San Francisco :: A Real Vacation:: Thursday, Oct 9, 2008

Our final morning in the city by the bay. A welcome break in the running regime allowed us more time to enjoy a final leisurely breakfast before making our way back to Oakland and our flight back to San Diego (to arrive in time for Kim's Beer Judging class...and Quintron!). We settled on a final breakfast at Herbivore, seeing as it was close and hearty. We sat outside, the morning sunny and breezy, the traffic on Divisadero never waivering. Our waitress, who had an accent from somewhere in the United Kingdom, though we weren’t quite sure where, brought us tableware, and took our orders. I had scrambled tofu with mushrooms and spinach, breakfast potatoes, and some wheat toast. The spinach was well-cooked, not overly mushy and still retaining a slight bitterness without that raw calcium feeling of undercooked spinach. The toast seemed like it had been sitting for a bit, but the potatoes were good...really, how can you mess up potatoes with grease and salt? The whole thing seemed to be lacking a bit of spice, though. Could have used a lot more hot sauce. Took longer than expected to get the check and pay, so we ended up leaving a little later than planned. Of course, since we were staying in the laid back hotel, the front desk wasn’t manned when we were trying to leave. So we patiently waited, and maybe it worked out just right because just as we were leaving the hotel, a cab rolled up. We took one last ride out to the Civic Center BART stop. Now that we were experts on using the BART ticket machines, I reached into my wallet to find the BART card I had left from my last ride…only to find I’d lost it. Of course. A handful of quarters later, I was seated in the retro 70s car on the…train, listening to the incredibly noisy ride east. Emerging from the tunnel, I spotted the he industrial wasteland with a certain sadness during the last BART ride out to Oakland. And for the first vacation in a very long time, I didn’t want to leave. I could see myself staying.