Sunday, March 19, 2006

The weekend so far...


This is a four day weekend for me. :) Friday, Ted and I both went on a fieldtrip to Sacramento. Why both of us? Because it's better than working, that's why. So we drove 3 kids to Sacramento. First the class stopped at the old Governor's Mansion, which was pretty interesting. It's an old Victorian house, with 23 rooms, and they have it done up like it would have been in the early 1900s. Our tour guide was full of misinformation, which made us wonder, does he know what he's talking about with this place at all? He told our class that MLK was shot in '66 or '67, that James Brady was killed, and that the bullets missed Reagan. Interesting. I knew these 'facts' to be wrong, which made me wonder if he was saying things about the mansion that were incorrect as well, or was he OK on the specifics of the mansion, and not so good on the general US history. Hmmm.

Then we went to the State Capitol building. We got a nice tour of the Senate chambers, the assembly chambers, etc. But we didn't get to see the Governor's office (closed) and we didn't have to see Arnold running around (good). It's a beautiful building, so that was cool.

After that, we went to Old Town Sacramento, to the Railway Museum. We were so tuckered out by that point, we weren't really interested. Maya's in fourth grade, which is the year kids learn California History. The railroads are a big part of that history, but still, we weren't terribly interested. All three of our kids were worn out, so we left and came home. Whew. We think it would have been better to make two field trips out of it...one with the Governor's Mansion and the Capitol, and a second with Sutter's Fort and the Railway museum. Maybe they'll do that next year.

Yesterday, Maya and I went to sell girl scout cookies at the booth, and we got to meet Autumn's Mom's new dog, Minnie. What a cute little doggie! I prefer big dogs, personally, but I couldn't help but think about how much easier it would be to clean up after a 5 lb dog than a 40 lb dog like Genevieve. I'm guessing Minnie's poop is a LOT smaller than Gen's. :) After that, we came home and had lunch. Relaxed a bit. The plumber came and installed new faucets for us. YAY! We have hot water in the kitchen again! The bad news is that the reason we didn't for awhile is that part of our hot water heater is falling apart in little tiny chunks and clogging up the pipes. So we need a new hot water heater. Not this minute, but soon. Later, we went downtown to the shops to get a new cell phone for Ted (his was pretty much dead), a dress for Maya to wear to the Father/Daughter dance that they're going to in a few weeks, and to look for new jeans for me. Since I started wearing flatter shoes, my jeans are all too long, except those that I unwisely bought that are too short. So, I wanted a new pair of just right jeans. We didn't find a dress that suited Maya, but I did find some jeans that suited me, and I'm happily wearing them right now. :)

After that we got ingredients at the store for dinner, came home and burned it a bit, and ate. :) It was fine. Then we watched Dead Like Me for awhile, and off to sleepy land. Today we have no plans, other than laundry and homework. We'll see what we come up with after that. Maybe a trip to Target. Tomorrow, I'm going to play with my friend Neva. She and I were best friends in the 6th grade, but lost touch after that. Then a few years ago, I tracked her down via Classmates.com. We try to get together for dinner about once a month, and we've been trying to schedule a whole day together since December, and this is the first time that has worked for us. YAY! We're going to go into San Francisco and have lunch at my favorite little hole in the wall place, I think. (Mihn's Garden, on Clement Street, if you live in or near SF) It's not special or amazing or anything, but they have yummy hot and sour soup with shrimp and pineapple in it, and when I lived a block away from there, it was a favorite. We'll go to Green Apple Books and hang around there. Maybe Ambiance on Haight Street, though I probably can't afford anything there. Just walk around in the rain and see SF together. We'll have an early dinner at the Elite Cafe (Etouffe, here I come!), and then home again. SO nice. I'm looking forward to it.

Hope your weekend is lovely as well. :)

2 comments:

Piece of Work said...

Sounds like a nice weekend, and a great trip to SF coming up. Ooh, Elite Cafe, I forgot about that place. And Ambience! I lived near the Haight, so I used to go there a lot, although I couldn't afford to buy much. I think now I could, though! ;)
That is really funny about the tour guide. What basic facts to get wrong! Was he testing the kids to see if they knew? Hilarious, in a disturbing kind of way!

Cherry said...

Did you make it to Ambience? I know its one of your favorite stores and you always come away with the cutest things there.
Sounds like you had a lovely 4 day weekend!