Weekend wrap-up

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This weekend we were supposed to be in Austin – it didn’t happen because we thought there was a better-than-average chance that the city would be drenched owing to Hurricane Rita. That wound up not being the case, but we rescheduled our tickets nonetheless.

Friday night I returned from a day up in San Francisco (concluding with wayyy too much shrimp eating at Bubba Gump’s on the wharf) and attempted to go to the Stellastarr* show. Much to my great regret, it was sold out. Elle and I were a bit irked about that, so we headed back down to good old Potrero Hill and had a tasty pizza dinner at Goat Hill pizza. After that we headed home.

Saturday I woke up and undertook some automotive repairs. The wheel-well skirt on my driver’s side had gotten shredded by road damage so I headed over to pick up a new one ($60.00). Upon pulling the tapping screws out from the old one, I noticed that many of them were old, broken, chipped etc. So, this necessitated a trip up to Kragen to get replacement. They didn’t have any Honda screws, so we had to go back to the dealership. Now the skirt takes 11 screws, I had saved about 5. Thus did I have to buy 6 replacement screws for $3.50 a piece! I decided to make it a dozen as I wasn’t sure what else I’d find.

I put the screws in and, while I was checking around the other parts I noticed that some other fastening screws (not those I had just purchased) were missing. A third trip to the dealer and I found out they didn’t carry those screws and the gentleman referred me to the local Orchard Supply Hardware. Thankful at the prospect of knowing that I wouldn’t be getting screwed a third time that morning I headed over to the OSH and picked up the supplies ($2.17). After applying the screws everything was tightened up properly. We headed over to Lozano’s for a car wash and some of that tasty free popcorn.

Saturday night we went up to the city to meet up with 2 of my co-workers who were visiting from the UK. We had a great dinner at Alioto’s (I the shrip and crab capellini; Elle the potato-encrusted salmon) and then headed to North Beach to a lounge I know. After a few drinks we then headed up to the Marina to some forgettable bar where we closed the night up. We headed back to my car and drove home.

I love driving through the city late at night. There’s no traffic and you can really kind of enjoy the silent majesty of San Francisco. We wound down Lombard street, headed through North beach to Union Square, passed the glittering Fairmont Hotel, and then swung east to the Embarcadero to 280 to 101 home.