'Tis the season - Job-Hunting and Football

Un-packing, Job-hunting, Football, Explorations, and Cooking are a few of the major things going on in my life.  As of now, I have squeezed my stuff into a closet, a new wardrobe from Ikea, and a bin under the bed.  I am still waiting for a shelf to be put up in my closet, but we are waiting to borrow some power tools.    Greg had the apartment set up very nicely before I even got here, so except for some area rugs, extra things for the bedroom, and a few kitchen accessories, we are good to go with all the essentials.  It is very comfortable and cute, our little one bedroom, one bath place.  The kitchen is a very good size and the bathroom has a glorious rain shower head.  If you know about my habit of taking too long in the shower, you can imagine how bad it is now.

The hunt for a job is still on.  It was looking very promising in the first 2 weeks I was here as I had gotten interviews for two positions I was very interested in.   Unfortunately, neither panned out.  I have been spending a lot of time working on improving my resume and sending it out to job postings I find on LinkedIn, Craig's List, and specific hotel company websites.  I have also been looking for volunteer opportunities to start networking.  It has been exactly a month that I have been here, and I am starting to get a little anxious about finding something.

So enough about that boring stuff.  We have had some fun weekends here in the Bay Area.  Greg and my first weekend alone together was fun.  We had a nice little Saturday at Ikea where we picked out my wardrobe/armoire thing, a plant for the living room, and some other little things.  On Sunday we took a drive to Mt. Tamalapais, better known as Mt. Tam here, and went up and up, around and around until we came to a spot along the road to park.  We got out and took a steep hike up a hill and came upon some beautiful views.  From up here you could see all the way out to the Farallones.  I just finished reading The Devil's Teeth, which is all about these treacherous, uninhabitable islands and the Great Whites that feed there every year. 

If you can zoom in on this picture, the tiny dots in the center of the ocean's horzion line are the Farallones.

Martin Luther King, Jr weekend we had more visitors from home.  Ryan and Greg stayed with us for a few days so they could do a little surfing and skiing.  They drove to Tahoe the first full day they were here and stayed overnight.  Unfortunately there was no snow for them, so they just went on a hike and did boy things.  After some drinking and gambling, there was a little mishap and Minnis's shoulder got dislocated or something, so he was in pain the rest of the weekend here.  Some things never change.

We got up early one morning to head down to Santa Cruz, meet up with Matt and his friend Simon, so they could do a little surfing.  Santa Cruz is a great little town with a lot of things to do.  Here is a picture of the waves.

It was a little too crowded and the waves weren't the best that day -  which was fine because there were football games on that afternoon.  We went over to The Crow's Nest and got a table in front of some TV's and next to the window overlooking the coast, and watched the 49ers play the Saints.  The place was filled with spectators, but definitely not the showing of fan fare you would see during an Eagles game.  There were a few jerseys and some people wearing red here and there, but that was it.  Since Philly's playoff dreams were over, I decided to root for the 9ers and join in the excitement of this city.   It was nice to see them win.

The next day was the Giants/Green Bay game.  Greg found a NY bar in the city, so that is where we went.  We took the ferry and then hopped on the California Street Cable Car to get to Ace's.  It was my first time on a cable car!

They were excited too!

We got to the bar on Hyde Street.  If you are a Giants fan, this definitely is heaven on earth on playoff day.  The place was packed long before kick-off and we were glad we got there when we did.  They have great drink specials - Bucket of 5 - 16 oz Bud Lights for $12 that come with koozies.  And then they started grilling burgers and sausages outside and bringing them in to feed the crowd.  We had a good time and the Giants won.  This made for a happy group.

Ryan and I are the only non-fans, but we had a good time.

The rest of the time they were here, we hit some Sausalito local spots, like Bar Bocce and Smitty's.  It was nice to have guests and I know Greg was very happy to have his BFF's here to get crazy with.

The next weekend it was back to just the two of us - but it was filled with football fever!  The Niners were hosting the Giants for a fight for a spot in the playoffs.  I was able to hook up with Lauran and bring Greg and Matt to meet her and some of the Giants and their fiances.  We also met Tuck's agent and Mike Silver who writes the sports column for Yahoo!.  Everyone was so nice and friendly to us, that I felt compelled to root for them against the 49ers.  Had the Ravens beaten the Patriots, it might have been a different story, that and being back at Aces for this game I was catching Giants fever (only because my team didn't make the playoffs!).

Matt, Lauran, Justin, me, Greg

Ace's was even crazier than the week before, which we suspected.   We did not expect to meet so many New Yorkers who were in town just for the game.  Small world that NY is, Greg ended up meeting people that he had worked with on projects at other companies while he was working with JP Morgan.  Thankfully a bus was coming to pick a lot of these people up and drive them to the game.  It made for a little more room and an opportunity for us to grab a seat.

No one was grilling food for us this time, so Greg ordered 5 large pizzas, walked to pick them up, brought them back, and charged $10 for anyone who wanted to eat some.  He made all his money back in about 10 minutes and made a lot of people happy.  It was actually delicious - it is hard to find good pizza in San Fran.

PIZZA, New Yorkas, and Me.

The next weekend Greg and Matt wanted to capitalize on their season passes and the precipitation that had come down during the Giants/49ers game and go to Kirkwood.  Saturday morning we woke up early and Matt drove us in his new Acura the 3 hour drive to the mountain.  It turned out to be a beautiful sunny day and the resort was bustling.  They hit the trails and I hit the fire in the lodge.  I did some reading and worked on the blog until we met up for a great lunch and spicy bloody mary's.  After lunch they took a few more rides before we left.  I drove us home since they were exhausted.

Sunday Greg and I decided to take a bike ride along the coast to Tiburon.  Here is a map of our ride.

View Larger Map

Some photos taken along the way:

We wanted to get lunch and bloody mary's on the deck at the infamous Sam's Cafe.   Their website has a live camera of the deck at all times.  It was packed, but we were able to get a small table and some drinks and apps and watch the water and sailboats.  We rode about 15 miles total on Sunday.  Another good weekend.

And that's January in a nutshell...Thanks for reading! xo