Diary of an adult runaway

The road to RWA

I did a quick updatebefore National, promising photos of our trek from L.A. to SF the following week. So, I was out by about 1 or 3 weeks, but good things come to those who wait. Or, should I say, massive amounts of shit comes to those who wait. Because I've finally downloaded everything so here's hoping your bandwidth holds up.

This first shot comes about 2 days before we headed north, when we were at the fine dining establishment of Bob's Big Boy (Tamara: are you serious? Me: hell yes, it's Americana, baby! Tamara: sigh.) We'd just gotten through laughing at the server--who told us he wasn't flirting with us, really, coz he was as queer as an Easter basket--when I looked across the road and spotted this:

Indeed! No wonder he worked there. And to keep the entendres going, check this out:

Yes, it's a cattery, no Dolly Parton in sight. 

The trip began with a last breakfast in Topanga, at Mimosa Café. A-yup, the same one featured in my ms Learning How To Stay, so when that sells and you buy your own copy (or 4--perfect for every gift-giving occasion), then you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. As you can see from this shot, I'm not the only writer in the hood:

We snuck (sneaked? wah?) out the back because there was a pirate I was avoiding out front, plus the little zen garden is pretty:

 

Why I love Topanga: all is possible:

Rolling into Santa Barbara:

Um...okay...

Officer! Some bastard stole my bright shiny red Mustang and is parading it down Main Street...oh, wait...that's not mine:

The plan was to stop off at Los Olivos so I could check out some stuff for a manuscript but we ran out of time and so here's some vinyard somewhere near there:

But we did have to stop at a Wal-Mart along the way and get me a new suitcase to fit in all the crap great stuff I'd acquired along the way (68 cent aqua plastic margarita glasses at Target, anyone? ANYONE? Yes, I thought so, too) and whilst there I came across the coolest thing EVA!! It's this shower wrap, soft terry, bright stripes, Velcro closing. The kind of things college kids half my age flit around sorority houses in. (Tamara: You're not serious, are you? Me: Fuck yeah! Americana, baby! And it's only 10 bucks! Tamara: Sigh. Me: <g>)

I'd told Laura we'd make it to SF about 6 but it soon became evident we wouldn't, not when I insisted on pulling into Jack In The Box and asking them for an antenna topper, the one with the hat. Like the dude in all the billboards we'd been passing:

I was shocked and outraged to learn they didn't have them, that this was an ADVERTISING GIMMICK, though was mollified (read: fell into line like a good consumer) when she lobbed me a Jack in a construction helmet. Tamara asked if there might be more Village People Jacks back there, perhaps an Indian, but that didn't go down too well and so we had to make our escape. Roared into San Francisco singing J-Lo and spent half an hour trying to find the B&B, the same one I'd stayed at in '91 and '93 and could still remember the smell of--and the address of, though I couldn't remember the cross streets and we didn't have a map.  "If we could just find the fucking mission" I said. "We're IN the Mission," Tamara said. "Yeah, no, I mean the actual MISSION. WAIT! THERE'S THE BASILICA! TURN! TURN!"

Needless to say, we were hyper by the time we met Laura. Dumped the bags, hauled her into the car and raced off over the hills and across the bridge to the Headlands. The last time I'd been there, Keriand I chased a skunk around before it lifted its tail and we backed off. This time, no skunks, lots of tourists. Late-night run to the Safeway for a toothbrush then it was time to crash.

Next morning: sightseeing! Past the freaks on Market Street (again: I love SF) until we got to the cablecar turnaround and one freak in particular caught my attention. Isn't he beautiful? Those cat ears, that feline smile. I heart Cat Man!:

Then something else caught my eye and I popped out of line to see if I was right. At first I thought it was a copycat, then I saw the Jesus tattoos and knew it was the real deal.

"The Naked Cowboy is walking down the street," I said.

"What?!" Laura said.

"The. fucking. Naked. Cowboy. is. walking. down. Powell. Street."

And so he was:

He came with his own camera crew and cop. I later learned he'd been arrested for illegal busking in Union Square a few days before and had swanned into City Hall wearing a fur coat and his tighty whities. An older woman got her photo taken with him and had just (at his urging) put her hand on his ass when her daughter tried to get her attention. "She's busy, honey," he said. You go on with your bad self, NC!

We caught the cable car down to Ghirardelli Square, where a children's orchestra was playing. The kids were super excited and serious and sweet:

And there were cupcakes! Kara's, to be exact:

It was torture choosing, but I settled on a Raspberry Dazzle:

See the guy in blue on the sidewalk? That's Rhymin' Simon and I first came across him in '95 and he's still here and he's still funny:

And I remember this guy from 2002. His schtick is to hide behind the bushes then shake them and yell and scare the hell out of people then everyone laughs. See the people across the street? They're waiting for the next victim:

 

Me: (getting camera all set up to take a shot) Him: If you're gonna take my photo, leave a few bucks, would you? If I took a photo of your bush, that's the least I'd do. Me: (couldn't talk, doubled over in laughter)

The Boudin Bakery at the wharf:

A trolley car on the F Market line:

The obligatory sea lions shot:

Remember that basilica I was yelling about? Yeah, here it is:

And here's the mission. Mission Dolores, to be more specific:

The next morning at breakfast, we met Heather Anne, who just happened to be going to National, too. I'd gone all gimpy after hiking around the day before, so HA and Laura teamed up for some more sightseeing while I sat in Borders and wrote and checked out the scenery. I saw Paula Roe go by then Jan Durkin then a whole heap of women looking wide-eyed and a little scared of the big, bad city, and I thought "Yep, I'll see you at the conference" and I did. I also saw this:

Wow. I remember when Union Square used to have actual, you know, grass.

HA and Laura collected me for lunch (Lori's Diner--decent food but couldn't be a real diner coz there was no photo of Elvis, scammers!) then I led them on a merry journey to one of my favorite spots, Telegraph Hill. This is where my latest ms is set and I wanted to check some things for myself, even though I completely lucked out and found the email of the occupants of the house where my heroine lives and they've totally been helping me out. On the way, we met this beautiful, beautiful dog who was waiting at the bus stop for his mom to get home from work (much rejoicing when she did) and a sweet puppy who wanted to play but needed a little support:

Coit Tower:

The view from the Filbert Street steps:

This deck is just begging for me to move in and populate it with plants and cats and 69-cent plastic margarita glasses:

Sweet cottage, won’t you be mine?:

Oh, wait, won’t you be mine?:     

The road boardwalk to Cora’s house:

Cora lives here on the 2^nd floor. Holden lives on the 3^rd. They get up to no good all over the place:

This one's for Keris. It's the closest I could get to the parrots, the cheeky sods:

The outside of our B&B:

The kitchen, which has not changed in 15 years, swear to God. The only thing I could find that had changed in the entire house were the tiles in the upstairs bathroom. Even the "Please conserve water" sign was the same one from 15 years ago, from a dot-matrix printer. I love that it hasn't changed, though of course in my head I've won the lottery and have already planned which walls I'm knocking down (the one between the front living room and the upstairs bedroom; the one between 2 of the downstairs bedroom to make a master suite) and where my writing area will be (in the back living room). I'm keeping all the wood trim:

The next day, my mind was churning with story ideas. Knowing what an absolute bitch I can be totally AM when I have the writing bug biting me, I left HA and Laura to their own devices again, did some laundry then headed off to write. I wandered through the Castro: 

 

The requisite Painted Ladies shots:

 

Heh:

    

I thought I’d catch the bus to the Haight. I was at the stop with 2 teens, a boy and a girl, and their grandma.

Grandma to girl: Stop laughing to yourself, you sound weird.

Girl: I’m not laughing at myself, I’m laughing at those white girls. 

Me: snort

Girl: Oh, sorry, sorry! 

Boy: Oh, she’s sorry! (hitting her) 

Me: Seriously. It was funny. Now I’m laughing at them.
 
The bus came along and up the hill we went, past several promising cafés, so I decided I’d stay in the area--Upper Castro/Eureka Valley. I got off just in time.
 
Weird guy (sitting beside grandma from bus stop): mutter mutter

Grandma: Why are you talking to me like that?

Weird guy: Who says I’m talking to YOU, you old bag?

Boy: You better not TALK to my grandma like that or I’ma whoop your ass!

Girl: Yeah, step off!

Weird guy: Shut up!

Nice guy: Driver, there’s some asshole harassing 2 women back here.
 
I made my way back toward the café, past a drunk guy who said “You just missed 'em! 3 boxers! Ran right by here!” Needless to say, there were no boxers to be seen, of either the human or dog variety. Okay, dude. Found the café, Queen Malika, which turned out to be a little creperie run by a nice French guy. Had a scrummy turkey crepe then got down to business. I wrote. And wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote, then looked up and noticed the great view. Pink and blue! And a massive front room that overlooks the street and a door that leads straight to great coffee. Oh, pretty little cottage, won't you be mine?:

I drifted down the hill in that wonderful daze that a good writing binge leaves me in. Somewhere along the way I saw a gay guy in his car, looking quite natty à la Tim Gunn, but less structured. He leaned out the window and called "I love your outfit!"

Me: Thank you! I was just thinking the same about you!

God I love this town.

This story ends where all good stories do, with avocado cactus enchiladas and most excellent margaritas at the Velvet Cantina. Dear bartender, I'll say it once more: you fucking rock!

Happiness is...

Dipping my feet in the Pacific

 

followed by a real margarita

and a turkey burger!

I'm blogging live from here:


Sedona, Arizona, where the sun is shining on those beautiful red rocks, the wind is sweet and the people are funny. Lots and lots of stories to tell and photos to share, which I'll do from Santa Fe tonight--assuming we make it there. Wish us luck!!

London

From the air, looks a lot like Melbourne, green, tiled rooves, then you start seeing the London Bridge and Buckingham Palace and now I want to come back.

Heathrow airport (at least Terminal 4): dismal, gray, poorly lit, totally unappealing. But there's a WH Smith that I'll hit in a few minutes...

English euphamisms at their best: the captain announces it's 5-6 degrees, wuite a pleasant day. I look out the window and it's cloudy and gray. Hmmm.

English humor at its best: the attendant was handing out landing cards. A fellow passenger was a little confused.

Passenger: I'm transiting, do I need a card?

Attendant: Australian? We tend to like you to transit straight through.

:-)

Bruges

I'll admit it, I knew nothing about Bruges before Saturday. Alls I know is my friend Sandra said "I'm tired of travelling on my own" so I said "I'll go to Bruges with you" and that was that. Ok, so I knew there would be chocolate and beer (and boy, was there ever!) but I knew nothing about the canals (Venice of the North? Really?) and other things. I certainly knew nothing about the hospitality of the people and that they all speak English (and Flemish and French), or I would have been there much earlier! As it is, I was so enchanted, I want to go back in spring next year for a mid-week break and just wander and write and drink more of the local blond beer. Here are some shots:

On the way

Starting off at the Verdi tea salon

I've learned to order the house specialty anytime I see it and this is Chocolat chaud de la maison--blocks of chocolate that you stir into the hot milk. And don't forget the cream! I thought that would put it OTT, which it kinda did but in suuuuuuuuch a good way.

Postcard row

Nom nom nom. BTW, Bruges definitely went all out for Valentine's Day. Everywhere we went, there were red hearts, etc.

Lovely day, lovely day, such a lovely day

Heaven. The Pralinette chocolate store.

Look, canals!

And more.

So we took a canal cruise and the guide, in his no-nonsense Flemish attitude, told us this was the tallest tower in Bruges, with 336 steps and no elevator, so we'd just be paying 5€ to tire ourselves out.

I'm thinking Bruges could be the setting for a very moody historical.

Which you could write in this lovely little building.

Or this one.

Love the idea of a bedroom right on the water. Except, you know, when it floods.

Pretty.

Apparently this is some famous guy. I wasn't listening to the commentary but talking to the English lady beside me about the best places to eat in town (priorities, people!) She reeled off a few names then said we couldn't go wrong if, just like in Paris, we went off the main streets and asked for flemish stew. Which is what we did. And it was gooooood.

I liked this modern font on an old building.

This is part of a former hospital and definitely says "moody historical." I see bodies being smuggled out via this alcove--or people who are supposed to be bodies, etc.

Saved for my next visit when I can really enjoy it: the brewery/beer museum.

Oh, and Bruges is famous for its swans, too.

And as the home of Michelangelo's Madonna and Child.

The door to my latest "Oh, I want to live there!" find.

The rest of my new house. Difficult to see, but there were the coolest rondelles in the stained glass that glowed in the afternoon sun.

What I did most of the day.

What I did the rest: ate.

The Church....of? No, maybe it was a Basilica. (Normally I do a little research before a trip but this time I was just going with the flow and loving it.)

Gorgeous inside.

Apparently some of Jesus's blood is stashed away here, but I want a DNA test before I go revering, thanks very much.

I have other photos of this really bizarre parade that did 2 extremely loud laps of the town--I'll upload them later. At first we thought it was Gay pride coz there were a lot of people in rainbow-colored costumes dancing to techno then we saw the float filled with septugenarian vikings and another with kids and other people in baby costumes and couldn't work it out and thought maybe it was some kind of northern carnival. What the hell, they were showering us with candy, that's all that mattered.

All in all, a lovely day in a town unexpectedly full of treasures. been in the art mood lately, so I bought a very cool watercolor of a guy in a local café. And did I say the people were nice? The people were LOVELY, kept giving us freebies--chocolate, lavender sachets, and more. Next up: a weekend in Amsterdam in June. Wait! Next up, Australia then Amsterdam then California (and Colorado and you're on for margaritas, Donna and Barbara!).

And now I'm going for lunch at the chateau. (I know, I still get a buzz out of saying that!)

Life = good.      

Tell me: what am I missing?

Yesterday, I made red velvet cake (except it was pink) and had cherry Kisses available to all who dropped by. My 2nd boss, an American, looked at me when I presented her with a piece of cake. "How do you even know about red velvet cake?" she asked. (Last week she'd seen my Elvis wallet and, when I said, "Elvis is the man," whipped out a photo of her dog. Yep, called Elvis.)

I didn't tell her that, as a teenager in a horribly dull little town, when I got bored in class (read: often), I'd list the 50 U.S. states and their capitals and dream of the day when I could travel there. Yesterday at lunch I did the online version: first located the states then their capitals. I scored something like 140 (out of 150) on both. And something occurred to me as I did them: I have a serious gap in my US travels. I can find my way around San Francisco almost as well as a native, I've spent what amounts to months in New England, Florida, the West, the Southwest, and the Northwest, but I haven't been to the Plain states.

This year's trip (a.k.a. 20th Anniversary tour) is already planned and it's going to be great. Hit L.A. about July 2nd--coz who wants to miss the 4th?--and hang out with Tamara, whose new job comes with summers free. When I said I was in the mood for baseball this summer, she informed me she's only a few minutes' walk from Dodger Stadium. Score! Wait, that should be "Home run!" Once we've filled our bellies with too many hot dogs and loaded up on too many margaritas at Abuelita's in Topanga Canyon, we're hitting the road. I'd like to visit Capitola and San Diego (attention, crazy, beautiful Dueñas family: get that blender ready and notify Wal-Mart and Jack-In-The-Box we're on the way!) then go further afield: Arizona, maybe the new spa in Truth or Consequences, Santa Fe, Colorado, swing by Sundance and kidnap Redford. Visit Miss Fiesty in Lake Tahoe then wrap things up with 2 weeks in San Francisco (I want nosebleed seats--section 315--at AT&T park so I can watch the game and stare at the bay).

But next year? The 2009 Heartland tour. For me, the great unknown. Even before my first trip in '88, I had some idea of what to expect. But, apart from Mount Rushmore, the Oklahoma City memorial and the blinding snowfields in Fargo, I have few visuals of the area. Nebraska is a blank to me, Kansas is an endless highway, courtesy of Glen Campbell's Wichita Lineman. I know Minnesota has lakes, from all the movies I saw of kids going to summer camp (oh, I so wanted to go!), Oklahoma has tornadoes and dust (thank you, Grapes of Wrath). Iowa? Nothing comes to mind. My images of South Dakota are courtesy of Redford: Pine Ridge in Incident at Oglala. There's obviously much, much more there and now I'm itching to find it. I want to go to Wounded Knee, I want to see fields of sunflowers and herds of bison and whatever else I might happen upon. Oh, wait--the Mary Tyler Moore house is in Minneapolis, right ;-) I want to see ghost towns and what's left of Route 66. The cities will all be complete novelties to me, too. I'm suddenly longing to wander backroads and explore towns and, you know, avoid tornadoes wherever possible. And take photos like this:

So feel free to tell me what I'm missing, what I need to see and do. And for the year after, when I intend hitting the South. Mississippi, Alabama, the Carolinas, Kentucky, Johnny Cash Parkway. Maybe I can even convince Tamara, who fled in the face of Katrina, to go back to N.O. All I really know is I'm going to end up in Memphis for Elvis Week. And all will be right with the world.

   

Tickets to ride

Ticket #1:

My good Kiwi/Aussie mate Sandra and I are going to Bruges on Saturday (early!!) to eat chocolate, drink beer and buy lace and dolls. Okay, maybe not the lace and dolls....

Ticket #2:

First time home in 3 1/2 years. Vue de Monde, here I come! (Is it a little ass about to live in Paris and yet think the best French restaurant is in Melbourne? Well, yes, but that doesn't make it any less true.)

Get...

Get your sunnies out! Not all that long ago, I was whining wondering where summer was, knowing full well we had another 2-3 months before it arrived in full force but bugger me dead, it's here! 28 degrees today, everyone smiling and happy. Oh, I know I know I know it's too early in the year to be this warm but if only you could see it here. After a long, dark winter, the horse chestnuts are in full bloom, the geraniums are spilling over balconies, my lavender plants are reaching for the sky. Of course, the tulips only lasted a week before melting away...

Get this attitude. I asked Jenny to find a retouch place for a skirt of mine that needs a new zip, because I don't know any places in my neighborhood and she's got a few near her. So she tried to....but they said it had cat hair on it and refused to take it until she'd washed it. What they don't know is that it was washed--even washing machines are no match for my 2 moggies, who shed more and more as they age. Lemme tell you something. I could have a package delivered, shrinkwrapped and bound in tape, prepared in a vaccuum, open it 2 miles away from my home, and there'd be cat hair in it. Anyway, tant pis, no business for that mob. Instead, Jenny took it to a place in the 16th near our work where no one even blinked. They've no doubt seen everything here in Paris's "upscale" west, where the street I work on is an obstacle course because people here are too important to pick up their dog's shit.

Get your gangster on. My oh-so-tough mum and her cousin. There is no hope for this family.

Get here PDQ! At this time every year, I'm awaiting the arrival of the latest Sookie Stackhouse paperback. Amra's already read and loved Definitely Dead, commenting on one of the many aspects I admire about Charlaine Harris's writing, and that is that she does what's best for the story, not what's best for her ego. I've found that too often in a series, the writer won't let characters go when they should, resulting in the destruction of the character's believability. Harris has never been overly sentimental, which has made for some damn fine characters and plot twists. Read her Shakespeare series for a real kick-ass heroine who doesn't want people to love her but lives with such integrity that you have to love her anyway.

Get outta town. 20€ on the TGV to Switzerland during summer. 25€ to Milan. Uh-oh.