Top Ten #2: Tex-Mex

I cannot stress the importance of good tex-mex.
California has a large Mexican-American population, so there are plenty of Mexican restaurants around, especially in the Mission. Burritos are king here, and people are very picky about the way their burritos are made.
I like burritos just fine.
But sometimes I just want some fajitas.
Or some good enchiladas, dripping with sauce and cheese.
I’ve tried several restaurant’s versions of fajitas and enchiladas, and I can’t really like any of them. It’s not that the Mexican food here is Taco Bell bad, it’s just different. The salsa at most Mexican restaurants is also not as good as in Texas. When we’re in Houston we could eat at a different Tex-Mex restaurant every night for dinner since each has it’s own specialty!
Pappasito’s, Ninfa’s , Los Cuco’s. Chuy’s, Lupe Tortilla’s, El Tiempo Cantina, Irma’s…..The list goes on and on…….

Top Ten #3: Kolaches

Now we’re down to the top 3, nearest and dearest to my heart!
If you would like to make some money, purchase a Kolache Factory franchise and open it up in California. We cannot find kolaches here!!!! Believe me, we’ve tried. An extensive Google search led us to a donut shop some 40 miles away. Unfortunately that’s a long way to drive for a breakfast treat.
(I was talking with a friend from Cleveland about my kolache withdrawal, and she said they have kolaches in Cleveland; pastries filled with fruit. Nope, not the same type of Czech pastry we’re used to in Texas.)

Top Ten #4: BBQ

Brisket. Ribs, Jalapeno sausage. Real BBQ sauce.
We haven’t had a chance to try some of the BBQ places around here, but I doubt they’ll be as good as the BBQ in Houston. I especially miss Baker’s Ribs right down the street from David’s place.

Top Ten #5: Barnaby's

I miss Barnaby’s, our little neighborhood café. Everything there is SO good.
This was the default place form Carol and me when we didn’t know where to go for lunch or dinner. I would always have such a hard time deciding what to get; the chicken Mediterranean salad, or a burger with the best fries in Houston, OR if I was really hungry, the lasagna.

Top Ten #6: Latin Restaurants

We’ve found some really great Latin restaurants here in San Francisco, our favorites being Spanish tapas, Peruvian, and Cuban.These types of restaurants are more difficult are harder to find in Houston.

But I still miss my Houston favorites:
Café Red Onion for trendy Latin fusion

Mi Luna for Spanish tapas and sangria

Amazon Grill for Latin-ish food, but especially for their plantain chips with chimichurri sauce

Mi Pueblito for Colombian, especially the empanadas
mmmmmm……….empanadas…………..

Top Ten list#7: Houston Folk Art

One of the best things about living in the Heights was the proximity to all sorts of crazy Houston folk art, such as ART CARS. There was a person on our block who had an art car, and it would always make me smile when I saw it our on the street. It would so cool to be driving down Montrose on any ordinary day and suddenly see a random art car, chugging along beside you.
I will be very happy if I get to see an art car when I’m back in town!

Other Houston craziness: The Beer Can House, The Orange Show, and of course The Art Car Parade.

Top Ten list: #8: Galleria/malls in general

I used not like the Galleria very much, but that was before I lived close to the giant shopping center. Now I miss the convenience of having all those stores in one place, and then being able to get in the car and go home. While there are tons of great shops and department stores here, it is a bit of a hassle going to and from each individual store when you’re short on time. Especially when it’s raining.

I used to go to the Galleria, Memorial City, or even the Village after work, and do shopping a little at a time. It was nice and relaxing. Now going shopping is an event, where I have to schedule a big chunk of time and plan out the logistics of each shopping trip. The bus takes longer, and cuts into shopping time, but it’s free with my MUNI pass. If I drive, it’s faster, and I can leave whenever, but then I have to find and pay for parking and deal with crazy traffic. Amazon.com is my new favorite website.

Top Ten list: #9 Driving

I normally look forward to walking to work everyday. It’s nice to walk 10 or more blocks daily, especially when the weather is nice, as it usually is. However the past few days have been miserable with rain, which means I show up at work a soaking wet mess.

I miss my car.
I miss having a garage.
I miss walking from the car to the office in a nice dry garage, and being able to wear whatever shoes I want!
I also just miss driving around town. It’s nice being in the car, zipping around the freeway and being able to get where I need to be without having to depend on the bus schedules.
I DO NOT miss sitting Houston traffic though.

Top Ten list: #10 Whataburger

Let the countdown BEGIN!
I am so excited about our trip to Houston, I just can't stop thinking about all the stuff I miss.... so now I begin my TOP TEN things I miss about Houston that I must have when I'm back in town.

10. WHATABURGER-
Oh good God, the other night was cold, rainy, and it was 8:30 when we headed home after a few long hours of holiday shopping.
We would have given ANYTHING for a whataburger drive-thru. I think there's 2 drive-thrus in the entire city. (ok, maybe not just 2, but there are only 2 near us that I know of; a KFC and a Burger King which both look gross).

Though when I finally make it to Whataburger, what ever will I choose?
The perfect whataburger with cheese (NO PICKLES), and fries, OR
the chicken tender basket with creamy peppery GRAVY.......decisions, decisions!!!!!!!

New pictures

IMGP1807.JPG, originally uploaded by ednita212.

We got a christmas tree this past weekend! We had gone to several storeslooking for a little artificial tree to put in the living room, but we didn't really like any thing. I found this one at IKEA...it's a little bigger than we had planned, but it's great.
I also posted pictures of our hike through the Marin headlands. I think we've taken some of you out to the lookout point, but this time we drove past the point to walk the trails. It's really beautiful out there, and you almost forget how close to the city you really are.

Click here to see all my pictures

Fleet Week 06

These pictures have been sitting in the camera for a while, but here they are!
These are from the Blue Angels Show during Fleet Week. It was pretty chilly that day out by the water, but it didn't matter, we still sat out there for over 3 hours watching all the cool air shows.
To see all my pictures from the air show, click here!

Our New Toy

Guess what this is for!

-D

Tostones...

La semana pasada por fin use las tostonera que me regalo la Senora Maria! En el Whole Foods, el Mercado cerca a la oficina, vi que tenian unos platanos verdes que se veian deliciosos. Claro, casi $2 por libra porque eran platanos “organicos”; pero es el unico lugar cerca donde puedo encontrar los platanos; el Safeway de la marina no los tiene. Como me hace falta el Fiesta!

Para acompanar los tostones, puse a cocinar “Comfort food” latino: arroz con frijoles negros, carne asada, y tostones! Que comida tan rica, gracias senora maria por la tostonera! La proxima semana tenemos que hacer tiempo par ir a la mission, el barrio latino de san Francisco, porque ya casi se me acaban los sobresitos de goya.

Rough Translation ***
Last week I was finally able to use the plantain smasher Senora Maria sent to me with my mom. At the Whole Foods near my work I saw some green plantains that looked delicious. Of course they were almost $2 a pound because they were organic; but this is the only place nearby where I can find plantains, the Marina Safeway sure doesn’t have them. I miss my Fiesta!!

To go with the plantains I made latin comfort food; rice and black beans, carne asada, and plantains! How yummy, thank you Senora Maria for the smasher! Next week we’ll have to plan a trip to the mission, the latin neighborhood in san Francisco because I’m running out of my goya products.

***NOTE: so there are some words that really don’t translate well, such as “tostonera”. So I’ve decided to call it the plantain smasher!” On the other hand, “comfort food” is an American saying that doesn’t really have a Spanish counterpart. This whole dual language thinking can be a little tricky sometimes, I swear one day I’ll go to sleep and wake up talking in French because it will be easier!

Mom & Carol's visit

IMGP1577, originally uploaded by ednita212.

Here are the pictures from my mom and carol's visit a couple of weeks ago. Sorry it took so long to post! We had such a great time. We went out to eat to different restaurants, strolled around the neighborhood, went to the Ghirardelli chocolate festival, shopped at H&M, AND hit up the Muir Woods and Sausalito! I think that our favorite outing hands-down was the bowling at the Presidio Bowl! This is a picture of us by the bridge. It was pretty foggy the whole time they were here, but the last day it cleared up some. I have more pictures, just click on this image and it will take you to a new picture library...

Ok, so I'm trying something new! I love the blog, but I'd like a place to put differeny collections of images when I have large batches. So I've found this service called Flickr, which is a photo sharing place, kind of like a photo blog. I'll place lots of pictures on flickr, and just link to the blog! Hope it works.....

Labor Day in Monterey Bay

Hope you all had a great Labor Day weekend!
Today we got up way early (6:45 am) for our road trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium to see their new great white shark. After 2 hours in the car, we finally got to the aquarium, and got in line. What a crazy day, it was packed. I really wish I had brought my SLR; it was difficult to get a good exposure under those conditions! But here are the best shots of the day.

The shark was in an exhibit called The Outer Bay, a million gallon tank, and they had a “bubble curtain” up to help the shark get used to its new surroundings. The shark was a juvenile, only 5 feet 8 inches and about 150 pounds, a little on the small side and hot the huge Jaws you’d first think of when you hear “great white shark,” but it was quite impressive nonetheless! The tuna in the same tank were HUGE, and the sunfish bizarre. We saw a bunch of cool exhibits with a lot of interesting animals; I think my favorite was the shark though.

After a few hours in the aquarium, we ventured outside for lunch. We had lunch with a great view of the bay, and it turned out to be a great sunny day. We walked around cannery row, Steinbeck Square, and even stopped in a few shops. Monterey os a great little town, I’m sure we’ll be back sometime!

Banners are up

My banners went up today! I designed this 50 year logo for the Stuart Hall for Boys, and the school put it up on these street banners….they look pretty good! We snapped this picture today when we had to move the car.

I also have a few other pictures, a couple of last weekend when David and I drove around the Castro/Noe Valley/Twin Peaks area. We made it to the top of Twin Peaks and the view was amazing, you can see all the way to the bay until the fog rolls in. Noe Valley was really nice, it had a great neighborhood feel; maybe this will be our next move.

Oh yes, and there’s my new ‘do. I finally made the call to a salon, and got the hair chopped off; 5 almost 6 inches! This was right after I came back from the salon, she spent maybe 15 minutes cutting, and more than 30 blow drying it. I wish I had that much patience to spend that kind of time on my hair.

Half-Moon Bay

After a couple of weekends of hanging around the house, we decided to take the old explorer out for a road trip. (I think it had been more than a week since we last drove the car.) Our drive would have been much more scenic if we could have taken Highway 1 all the way down the coast; however the highway was closed for a long stretch at a portion called Devil’s Slide, remnants of the landslides earlier this year. It was a gorgeous and COLD day at the beach. It’s so weird being at the beach all bundled up, and not even wanting to touch the water! I read in our little guide book that there’s places along half-moon bay and further south where you can see the California grey whales when they come in the fall….we’ll definitely go back to half-moon bay.

Random Photos

I love David's little Pentax camera!
I sometimes throw it in my purse because I love to take pictures of the interesting day-to-day things I see in our new town. Here's a collection of some interesting stuff!

Office Space

Here's a few more pictures of my work area. I've also got a shot of the front of the building, finally! It's the white one. My space is on the second floor, behind the big tree. I'm near the big bay windows, so I have plenty of natural light and a nice view of the street.
The last shot is just a row of victorians on my way from work to the bus stop. I want to live in that blue house, it's gorgeous!

First day at work

I can’t believe I actually got out of bed this morning at 7 am. It was hard, but at least my coffee was ready when I got up. The bus ride was an easy 10 minutes on an empty bus, and the hike over the 4 blocks to get to the office wasn’t too bad; I was wearing sneakers. Got to the office, and man was I was floored when I saw my desk; a dual processor G5 with 2 hard drives each 400 gigs, plus an external 400 gig hard drive, hooked up to dual monitors! My dream set-up! Technical difficulties though, the adobe suite had not been loaded on the dream machine yet, I didn’t have an email account or access to the server, etc….so I spent most of the day loading software and setting up email accounts and server access. Here are a few pictures I snapped of the office. It’s really a gorgeous old Victorian that’s been converted into office space. I just love the period details. I’ll try to take a few more pictures tomorrow!