An Awesome Weekend Gone Too Soon

The bridge as seen from Kirby Cove, originally uploaded by gregveen.

Damn fine weekend it was. Why does there have to be a Monday? I don't mind working, but maybe we could skip directly back to Friday again?

1. Friday Night: Kirby Cove
Ha! Amazing. Just west of the Golden Gate Bridge on the Marin side is Kirby Cove. For those of you busily doing east/west calculations, that means past the bridge toward the Pacific Ocean. Kirby Cove has a little beach with a sloping wood behind it. Some jerks during WW2 build bunkers there, but now they're ruined and mysterious but fun, half horror movie and half playground.

The view is epic - a little bit of the sea, a little bit of the bay, a long stretch of San Francisco, the swift and narrow Golden Gate Channel, and the huge bridge. Best of all, the night was perfectly warm and clear, so we sat on the beach or by the fire until we just couldn't stay awake any more, then slept out under the stars on the edge of a cliff and woke to the view. And mimosas! We had to leave at noon on Saturday, but I could have stayed for days and days.

2. Saturday Afternoon: Naps
As soon as the sky got light on Saturday morning, I awoke and couldn't fully get back to sleep. I didn't want to miss anything. I kept opening one eye and looking out at the view. Meanwhile, Greg's allergies came on like a flash flood. He hadn't slept a whole lot either, and between the sleeplessness, tenacious allergy symptoms, and the narcotic effects of antihistamines, he was out like a light as soon as we got back to my house. It looked too good to pass up, so I laid down on my bed and fell asleep, too.

3. Saturday Night: Stayed Home and Cleaned My Room
Sometimes, you just have to stay the fuck home. Enough said.

4. Sunday Afternoon: Epic Bike Ride from the Mission to Ocean Beach and Back Again
It wasn't until after the ride that I realized some days I ride 10 miles to and from work, which is pretty much the same distance we rode on Sunday. No wonder I was able to keep up on this ride - I had practice!

First I went to church, which was awesome as always, then headed over to Mission Control for brunch. Since I was on the way-late side, I brought my bike with me on bart, so I wouldn't have to walk. When I got to brunch, a few folks were leaving for a bike ride. Fifteen minutes later, another few people left for a ride, and then another crew ten minutes later. The last crew managed to talk me into it - I mean, I had my bike with me, I might as well, right? - and it was then I discovered everyone was actually going on the same ride. Eventually, after much rendezvous-ing, there were I think nine of us on the ride. We were a bike gang! Unfortunately, as I didn't plan ahead for said ride, I was the one in the mini-skirt and sandals. Because, people, it was hot on Sunday. Hot, I say. But, had I known I'd be peddling all over town and back again, I'd have worn pants or shorts and shoes. At least I was wearing exceptionally modest undies (as always).

Greg, meanwhile, was at home doing his taxes and sniffling. I really wanted to make him join us, but I knew he'd be miserable riding through the pollen cloud that was Golden Gate Park. Sorry, Greg.

5. Unrelated: Brick!
The weekend before, Greg, K-dub and I watched my new favorite movie, Brick. People, for real, such a great film. I'd heard a ton about it on NPR when it first debuted at Sundance a few years back, and Tim and Tina both really liked it and suggested I see it, but then it sort of fell off my radar. Fortunately it got back on my radar. Hooray radar!

Anyway, that's neither here nor there. The point is, this film! The script, the acting, the costumes, the editing! Its a film noir set in and around a high school, and almost every character is a teen age kid. Its contrived, but executed flawlessly; one of the most important pieces of knowledge I learned in art school was this: in art, its okay for us to make our own universe, but we have to be consistent within our universe. So goes the universe of Brick.

And why not a high school noir? The archetypes fit perfectly - the moody loaner hero, the fallen, tainted ingenue, the dangerous femme fatal, the slimy cad, the sinister master-mind, the ham-handed thug, and the gritty, ruthless cop - in this case, the vice principal. It fits together so snuggly, one wonders why no one every did it before. The film plays the gender roles like a violin, too, comments on traditional film gender roles without ever having to even say anything.

I'm not going to tell you a damn thing about the story, though. I don't want to give anything away. Every detail counts in a good noir, and nothing extra is included, so to tell you anything is to tell you too much. That said, when listening to all those gushing NPR reviews, they couldn't help but give away the four clues, which are four words, and I'm going to give them to you, too: Brick, Tug, Frisco and Pin. Go watch it and see what it all means. Yay!