A Snickers Bar

On the second of January I wrote that I got a ride to San Mateo on New Year’s Eve Day.  I had a drink at O’Neill's and the took the trains until I ended up at the Uptown alone.  I talked to the bartender and then went to my friend’s.  She told me we needed stuff for the party she was throwing and asked me to go to the store as her old coworker came in.  I went to Kinko’s on the way.  I came back with ice and a couple of other things.

My riding partner’s wife had appeared when I returned and the house was ready for the party.  I was between the living room and kitchen for awhile after that.  I had the punch and noted there was a non alcohol version.  The husbands arrived and I remembered that my friend’s roommate had come in too.  The other roommate had the weekend off.  The fun had started a short time later.  There was a taco bar and I at one point even had to wait to make my own.  We were playing Jenga when one of the roommates made guacamole.

Only one person had to leave before the last of the guests arrived.  We had all made crowns by then and the rooms got crowded and confused.  There was one more round of tacos then, cake and finally we started playing cards around ten o’clock.  We did that diligently until midnight and then pretty much everyone had left.

We were cleaning the apartment when I got a text from an old acquaintance and her brother who came to the party late.  I buzzed them in.  We drank sparkling wine with them and they took off for pizza.  We finished cleaning and I was in bed at 330 that night.

I was up around 1130 the next morning and went to Cafe Soleil around two with my friend.  We had some toasted breads with a salad and gherkins.  We then walked up Page and stopped at Stanza before catching caught a bus to my place.  She sat with mom talking for a while and once I had filled up my tire we rode down to the beach for the sunset.

Later we rode back and got warmer clothes before heading out to find a meal.  We discovered that Outerlands was closed so we rode into the park to find something else.  We had trouble near the Polo Fields but I had gloves on.  We went up to Kezar and then down Page to Magnolia where we found that the only parking spot was a fat pole.

Inside we were underwhelmed by the service.  The guy sitting next to me stopped a waitress and complained that I had yet to be served.  The waitress was terrible.  We shared a meal and later talked to the man and his companion.  They were from the peninsula and loved eating salmon.  When we were done we got the bikes aired up at the gas station and headed to Civic Center for Bike Party.

Upon our arrival we found a lot of close relationships waiting. My friend even got to see an old coworker before the leadership took the green flag out to Polk.  We climbed to Polk Gulch and took Chestnut.  One acquaintance asked for a Snickers bar when we stopped at a liquor store on Van Ness.

At the Palace of Fine Arts we took pictures, my Twitter friend and I had a beer and I climbed the “stairs.”  One of the riders lent me his pump and I introduced a lady we knew to the group right before it was time to go.

We rode to Fillmore and up to Union before we climbed to Green on Laguna.  There was a cop around there that wanted to know what we were doing.  We went to Polk and Pacific and then climbed to Steiner and upto the top of Alta Plaza where we interacted with my friend’s old coworker and his friend’s.

When the five of us decided to go I said bye to everyone and led the group to Fillmore.  One guy had trouble with his chain.  However, my friend thought that they were fun and interesting.  After we said bye to the guys and rode through Hayes Valley Charlie and I had cake.  I was in bed around 12.

In the morning of the day that I wrote this I was up at 930 and made some burnt toast with eggs and potatoes.  After a brief interlude by myself I then spent several hours working on a fox for my friend.  She and her roommate discussed things about the party the night before.

I went to the store and had coffee after that.  My friend was headed to a show with her old coworker.  I noted as I was getting my bike together that I had a lot of chores to tend to.  I filled my tire up then and rode through the park and ran out of energy at the top.  I rode to 40th and home after that.  I noted that I did the whole ride in 38 minutes.  I spent hours doing very little then and later started typing.

This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.