(all photos linked to larger images, except the one to the left there)

August 11, 1998 -- I have to pause and think about the date, and I'm still not sure I've gotten it right. As I head east 30,000 feet off the ground the worries of home begin to filter back and settle - so bring forward happier images - Andy waiting, Didymus scooting up the ladder, sleeping in our own bed, weekend after weekend at home bicycling rebuilding tending reading relaxing, and first what has just happened. I have not always been relaxed on this vacation to San Francisco, feeling sometimes hemmed in by people, smoke-hungry, dependent, chilly, hot, tired, unable to do what we want when - but it was a good vacation, full of exciting people and activity and good sights. Arriving with Sue at the airport today I realized how long it had seemed since we arrived on Thursday evening and Steve meeting us at the gate, and started to write what happened, knowing I'll only get the highlights and the names and probably miss half each of even them...

Thursday -- we are in early at SFO and Steve meets us; leaving the construction-engrossed airport the sky looks strange to me, colors of twilight a degree different from what I think I am accustomed to seeing. I have not been as fearful of flying as usual. We drive over the bay on the very long San Mateo Bridge which we'd watched from the plane as we descended over the endless bay. At Steve's new home on a thin strip of nowhere between Hayward and Castro Valley we meet his brother Mark, who bears enough resemblances as not to surprise us, and eat artichoke pizza, and Sarah arrives bearing rice pudding and maps, and we chat instead of playing Scrabble. This might disappoint Steve a little. I think we sleep well.

Friday -- Andy, Steve and I drive to Berkeley to fetch Bradley, whose tiny new home is very relaxing and comfy and includes an occasional cat. We meet Sue, Joe and Roger at a nice cafe with not enough cooks and each table named for a famous woman, talk, laugh, eat. It is very good now, stunning and normal to be among these friends ordinarily so far away. After lunch we check out Good Vibrations and then rearrange ourselves (no, not on the basis of anything we found there); Bradley and Steve head off to work. I leave my black jacket in Steve's car and do not see it again until Sunday, as Mark will kindly take the Integra to his teacher's exam on Saturday so we can have more room in the 4-door. Sue, Joe, Roger, Andy and I drive to Joe's workplace and do some shuffling around, a trip to Trader Joe's grocery, then switch again to a white rental for the first of several long trips across the San Francisco - Oakland Bay Bridge (a name I am compelled to sing, thanks to Preoccupied Pipers). We seem to drive about the city a lot in our quest to get to the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park, chilly and tourist-infested rather than serene but interesting all the same with its flora and koi and pagoda, we mostly cut up rather than becalm but it is fun there, giggling about keeping on the path.

We then drive to the cavernous Haight-Ashbury Amoeba Records, which makes full use of a former bowling alley. I'm not much in the mood for addressing such a huge record store, so walk up and down the boutique-overrun, street-peopled Haight Street for a bit before returning to browse, meet good-natured Stacey who works in the classical section, and make a couple indifferent purchases but Rog and Andy have found some interesting cds (we will bring home gifts as well - a California mix tape from Steve, the new Reign of Frogs cd from Rog, raspberry preserves picked cooked & canned by Lorrie and Stefan, two Amoeba $1 rescues from Doug). Stacey has told us of what sounds like a complicated "easiest" way back to the bridge and she should know, and we get caught in traffic regardless but finally roll into Albany on a nifty frontage road moving twice as fast as freeway traffic and up through the labyrinth to Sue & Joe's elegant, light, swell apartment in the side of a hill. We relax, hand over our gift of Loud Family tour diary, read the books and take liquids, then Sue, Rog, Andy and I head over to the much-touted Asian Mall, which turns out to be not the bustling, loud marketplace I'd anticipated but a contemporary indoor shopping mall filled with Chinese supermarket, video store, herb shops, Sanrio outlet and the like. Sue and Andy buy ice cream. I buy a lot of rice crackers.

Back into the car, with Joe, we head to an appointed rendezvous at Berkeley's familiar, amazing Amoeba where Andy and I are hard-pressed to spend our very generous $50 gift certificate from Steve while digging Bradley at work, identifying and excitedly meeting Lorrie & Stefan, seeing Steve and Sarah, not recognizing Dennis at first and meeting his cool, vibrant partner Heather. Eventually we all (sans working Bradley) extricate ourselves and head up Telegraph, a merry bunch, to the unique Michael's Diner, which offers every standard diner dish in vegetarian form. There is much giggling and mirth over the cutlery and the seating arrangements, including one or two large-scale moves before we finally end at the large semicircular table, Sarah at a chair in between the ends of the curved booth ("thinking outside the box," Tim later wrote) and joined by that same Tim, who with Andy engaged in an animated discussion of DC music stuff past and present. Steve showcased his new assertive self by plucking the first french fry off my plate. We convinced various waitstaff to take our photo, including one shot featuring our fortunately good-humored waitress. Talk was jaunty and incessant, and we stayed for a fast-moving 2+ hours before heading out into the night and leaving in our various directions -- Andy and I got into yet another car, this one driven by the kind-hearted Sarah who is yet unkind to herself regarding her driving prowess (she's quite good), and took a fast but seemingly long turn down the 580 (they call the highways the 580, the 101, etc., the unnecessary article charming to me), reconvening with Stefan and Lorrie - with whom we'd felt instantly comfortable - and old friend & long-suffering host Steve back home. I'm sure we conversed for a while longer but it was clearly time for bed.

Saturday -- after some slowness getting started, and a look at the snowy 1990 Game Theory tour video, we five at Steve's house stop for a bagel in Castro Valley then in to San Francisco the slow way, I fall asleep on the interminable bridge which keeps me from getting irritable but I still insist on being let out of the car to go meet Bradley while the others park. We are to meet in front of the Virgin Megastore; I pass by a Bible concert at the BART station and do not at first see Bradley getting conversed at by a street person who was reportedly interesting but exhibited an unfortunate racist streak and the belief that Jim Morrison (famous blues singer) had recently died. He, the street guy, was delighted when something he said broke me into a reluctant grin. It charms and worries me about Bradley that he gets into these sorts of conversations so accomodatingly. Bradley offers me a carrot. The rest of our party surprises us by appearing from an unexpected direction and we all troop off to a land where none of the tourist license plates or cards read "STEFAN" or "LORRIE", much color and bustle, and buildings that look prettier in the top floor - Chinatown, raucous, crowded - we locate Kowloon Vegetarian Restaurant and sit for a nice meal, then troop up more streets, a pleasant half-hour in City Lights Bookstore which would have turned into a cozy day, and onward to Washington Square Park where eventually we temporarily part, Stefan, Lorrie and Steve to Fisherman's Wharf, and Andy and I, with unexpected, welcome Bradley, to Old St. Mary's Cathedral for too-much-piano Mass and truly grateful prayer. Then time to meet up again and locate the car, drive up to Potrero Hill and Thanya & Salie Thai restaurant, disorienting and tiny, where at a long cramped table we find Sue and Joe, Rog, Dennis and Heather, Sarah, plus Jo, Ana, Paul, the JDC John with two friends whose names I have lost. Sight-for-sore-eyes Doug arrives shortly after we do, digital camera in hand, and we all squeeze in for a yummy meal and brief napkin war en route to the concert of our hopes and desires. By now my two-years-or-more memories of Dennis and Doug had diverged from reality just enough that this weekend seemed almost a first-time meeting -- I was neither disappointed nor pleasantly surprised, of course; merely had to make some minor adjustments in my images of them, mostly the visual parts. Ana, too, though we had not met before, belied my mind's eye by carrying all the physical characteristics I'd thought but looking completely different all the same -- I guess it's the living-breathing realness of our "Internet friends" that jolts and delights us so. John was a treat, and I truly wish we'd had more time to chat.

Overwhelmed by people I asked Andy to walk with me for a while before we followed everyone into the Bottom of the Hill, and when we'd breathed for a bit and handed over our tickets we were soon swirled again into the almost-tiring excitement of meeting or reuniting: long-awaited Robert, Kenny (apparently delighted to see us, how warming!), Kristine, Scott, Gil, Stacey, Anton, Tim, Alison, Russ, and surely others but I'm again overwhelmed, writing this (Karen we did not see until long after the show, when everyone was leaving or had left). An overstimulating scene indeed, and here I have to bow out of attempting to describe the show itself, as others have done it better on the loud-fans list (and shortly into the tour diary) and as I don't know how I'd ever get it down -- maybe someday -- but for now I'll have to hold my memories of the relentless cheerfulness of the John Moremen Band, the arresting showmanship of John Wesley Harding (and surprise of guest Chris von Sneidern, whose appearance, in both senses, was not at all what I'd expected) and , well, the jubilance and verve of the Loud Family, and palpable love (yes, really) emanating with the sweat and dancing and shouts of the audience. I caught Alison's eye at one point, laughing, and Scott's at another, intense, and watched and heard and clapped and danced and headed about all the way into it, gladdened throughout, they sparkle and charm. Seven lovely encore songs including almighty "Execution Day" and -- oh well, Scott's hilarous pout when he couldn't get his water bottle opened right, Gil's tsk-ing the audience as he puts his smokes away unsmoked -- well, afterwards we stubbornly refused to leave (Robert got us all a reprieve form the bouncers by telling them we were sort-of with the band), eagerly chattering with ourselves and various of our celebrity friends. Andy and I presented the tour diaries which were received with gratifying, ticklish eagerness and impressedness and curiosity. We arranged ourselves into a number of photographs, charged and not yet exhausted, and finally tumbled to the street after convincing the bouncer to take one photo of us, then chattered some more, especially with Paul and Ana with whom I'd not had much time before. A couple miscommunications sent Stefan and Lorrie up the hill afoot while Bradley and Steve drove past them back down the hill, but everyone got sorted out and we bade farewell to our heroes, and thanks, and even some tentative plans for later, and we must have talked at length about the show on the way home but I can remember little but Steve's pronouncement that he was falling asleep. Thankfully -- I'm here to scribble this -- he didn't, not on the 580.

Sunday -- We fell asleep around 3:30, which I couldn't keep myself from noting is 6:30 Eastern time, and were up, however groggy, at around 9:00, hence my falling asleep on the way, later, up the beautiful coast -- Lorrie told me I was sleeping through heaven. Andy had to say his goodbyes and I drove him to the airport on bright Sunday morning up the 101, goodbye alas, we will be together again in two days' time but I recalled a hint of all the times we'd had to take one another to airports to say goodbye for weeks or months. I sorta got lost in Hayward but managed a few u-turns and returned only a half-hour late, Lorrie & Stefan all packed, we exchanged the golf clubs in Steve's trunk for an assortment of bags, sleeping and otherwise, and took off into the day.

On an inspiration Steve rerouted us west to pretty Half Moon Bay, where we got a nice lunch at a small cafe featuring an oddball browsing library - the New Yorker book of lawyer cartoons, a book of affirmations for women, Love and Orgasm. Then we walked a mile west to the shore past a horse to whom I almost, inadvertently, fed a drinking straw, and a mess of a car bearing the necessary bumper sticker "This is Not an Abandoned Vehicle", and into the park and down the rocks to a popular beach, stunning water and large sky, fun pebbly sand -- at Stefan's advice I scooped some into a film canister to take home. We walked to the water's edge where, mesmerized by the breaking waves, we were unprepared for the sudden large one that swept over our shoed feet -- turning to scramble back Lorrie slipped and got drenched to the knee and we all giggled through the grit in our ankles for the next half-hour. Back on the road again after a scary outhouse experience for Stefan, we drove scenic Route 1 back to the city, me unable to keep my eyes open and so missing some of the best in a weekend of great views, but somehow revitalized by the time we hit Haight-Ashbury. We browsed in the big Amoeba again for some time then wandered the streets, looking for the famous addresses, ooh-aahing over the domestic architecture and complaining about the big Ben & Jerry's sign providing a rude backdrop for the street signs at the notorious intersection.

Too soon it was time to leave for the airport again to see Lorrie and Stefan off to Oregon, shuffling reluctant goodbyes and it is just Steve and me now, heading back into more impermeable traffic to cross the Bay Bridge to Berkeley, dinner, and finally the passing along of Janet for Steve to Sue; I would spend my last two nights in the airy apartment on the hill. Roger had already left -- I wish I could have seen him once more even though this would've surely entailed getting pelted with napkins -- and Joe was making ready to go off on a business trip, but Doug and Bradley were over, with guitars (we'd managed to not get together with Bradley all that day even after he'd taken off work for our sake!), and between the talk of billing for web services we were treated to several of Doug's songs including a wonderful, shoulder-shaking number called "Model City" (on radio stations everywhere, eventually). Sue, Doug and Bradley were on a high wire from sharing a $92 bottle of wine that evening, more a titillating expense buzz than an alcohol one. Doug had to leave, as usual, too soon, and we discovered we were tired and headed to our various resting-places to crash.

Monday -- Sue had some work to accomplish, so Bradley and I got our day together, a kind drive from Sue to Bradley's abode and then we two tramped off into Berkeley -- the wacky California landscaping, the sadly closed toy store wonder, searching Shattuck for a smoothie, and eccentric but great meal at eccentric but cozy Smokey Joe's vegetarian cafe with Ned (?) the one-man show, trekking to campus and up to the top of the bell tower for magnificent vistas, then to Telegraph, Istanbul Cafe, Cody's Books, and outside Amoeba Bradley runs unexpectedly into Dave from Regular Einstein, who'd just gotten into town the night before and was positively grooving on Berkeley. We three chattered our way back to Bradley's for relaxation and plan-making for the evening, then split up so Bradley and I could get the BART back to Sue's (BART very reminiscent of the DC Metro), walk down Central, up Pierce, back up to Sue's and back down again to meet Gil, Stacey, Ana, and Steve at Christopher's Nothing Fancy Mexican joint, finally a chance to talk with Ana while waiting in line, which left us fully unprepared when we got to the counter and the waitress seemed impatient with our indecisiveness and, interestingly, with Ana's correct pronunciation of the Spansih words. While Stacey, Steve and Bradley talked Illinois and music at that end of the table, we were treated to Gil in great form at this end, laughing over stuff related to marriage, Charlotte, being on tour, and all sorts of terrific topics. Ana said she'd like to record conversations with Gil the way people collect on tape oral histories from their grandparents and is she ever spot-on. A table of more interest you couldn't find in all the eateries of interesting Berkeley that night. After they closed the restaurant around us, we took the conversation out to the sidewalks for quite some time before making our reluctant goodbyes and now it must really be time to go, having to say goodbye to Bradley, and back home Sue and I talk about marriage and childbearing (no and no, as yet) for a time before bed, and then again needed sleep.

Tuesday -- and now Sue drives me to the airport and next time we will certainly fly into Oakland instead, after once more over that incessant bridge. Sue has -- everyone has -- been most generous and wonderful but something in me understands it's time to be alone and quiet and eastward now, to sit in airplanes and write all this down and lose back the three hours over clouds and fields and come back to the sunflowers in bloom, the stacks of mail, the growing kittens and to my husband waiting at the gate, California will return but now we are home.

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