Double Entry: Th & Fr

Thursday night my cousin, Rebecca (the cuz or just cuz), her husband (the doc, or just doc) and I met at a new Marin restaurant, "L'appart". It had been on my list and since we were unable to get together last week due to unfortunate and unforeseen circumstances, we rescheduled for Th night. Perhaps if this restaurant were located in Southern Cal or Arizona or Florida, the idea of maximum outdoor seating vs minimum indoor seating would be a good idea. On a cold June night in the Bay Area, it wasn't such a good idea. When the cuz sat down and the waiter said, "good evening", the response was, "I'm cold". After a little back and forth on why they couldn't wheel one of their unused heat lamps over to our table, we were moved to one closer to a heat lamp. It helped, but it wasn't optimal.

Once we got to the food though, it was terrific. We started with a fois gras appetizer with marinated strawberries. I ordered the mussels and the cuz had the duck. The duck was cooked perfectly - not gamey, with just enough fat-YUM. Joe, the doc, had steak. We didn't end up with dessert because I needed to dash into the city to catch john's non Wicked gig at The Boom Boom Room, playing a birthday tribute to Jeff Beck. Luckily I had had a cup of Joe (not the doc) so I was raring and ready to go. I met up with a friend Michael Hatfield (Mikey Luv of the Buddy Luv band), Diana and Harvey. Around midnight, Diana made a comment that she was surprised I was still there - "AACK!" I panicked realizing the time. I had to be in the city early to present to the President of my division, so I hit the road.

FRIDAY
I got home and threw the bike rack and bike on the car and drove to Kate's. She was going to take me on a real ride. We drove up to Skyline Blvd, parked and started riding up hill. She kept insisting that most of the road was flat and the hardest part was the begining. Clearly she's never looked at a topo map before. I realized after huffing and puffing my way up the hill, after every up, there is a down, which is fine except that only means you gotta ride back up where you just came flying down. She kept telling me it was "flat". Sure, flat at a 10% incline - I never touched my pedals - until I had to pedal back up that damn "flat" hill.

Okay, so that's a lot of whining. It was a great, beautiful ride through the redwoods, but I'm going to curse her tomorrow when I can't walk. Now - I'm going to do something different and go collapse on the couch!