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A Vampire's Travels

January 26th I went down to Sacramento, there I met up with my donor and we spent the night at my daughter's house, from there he and I went to South San Francisco. The big fun plan was to meet up with my ex and the aforementioned grown daughter to see the Hatshepsut exhibit at the De Young museum in San Francisco the 28th. Meanwhile, he and I hung out in South San Francisco eating at the wonderful restaurants and enjoying just hanging out together.

At first glance, S.S.F. looks like an overgrown industrial park with a bunch of hotels thrown in for fun. However, once you cross the freeway you find a really neat little downtown of Victorian buildings. There are lots of cool shops and many good restaurants, yet somehow it isn't all tourist-trappy. Maybe it's different during spring and summer, but we had a blast. There are lots of Italian and Oriental food places, and real, honest-to-gods diners. Yes, REAL diners, with the counter and stools and people cooking right in front of you. We had killer pizza at Cecilia's http://www.restaurantrow.com/ShowPics.cfm?Type=Menu&nCode=858407&code=858407&Byte=u&Number=1&Ext=gif&Name=Cecilia's%20Restaurant%20%26%20Pizzeria&Word=menu&Count=4&state=CA - great Chinese food at the Full Moon http://www.yelp.com/biz/xQcR4uzcRcLz_XRuB46_9A?hrid=hGyAHWKZU_LB9O5cc6WlPQ - and two really good breakfasts at Ed's Diner and_ http://www.google.com/local?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&q=ed%27s+diner&near=South+San+Francisco,+CA&sa=X&oi=locald&radius=0.0&latlng=37654722,-122406667,16057409540823508174 and the Cozy Cottage diner (can't find a link, sorry!). The St. Vincent de Paul's was huge, too...3 floors with a huge used book and music section. The donor was in heaven. Plunk him down in a room full of cheap used books, and you'll have to use a taser to get him back out in any kind of hurry. We'd gotten a hotel with breakfasts and a mini kitchen, but never cooked a darn thing OR went down to the lobby for brekkies.

Friday we went to the Rosicrucian Egyptian museum http://www.egyptianmuseum.org Oh my! It is marvelous! The place is quite large and nicely laid out. The large pieces are reproductions, but everything in a case is authentic. It has several floors, and a tomb replica you can walk down into. It was all I could do not to jump down into the pit below the sarcophagus and poke around. I KNOW there's nothing there, but I was still mightily tempted. The repeating loop of meandering, going-nowhere new agey muzak left something to be desired, however. Still the exhibits are many and varied, there are videos shown regarding research projects the museum is working on, and the mummies are displayed fairly tastefully. The grounds are gorgeous, too. They have statuary and a lovely reflecting pool, a banyan tree, papyrus and lotus plants, etc. The buildings themselves are wonderfully made, as well. The planetarium is a little jewel with tile mosaics and marble floors in the lobby and lady's room. (I notice these things.)

Saturday it was the De Young and Hatshepsut http://www.thinker.org/deyoung/exhibitions/exhibition.asp?exhibitionkey=462 , one of my favorite uppity women in history. (She was one of the few female pharaohs, not merely a regent keeping the throne warm until her son was old enough to take over.) I used to go to the De Young museum a lot in my youth, as well as the aquarium and Academy of Sciences. I was saddened to see the latter two had been flattened and are being replaced by new buildings, as was done with the De Young http://www.sfgate.com/traveler/guide/sf/neighborhoods/ggpark.shtml It's never easy to see something you love destroyed and replaced by something "new and improved", especially when the new one is butt ugly. Yes, the new De Young is less than attractive. The outside is sheathed in coppery metal dinked all over with pimples and punched full of holes. The 'distressed' surface of reddish metal in a coastal city just makes it look like someone dragged a rotting old hulk up out of the bay and plunked it down to use as a museum. I kept expecting rusticles and dead crabs. Further, it is NOT laid out in such a way that a large crowd can wait around to get into see a popular exhibit in the rain without a good hard soaking while they wait for security to peek quickly in their purses and make sure they aren't smuggling in Bin Laden. It was stupid. I could have had anything in the world under my wallet or in my boot, and they'd never have known. For this I got drenched??? Further, there is a goofy restaurant thing plopped atop the museum that looks like someone lost an air traffic control tower. Inside, the museum is a big, bland neutral space. And that's fine, it doesn't detract from the displays. I gotta tell you, though, I’m pretty nervous about what the other two replacements will look like.

Be that as it may, the Hatshepsut exhibition was wonderful! Lots of stuff! Way, way more stuff than Tut's had, and about half the mob. There were quite a few very large statues, some lovely furniture, daggers, and lots of unusual jewelry. Whoever put this one together really tried to find unique items. Again, it was possible with a bit of sidestepping to see most of the pieces form all sides, something I really appreciate. Between this one, the Tut exhibit, and the Akhenaten materials at the Rosicrucian museum, I feel like I know a good deal more about the 18th dynasty. They were a very unusual family! They seem to have been big on thinking 'outside the box'.

We had been going to stop at the Tea Garden for afters, but it was late, and cold, and wet, so we went back to the hotel with my daughter and then out for dinner. We had a lovely visit, but then I had to take her to a friend’s house in Oakland. The rain was relentless and greasy by this time, smearing my windshield like it was raining Vaseline, and the traffic was vile. We had to drive almost all around the bay, as there was a massive traffic jam on the Bay Bridge. It was one of the most exhausting and nerve-wracking drives I've ever made. I could almost see the other cars near me, but none of the signs. Without my donor as co-pilot, I'm sure I'd either have died in a wreck or still be going around and around, I could almost have put the truck in neutral and just let the other cars shove us along the road.

Sunday my sweetie had to fly back home, but we had a little time to kill, so we went to Ancient Ways http://www.ancientways.com and then to Lake Merrit in Oakland. Ancient Ways is a well stocked, clean, and well organized magical supply shop. They have a wide selection of herbs, books, and candles, as well as images, incenses, tools, and ritual garb. The place is clean and tidy, the staff friendly and knowledgeable, and I found the pricing to be quite reasonable.

Lake Merrit http://www.oaklandnet.com is a nice get away in the big city. The lake is large and very full of birds, ducks and gulls mostly, fortunately the savage geese I remember from my childhood are gone. There is boating, picnicking, and lots of walking and jogging. We sat on a bench and had cheese and crackers for lunch, and fed the birds the crackers we didn't eat. One especially piggish gull swallowed a Triscuit whole. We could see the corners and knew it had to be awfully uncomfortable, but it flew onto the lake and got a drink and was able to swallow it ok. And then I drove him to the airport and was sad and went home.

Deborah Plantagenet

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