San Diego Zoo

We had to get out of the house this weekend, so we went to the Zoo. One nice thing about being members is that we don't feel pressure to see everything each trip. This time we just had lunch at the restaurant, discussed plans for the future, walked past the flamingos and left. The most interesting things we saw was a Hasidic Jew walking towards the entrance, and a girl with really strong looking arms.

Windows 7 Rollout

Monday George attended the Windows 7 rollout at the Mira Mesa Edwards cinema. It was a fun marketing event that earned us a free Windows 7 Ultimate DVD. There were 3 non-planned observations made:

1) It was unfortunate that the registration was held in front of a large poster for the disaster movie "2012".

2) It was one of the few times he's been in the movies where the Men's room had the lines coming out of it and not the Woman's room.

3) At one point the projector tech at the front of the room got a phone call. We could see him pick up the phone, say a few things into it, then turn around to us in the audience to realize that we were all watching him. For some privacy, he decided to walk out into the stairwell to the side of the screen. This was a bad choice because now we could hear his whole conversation being bounced off of the cement walls of the stairwell.

Lunch was at Pat and Oscar's with co-workers.

Two Restaurants

This week we ate at 2 restaurants. Fillipe's had fairly good pizza, and Tierrasanta Mexican Food had their usual good Mexican fair.

Los Angeles

Martha's brother hurt his back this week, so we drove up to LA to take care of him. We put up a birdhouse, sewed up some clothes, went food shopping, and talked. We also drove around his neighborhood. One house has an elvis dummy on the balcony. ANother house is taken over by a real, (real) big tree. At one intersection we drove past a 3 car crash.

The drive up was filled up with trying out new podcasts (mostly dull, really). We stopped at the rest stop before Orange County, and it was real nice.

Dinner was at Sizzler, and while there was a lot of food, it was real ordinary. There was a tantruming kid at the table over there, and the waitress got my order mixed up. Granted, they corrected the error later when we were full. We had to return to the hotel early that night because of a stomach ache. We got a bit lost driving to the hotel, and the Van transmission threatened to die when we were driving through Inglewood at night. Reving up the engine I looked at a Halloween bilboard that stated something like "You're going to die tonight". We got to the hotel safely.

The most interesting on TV was "The Hilton Channel", which told the early huistory of the Hilton chain.

Yuma Az.

Who knew that Yuma was less than 3 hours away from San Diego? Yuma has always been a lunch stop-off on the way to Phoenix. This weekend we stayed 2 nights in Yuma, staying at a great hotel right on the Colorado River. Our original purpose was to go boating on Lake Martinez, but there was no boat to be rented. George was slightly miffed that the lake looked exactly light it did when he canooed there a few years back, as if it would have sprouted Tahoe in the interim.
Dinner one night was at the hotel where Fredrick served over us and recommended the mushroom soup. Martha much spiced it up with lemon from our tea, George just thought it was Campbell's.

One afternoon was spent watching "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs" (very funny). We ate another dinner at Chili's. I'm certain Chili's, TGIFriday, Applebea's are all the same place, really. This one was very busy, the table was dirty, the waiter spilled food on the table across the way, and one couple had a small TV on their table that they were not looking at. We also went to Cold Stone and had a nice cup of ice cream.

We left early on Saturday, listening to "Three Cups of Tea" the whole way back. It was a fun, short trip.

The Lion King

On October 13th, while George was cruising for dinner, my mother and I went to see 'The Lion King' at the Civic Theatre in Downtown San Diego. We were there in plenty of time and were able to wait seated in the lobby while the plaza filled with theater-goers. We both enjoyed the people-watching and the conversation that we had. I learned a few things about her during our stay on the lobby bench.

We both now enjoy a private joke regarding a harmless prank with a HUGE suv parked illegally in a handicapped spot in the parking garage. Probably just irritated the driver but we could have used the space ourselves!

Mother had trouble hearing the performance because she couldn't find one of her hearing aids before we needed to leave for the theater. Also, a tall, fidgity man in front of her during the first half of the show. During intermission Mother and I went to use the restroom (you know, the long, long line--which actually went very quickly). We traded seats for the second half and it was much better.

I hadn't eaten dinner before going out and so we went to the Denny's in Mission Valley. It was delicious. Mother enjoyed her chocolate cake with her after-thought vanilla ice cream. I enjoyed my hamburger but was especially taken with my seasoned fries with Ranch dressing. Umm.

I returned Mother to her home around 11:30 and then was on my way by midnight.

We had a great time. Now I'm trying to get her to go to one or two operas. That's something she enjoyed doing with Daddy. She's resisting. But I think that I'll be able to pull it off.

Joey's Smokin' BBQ

I didn't want my first non-Martha blog post to be about a Strip Club or a Bar. (I really don't know how to properly behave in one. Maybe next time). So I went to Joey's Smokin' BBQ in RB for dinner. THe food was really good, and I'll be returning, but an odd thing happened while I was there. I chose the place because "Cheeseburger, Cheeseburger" next door was crowded, and I only saw 2 tables full at this place. I went in, ordered, got a drink and sat down. By the time I got my food, my restaurant had become packed, and there was a line almost out the door. I started to feel bad taking up a booth. I'm glad there were a lot of people there. It's a good place.