Back in the Saddle

I'm back from San Francisco and jury duty, respectively. Here's a few random observations:

1) NOBODY who had any kind of home life is up and wandering around San Fran's Tenderloin after midnight. Everything that Giuliani squashed in Times Square is alive and thrashing around out West. I took a little walk near my hotel late one night and it was like 'Taxi Driver' out there.

 I love strolling sketchy neighborhoods after midnight almost as much as my mother loves me -- so maybe I was the exception.

2) I got to go on this awesome hike in a redwood forest with a bunch of old friends. We actually overheard a woman ask a park ranger, "Excuse me, could you tell me which trail has the freshest air?" We laughed about that the whole way. There's nothing like experiencing something new, hilarious and beautiful with good friends.

Especially when you sprain your ankle on the trail -- like I did -- and need to be helped to the car.

3) Kennedy's Indian Irish Pub is a pretty cool joint, an Indian restaurant nestled in the middle of an Irish dive bar with hundreds of beers on tap. I can't hold them responsible for the skull-cracking acid-sprayer of a hangover I experienced the morning of my friend's wedding. That was kind of my fault, but mostly the groom's. I do think the kitchen may have had an (unwashed) hand in the lower GI firestorm I weathered during the aforementioned hangover, however.

4) Part of Hitchcock's 'Vertigo' was filmed in my hotel. Very cool -- even cooler, I ran into Sally Kellerman in the elevator.

5) I'm pretty sure that if I were a lady and had a moustache coming in hard, I'd pluck, wax, or straight-up shave that sucker off. But in the world of the industrial cafeteria, the rules are different.

The lady who rang me up in the cafeteria in the D.C. courthouse definitely knew what it sounded like when the doves cry, if you get my drift. Still, there's nothing to make you feel right with the world like buying mashed potatoes and gravy from a lady with a neatly trimmed moustache who calls you "baby."

6) This potential juror sitting next to me in the hallway yeterday rapped along with his headphones for an HOUR. It was incredible. He made absolutely no sense whatsoever, and he kept rapping until he was out of breath. Instead of pausing to inhale, he just rapped right on through each massive heaving inhale, too, eventually rapping himself to sleep.

So yeah, that was my week, pretty much. Hope you guys are well, and I'm glad to be back ...