, and the list goes on…

Back at the hotel I got to see for first time all the characters that made up the Linguistic Society of America – and let me tell you, there were PLENTY of gays. I don’t’ even remember what talks we went to that evening, but it was really awesome to be amongst so many people all interested in language and linguistics – and all at the same time. For dinner that night we used our ‘Foodies Guide To San Francisco Book’ and ended up at a WONDERFUL Vietnamese restaurant in the Little Saigon Neighborhood. Everything was amazing – we had Vietnamese beer, some kind of spring rolls, squab (think a deep-friend pigeon served with the head and feet intact…the latter of which I of course ate), some kind of shrimp/pork combo in a big pancake you wrapped in lettuce, mint, thai basil, etc. for my main course, and then for Bryan noodle soup with a slab of rare filet and other meats.

That night we ended up going to bed at like 8:30pm – we were exhausted from the walking tour and conference, and since it was 11:30pm Boston time we felt somewhat justified….

TO BE CONTINUED…