Weekend Round-Up: Quiet, Finally

After a stressful week, it was nice to have a few quiet days at home. The terribly cold weather had Rob and I housebound for most of it and we had a chance to catch up on some much needed sleep and reading.

Friday night, we met Matt at the climbing gym after work. I tried bouldering (short, technical climbs with no rope or harness) for the first time. I’m getting rather strong and did pretty much every V0 and V0+ climb with no problem. Rob and I headed out pretty early so we could get home and talk to our really nice super, Mrs. Brooks, about our upstairs neighbor. It seems to have worked, and he quieted down.

It was miserable and cold on Saturday, so I stayed in bed all morning with a biography of Queen Victoria. At noon, Rob and I took the train out to Noe Valley to look at a two bedroom apartment. The place was enormous but had no parking, no storage, no dishwasher and no washing machine. A few too many “no’s” for $2,200 a month. We had lunch a few blocks up and walked down Church street to look at another location before taking the train back home. We we’re supposed to go out to dinner with Matt and Rich that night, but the plans fell through. So instead, Rob and I went to the market for supplies, gigantic artichokes and a movie rental (The Holiday). I thought our groceries were very festive:

Sunday morning was another chance to lounge in bed. I made breakfast of grapefruits, toasted rosemary potato bread and tea while Rob ran down to get the Sunday Times. I stayed in bed all morning like this, reading the paper from cover to cover. At noon, we walked down the climbing gym on Harrison. Rob and Matt bouldered some more while I hit the cardio machines and sauna. The boys had a jam session back at the apartment (it was the cutest thing ever). They’re starting to sound good:

While they practiced, I made peach tarts from this recipe. It was very soothing to bake, but I’m not very good at it and the final results looked better than they tasted:

Matt headed home later that afternoon. And Rob’s friend Rich (from Weaverville) called us up for dinner down in the Marina. We ate at a burger place on Steiner and Chestnut and caught up on the latest farm-life news.

We grabbed a taxi home. Our driver was one of the best yet, an older jazz aficionado who gave us a lesson in 1930’s ukulele jazz between Lombard and Duboce.

It was a perfect end to the weekend. Driving up and down San Francisco’s hills in the fog listening to Mildred Bailey sing St. Louis Blues.