it's only natural

I had a lovely first day back in California, even if it started later than I intended and I accomplished v. little. I slept until after ten, took a shower, putzed around the apartment, and finally walked over to Samovar in Hayes Valley for a bowl of tea soup and a masala chai. I started rewriting the first chapter of Madeleine and Ferguson's story while I was there -- I'm going to start writing every day (or at least three weekdays + both weekend days), so this fulfilled that even if it wasn't a tremendous wordcount. On the way home, I stopped by Flax to buy some paper for my notebook, and then successfully foraged for food at the independent grocer near my apartment. I decided to try a new brand of milk, buying it for its glass bottle (which I hope will keep it from getting tainted by the odors in the fridge), but I didn't realize until I got home that the milk wasn't homogenized, and so it's a little too creamy or something for my processed tastes.

But the best event of the day was that I drove down to Menlo Park to have dinner with Claudia (my former roommate, aka Claude the Fraud, aka Santy Claude) at our favorite tapas place. We are having dinner tomorrow night with Vidya (aka Vidius Chandicus, aka the Chandlord) as well, but we decided to meet up without her tonight so that we could have a tapas meat-fest without starving her. It was lovely to catch up just the two of us, and even lovelier to do it over deviled dates, chorizo, patatas bravas, etc. We followed the tapas with coffee and dessert at Cafe Borrone, which happens to be across the railroad tracks from Iberia; that two of my favorite places are within a block of each other seems to hint that I should strongly consider moving back to Menlo Park.

We parted ways around 9:15, and I drove back to the evil city. Now, I'm ready to go to bed, but I'm debating how to get my back to quit hurting; I think I strained it or something from lugging my two-laptop carry-on bag all over the place during my thirteen-hour layover in Memphis a couple of weeks ago, since it never felt quite right while I was home, and carrying the bag yesterday threw it over the edge. While I do need to carry stuff tomorrow since I need to do laundry, perhaps I will refrain from walking anywhere with my laptop, and I will just have to hope that that will do the trick.

That's all for tonight -- goodnight!