Back from San Francisco

Here I sit, a familiar scene for me: laptop open, waiting for an airplane. This time…it’s so much better. John’s with me, I’m relaxed and refreshed, and (while ready to be home) not terribly anxious to leave.

I thought about blogging during the trip. I pulled pictures over each night off Julia’s camera, thought about documenting each day as it was fresh in my mind. But I was so tired each night and we didn’t have internet access in our room anyway. Which was a blessing….made me truly “unplug”.

So here we are, ready to head home. We miss Faith, miss water pressure, can’t wait to take a shower with hard water, but wish we could take the bed at the Pickwick home with us.

Will we go back to San Francisco? Definitely if they clean up their homeless population or enact some laws that keep the panhandlers under control. It was INCREDIBLY uncomfortable everywhere we went. You could not walk on the street, in and out of any hotel, restaurant or shop without being approached by very dirty, very stinky people begging you for money then cursing you when you didn’t give them any.

It is hard for me to feel sad for those truly down on their luck when you have people clearly drunk and stoned out of their mind approaching you left and right. And then the homeless advocates out there asking you to contribute money to help the homeless—I’m sorry, I don’t live here and I’m on VACATION. To get away from my own stresses and the troubles plaguing my own hometown. I wanted to scream out “leave me alone!”. Why is it the tourist’s responsibility to clean up the homeless in another town? We’re already contributing thousands to the economy just by being there.

It was the most uncomfortable I’d been in a big city. Worse than New York even. So if you want to go to the city—get your stone face ready and be prepared.

Other than that—it was beautiful! The weather was perfect, the sights gorgeous, the people overall very friendly. Seafood was great (you were right, Melanie!) and it was wonderfully relaxing.

I truly didn’t think about work or babies the whole time, so it accomplished my mission. I did sneak a peak at my Yahoo e-mail while browsing the Apple store, but work e-mail remains unchecked. Guess it’s back to the real world on Friday!

Enjoy the pictures. For more, you can check my Facebook album. But for your enjoyment I included some of the best on here. If you want to brave the next few loooong entries—thanks for reading all the way through! These entries were mostly for me: my travel journal. But don’t worry—I didn’t leave my heart in San Francisco! I’m home!