Rain, Rain, Go Away

While Shad had been working hard all week Cashe & I had been lounging in our sweats in the hotel room, taken a few walks around town, mailed all our Christmas cards, met Dad for lunch each day, frequented the workout facilities, done a little grocery shopping, watched a little Ellen, a little Oprah & got caught up on all of the Tiger news.

Aside from the fact that I still can’t get comfortable walking or sitting again because of this LAME herniated disc, life isn’t too bad. California’s beautiful & sunny & 55 degrees (while I hear it’s a nasty 7 degrees in Boise!) I'm not complainin', but it certainly doesn’t feel like Christmas is less than two weeks away.

Being that we’re only an hour & a half away from San Francisco, we thought we would spend a day this weekend in the city. We hadn’t been there since 2005 when Shad was working in the area. Before that, we hadn’t been here since our move up from Southern California when Bob & Jen lived there & gave us the grand tour.

But given the fact that this trip has already been nothing but trouble since the day we started, Debbie Downer’s here to tell you, I should’ve known there were a few more bumps to be expected along the way …

This morning started off earlier than normal since Cashe knew it was Saturday & obviously doesn’t approve of sleeping in. So, after we had our gourmet continental hotel breakfast, we got ourselves ready (while Cashe snoozed in his bouncy seat – arms spread wide open) & we headed out the door … into a torrential downpour. Oh well. We had just come from ice & snow the weekend before; rain certainly couldn’t hurt us.

The drive was actually very beautiful & very green. The mountains look as if they’re covered in millions of broccoli florets. The landscape is much different than that of So Cal, & certainly much different than that of Boise. However, although very beautiful, I couldn’t help but be anxious & very tense. Who designs these California roads? And why doesn’t Arnold work on fixing them? Maybe it’s because “happy cows come from California” & the reason they’re so happy is because they’re standing in a sea of protected broccoli-floret-land while we’re driving on pencil-thin highways. The lanes are realistically only wide enough for maybe a Kia 2-door sedan or a Mazda Miata. I wanna know these SUVs & buses & hummers & limos drive on these bumpy, partially under construction, narrow lanes without experiencing some serious Claustrophobia is beyond me.

Okay, I’m done with my tangent.

So, we made it safely to San Francisco & the sun was out & gorgeous as we crossed the Golden Gate Bridge. What an amazing structure (“a concrete miracle!” – if you’re a Friends fan, you’ll get that.) It’s wild to think something so huge & actually very beautiful could be built over so much water. And Cashe enjoyed every minute of the backs of his eyelids as we crossed the bridge.

Our first tourist attempt was to walk around Union Square. That was one thing we had never done in our trips to San Fran & we figured it should be fun & festive this time of year. The problem was, it wasn’t super stroller-friendly. (We were warned: life sure changes once you have children.) And besides, we’re trying to stay on a budget & all of those amazing stores could have potentially been a bit too tempting.

So … instead, we decided to head on over to Fisherman’s Wharf where we always visit when we’re in town. Cashe was clean & fed, but still not thrilled to be in the city. He cried & cried & cried. We walked around Pier 39 in the pouring rain that had returned & taken over the sunny skies, hoping he might fall asleep. We saw the lazy, gigantic seals & had our photo taken in front of Alcatraz & the Pier 39 flags (although you can’t see Cashe all bundled up in his favorite reindeer outfit, he’s in there! He made it to San Francisco … & hated it.)

Since we couldn’t get Cashe to stop crying & we were both frozen, we decided to grab a few Mrs. Field's cookies (since you can’t get those in Boise) & bolt. There was no sense in trying to bring an angry child into a restaurant for a few fish tacos on the Pier. We might as well head back to our warm, cozy hotel room & snuggle up with some In & Out Burger (uh huh, we’re addicts) & top off the night with a warm bath & a few pain killers! Yeah, you read that right … I finally was able to get some pain killers for my back since I left mine at home. (I’m pretty sure I hear angels singing, “Hall – e – lujah! Hall – e – lujah! Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hal – le – lu - JAH!” Can I get an AMEN?!) And no, although it’s legal here (& advertised on their billboards), I am not smoking marijuana for medicinal purposes.

I do have another spinal steroid injection scheduled for when we return home. In the meantime, I have been in excruciating pain again, especially at night. But the wonderful difference between now & last summer is that I can now take ibuprofen & pain meds without harming Cashe. The pain meds don’t do a whole heck of a lot, but they do lessen the pain a little & I’ll take what I can get.

Hopefully the rain won’t deter us from a little wine tasting tomorrow (don’t panic, everyone – Cashe gets a bottle of his own ... of non-contaminated breastmilk, that is. Not wine). And maybe next week will bring us some memorable adventures & fewer road blocks, but if not, we look forward to a few more laughs & perhaps some life lessons.