Just Root Beer

So, we really didn't do anything today except go out for dinner . . . but more on that later.  I pretty much just hung out in the hotel room all day.  I didn't really feel like walking around San Jose and the only things within walking distance are restaurants . . . lots and lots of restaurants.  Yeah, I didn't really feel like walking around and looking at restaurants right after lunch lol.

Dad got out of the conference at like 5:30PM  (a little bit late . . .) then he said we were going to meet with his buddies and then go out to dinner.  haha, that didn't happen until 8PM . . . seriously (it might have been 7PM, but it was still really late.  Anyways we went to go find the guys in this huge convention center full of geeks and nerds (and there's nothing wrong with being a geek or a nerd.  It was just funny. shirts tucked in, pants pulled up to their chests, walking around with two or more hugely stuffed briefcases, oh yes, and laughing at C++ jokes . . . i could go on).  and dad wanted to stop at like every single booth.  I was in the middle of watching a TV show when I left and I really didn't care . . . until we had spent more than an hour in there.  Needless to say I was really bored (and sorry I didn't think of taking any pictures of that).  The cool thing was a magician that did a bunch of cool tricks with a rope that he would break apart and then put back together right in front of you.  And he did this really cool card trick were instead of finding my card when he shuffled the deck the name of the card appeared in writing on the side.  Oh, and he took my dad's 1000 rubles and burned it up but then made it reappear in an envelope that had been inside his jacket :)  that was cool.  And he gave me some flying stretchy monkeys (that scream when you press their bellies).  Other than that the rest was really boring.

So . . . finally we found everyone and they decided to meet in the lobby at 7:15 (it was actually more like 7:30).  And we ended up walking to Gordon Biersch Brewery.  Yes, a brewery . . . and yes, I did drink beer.  haha, just root beer!  It was awesome, homemade root beer.  Thankfully, I was really thirsty so I really enjoyed it.  Unfortunately, I was really thirsty, so i drank ALOT!  I don't know how many times the server came by and refilled my glass lol.  Anyways I ordered Fire-grilled Chicken and Fettuccine.  And, it was amazing!  I was really mad because I drank so much root beer by the time my food arrived I wasn't really that hungry, so i only ate half :(  but it was really good. 

So there were 7 engineers at the table . . . so guess what they talked about the whole time.  Well, actually I can't answer that because I really have no idea what they were talking about.  Since I know a little bit about computers (html, css, java script, and python), I was able to understand a very little bit of what they were saying.  The rest of the time I pretty much zoned out . . . and played around with the camera on my phone.

So here's the sign of the restaurant/brewery.

Here's the side of the building. Or it might be the front . . . the entrance was on the side.  So either the entrance was on the side and this is the front, or the entrance was on the front that looked like the side meaning that the front of the building is actually the side.  Confused yet? :)

 Here's another picture of the brewery.  this is the entrance that's either on the side or the front.

We had to wait a little bit for them to set up a table for us to eat at since there were 8 of us.  I felt like a little kid 'cause I totally had no idea what they were talking about so I took some pictures while waiting.  Please note: I am NOT a photographer.  I was using a cell phone camera so these aren't the best quality. . . and I also have no idea what I'm doing.

There was this really cool brick wall in the outside waiting area.  I loved the natural colors and the textures . . . and then there was this spot with a bunch of bricks that looked really cool.

I really just had to photograph what was there.  And what was there happened to be an umbrella.

I actually like this one--what do you think?  I was trying to be creative and juxtapose the colorful, textured wall with a small section of the smooth, mono-colored door frame (it's got other colors . . . but it's mainly one color).

Here's a pic of my chicken fettuccine.

Ok so, like I said earlier, I was really bored in the restaurant.  and, yes, these are "bad" on purpose.  I wanted to have a curvy table and extra forks :) (no, seriously it was on purpose--i think they're hilarious looking.  Actually pretty much anything in hilarious when your stuck at a table with 7 engineers lol)

I had to work with what was there.  So here's a picture of my root beer glass with another really cool brick wall in the background.

and here's just the brick wall.  isn't it neat looking?  i should have taken an up close picture.

Ok, so here's where i was getting really, really bored.  I discovered that my camera will take up to nine shots in a row...hehe.  So after a few normal tries, I started turning the camera this way and that and ended up with a sort of Alice in wonderland falling down the rabbit hole effect.

This is the wall to the right of our table.  I think it looks cool in black and white.

And here's a picture that I didn't take.  This is me at the table.  Actually I didn't sit here lol I sat on the other side, but I wanted the brick wall to be in the background.

Well that's it for now.  I'm going to post some pics of the hotel in another post and some more of the "fun" (but really bad) pics I took yesterday.  So, now that I've thoroughly embarrassed myself by showing you my awesome photography skills, or lack thereof, I hope you'll still keep reading lol

Funny thing on Pier 39

So, I totally forgot to post this in the last post.  anyways this is hilarious.

Just as dad and I were headed to the car, this older guy came up and started talking to us and wanted money for his church (yeah right . . . at 10PM when no one else is on the pier??).  So he was really nice but then he said something to dad about his wife.  Well dad and I both started laughing and we're like trying to explain that I'm his daughter and not his wife lol . . . :)  The guy was a little embarrassed, but he laughed it off.  Right before we left the pier we ran into him again and he said "oh, there's that cute couple again haha" and started laughing.  Either I look 40 or dad looks 20 . . . or maybe we both look 30 lol

Pier 39

Well I'm pretty sure it was pier 39 . . . I think.  Yes, it was definitely Pier 39.

So yesterday was the first day of dad's conference so I just hung out in the hotel room and did some blogging and some emails.  I was going to go outside and walk around . . . but it's like really cold here right now.  I know it's only 10AM, but CAN IT WARM UP SOON PLEASE!!!!!  It's supposed to be 80 today, but it's only 60 right now . . . but, I feel better knowing that it's still warmer here than back at home.

I also played with the camera on my phone and found out a bunch of cool stuff . . . like that I have a panorama setting!  So here's a panorama of our messy hotel room.  It kind looks like something from Alice in Wonderland because after I figured out how to do the panorama I also figured out that I could hold the camera at weird angles to get an effect like this:


I suppose you'll want to know what we did yesterday.  Well at first I really wanted to go to the wax museum in San Francisco but then dad talked me into going to the Ripley's Believe it or Not museum instead. . . . we ended up not doing either.  Since Ripley's was open until 10PM we decided to walk around the wharf for a little, eat, then go to the museum for an hour.  But, as soon as we got to the pier we seriously had the exact same idea at the exact same time--so we just walked around the pier for a couple of hours, ate dinner, and skipped the museums (which, imo, was probably way funner).

Before we got to the parking garage I saw this ginormous bow and arrow.  I just barely had time to grab my camera and take a picture before we passed it.  There were a couple of other things like that that I wanted to get a picture of (like a rocket and this cool tower) but we passed by too quickly and the first take was . . . not good. lol

 So first we walked around the wharf for a little bit and walked into a few shops and tried to decide where to eat.  There were two amazingly awesome stores there (that i forgot to get a picture of!!!! no!! oh well, I think we might be going back there sometime this week and then I'll get a picture of them).  So there was this store called Ireland Treasures and I think the name is self explanatory.  So it had all this cool Irish jewelry and stuff like that.  And then there was this really really cool (I already said amazingly awesome) shell store.  I can't remember the name (stupid me) but I'm pretty sure it was just called The Shell Shop.  Anyways, it was pretty small, but they had an amazing selection of rare shells for sale.  My favorite was this shelf of nautilus shells--and I really want one!  Oh, and in case you didn't know, I collect shells.

So, eventually we reached the end of the pier and saw Alcatraz island and a bunch of other stuff.  Ok, so please forgive me for the poor quality of the night pictures.  We did bring my mom's nice camera, but we left it in the car so we just used my phone camera again (which is fine for during the day but at night . . . not so good.  the flash doesn't work that great).

Here's a very blurry picture of Alcatraz (it's those lights in the center of the picture.)

This is some city that I could see across the water to the right.

This is the view to the left of the pier.

 here's my dad on the pier.

and here's me on the pier.

To tell you the truth, I don't actually remember taking this picture because I remember thinking that I wanted to take a picture with the pier 39 sign . . . and apparently i did.

So there was this really cool merry-go-round with two stories!

Look in the center and there's a second level of horses and stuff to ride on!

We finally decided to eat at Neptune's Palace.  haha and it was like a really fancy restaurant.  We didn't know it at the time, but they only served wine as a drink . . . so we ended up with water.  Anyway the food was REALLY good!  And our seats looked directly out on to the water :) 

Here's my dad trying to decide what to eat.

Here's me :p

Ok, so I should have taken a picture of the food before I ate it . . . but I didn't think of it until after I finished lol.  So dad ordered the grilled swordfish and we shared that (he wasn't that hungry).  it was amazingly good.  My mom doesn't like seafood  so I never get to eat it (except for tuna and salmon . . . blech).  So, it was really fun to get fish FINALLY!  I was also afraid that I wouldn't like it because I had never had the chance to try it before, but it was soooo good.

Ok so I also ordered a side of mac n cheese.  It actually wasn't that good . . . but I thought it was hilarious that a fancy restaurant had a side of mac n cheese lol. 

I also had a cup of clam chowder.  And it was the BESTEST ever clam chowder . . . ever . . . I'm serious.  So you can see how ridiculously small the cup is and it was $6 lol!  But dad and I both agreed that it was totally worth it.  It was really the best clam chowder I've ever, ever, ever had.

 here's a picture of me outside Neptune's Palace

 We walked around for a few more minutes.  And, of course, I couldn't resist going back into the shell store and staring at the nautilus shell that was too expensive to buy . . . :( (dad said maybe we'd go back and he'd buy it for me!)

So here's a picture of the pier from the entrance

there was this weird crab statue out in front of the pier . . . and it's body is a bush cut into the shape of a heart.  So, I named it "The Crab of Love."

So my dad said he wanted to take a picture of me in front of the "crab of love."  and it's a little blurry, but it's still cool.

Remember how I said I figured out how to do the panorama earlier?  So here's a panorama of the pier.

We passed some really cool bridge on the way home and here's a pic I got through the front window.

That's it for now!

The Lady of Mystery and Peggy Sue's

I saw a cool shirt at the Winchester Mystery House that said "The Lady of Mystery" . . . but it was really expensive!  If you haven't guessed yet, we went to the Winchester Mystery House yesterday evening.  But first we went out to eat.

One street to the right of the Hilton (right if you're walking out the front and left if you're walking into the building) is a little 50s diner called Peggy Sue's.  Dad and I looked into a bunch of other restaurants and they were like really expensive and some websites didn't even post the prices so that scared us a bit!  I don't really like fancy restaurants anyways and I much prefer places like Peggy Sue's.  My dad had a really spicy burger and I had a chicken burger with blue cheese!  Here are some pix of Peggy Sue's:

 This is the sidewalk on the way to Peggy Sue's--I thought it was gorgeous.

Here's dad at Peggy Sue's

And here's me with with my french fries . . . yum

Last, but not least, is the front of Peggy Sue's.  It's funny because it was practically sandwiched in between several huge expensive restaurants.  So, it looked really tiny.  Actually it was tiny inside, but I really liked it.  And, I'm so going back for a milkshake sometimes this week!

 So later that evening we went to the Winchester Mystery House which is only like 3 miles from the hotel.  The house is MASSIVE!!! . . . and weird.  Mrs. Winchester supposed built it to appease and/or confuse the spirits of the dead who were killed by the Winchester rifle.  Mrs. Winchester's daughter died and so did her husband.  When she went to a psychic she was told that the spirits of those who were killed by the Winchester rifle were haunting her.  So, she needed to build a house and never stop building it to appease them.  Construction started in 1884 and continued 24/7/365 until she died in 1922.  No joke, they NEVER stopped working on that house--not during a holiday, not during the night, not ever until she died.  The house itself is really kooky.  There's a seance room in the house and it's said she would contact the spirits to see what how they wanted her to build the house and that's where she supposedly got the plans (which sort of explains the strangeness of the house).  She was obsessed with spiderwebs, the number 13, and daisies.  Like I said, the house is really strange.  It's full of doors that open to nowhere, staircases that go right up into the ceiling, a cabinet with only a half inch of space on the inside, bathrooms with glass doors (seriously it's like the toilet was on display), windows in the floor, a room with only one entrance but three exits, and a four story tall chimney that stops one foot short of the roof (so all connecting fireplaces won't function), stairs that are 2 inches tall but two feet wide (for her arthritis--at least that has an explanation), stairs that are two feet tall but only two inches wide, and a bell tower with no way to get to it.  And there was no photography allowed indoors :(  but I got a few pictures of the behind the scenes tour (photography was allowed on that tour).

Here's dad with his hardhat on--we went into the basement and there were lots of low pipes so we were required to wear the hardhats.

Here's me with my hardhat on.  Now an interesting story about how this picture was taken.  I handed dad the camera so he could take a picture and he had his finger right in front of the lens.  So, of course, I said "wait don't take the picture, your finger's right in front of the lens."  But, as he moved his finger out of the way, somehow he ended up throwing my phone into the gravel . . . and now there's a huge dent in the casing.  Thankfully it didn't scratch the screen though.  We were both laughing because I've had the phone for years and here he has it just to take a picture and manages to do more damage in 30 seconds than I did in two years lol.  I did actually let him touch my phone again so here's the picture of me in my awesome hardhat.

I actually don't know why I took a picture of this . . . I think it's because everyone else in the tour group did and I just automatically took a picture of it as well.

The sun was behind the house so in the camera the front of the house looked black--here's probably the best pic I got of the front.  There are 160 rooms total in this house.

Here's a turret.

And here's the side of the house when I finally (stupid me) figured out that I just needed to play with the white balance . . .

That's it for now!  Oh, and I don't have any pictures of it, but after the Winchester House, we wanted to stop and get some water (and some Advil for our headaches) so even through there were little drugstores everywhere, we couldn't find a parking spot.  Lol, we drove around in circles for like an hour trying to find somewhere.  Finally we found some dinky corner store like a few miles out of the downtown area . . . and it had parking!  It's just funny how long it took us to find it . . .

A random pic I found

So when I was uploading the pictures from CA from my phone to my laptop I found a picture I drew earlier this year.  I never posted it on FB so I doubt any of you have seen it before.  Anyways, here it is. Sorry, it's a little blurry and there's a shadow of me standing over it taking the picture.  I didn't take the picture with posting it in mind--I just remembered that I took the picture because I can sometimes see mistakes better with a camera.

Yes, I know the right arm is way too big.  I was really just practicing because I hadn't drawn anything in months . . . and I hadn't actually drawn a person in pencil before (I've done people in scratchboard and with black and white colored pencils on gray paper).  So (have you noticed I say so alot . . . and use parenthesis alot . . . and use ellipses alot) anyways I think it turned out ok.

And, in case you were wondering, the guy in the picture is Ryan Reynolds as Wade Wilson in a scene from X-Men Origins: Wolverine.

DELTA stands for "Don't Expect Luggage To Arrive"

I know I said I would post pictures last night . . . but I didn't.  I was going to, but I realized that it wouldn't matter if I waited until the morning because if I posted them at 10PM here it would be 1AM in Cleveland.  So I might as well try to get some sleep and just post the pix in the morning.  Speaking of which it is only 9AM here (i've been up since 7AM), so I'm not being incredibly lazy and sleeping 'til noon :)  (in body time it is around noon).

The first flight from CLE to minneapolis was cramped and FREEEEEEEZING!  And the second flight was a comfortable temperature and I had enough room to breathe.  Nothing else really exciting happened on the plane.  Oh, except I heard one of the passengers joking that DELTA stands for "Don't Expect Luggage To Arrive."  (I overheard her saying that she lost a large suitcase through delta on another trip.  apparently she bought a ton of new clothes specifically for the trip, but she never got to wear them). Considering that I REALLY needed my suitcase I was a little nervous the rest of the trip.  But, thankfully, all our suitcases arrived safely in CA.  At the hotel, I found a notice in my suitcase saying that it was randomly chosen for inspection . . . which explains why my body wash was open and the clothes were really messed up.  I thought they might want to look at my bag because it was really, really heavy (I had to put a ton of textbooks in it . . .).

Ok, so here are some pics I took from the plane window.  Of course i didn't take any above cleveland because there were clouds . . . duh.  But, believe it or not, in other places you can actually see the sun and there aren't that many clouds!!!  So, I took some pictures just to prove it lol.  Oh, and these were taken through a plane window with a cell phone camera . . . and I'm not a photographer so these aren't that great.

I'm pretty sure that this is the Salt Lake . . . note the lack of clouds.

I'm pretty sure that these are the Rockies . . . again I'm only pretty sure ('cause that's what dad told me) and again note the lack of clouds.

Now, just to prove that I was above the clouds (and yes there was a cloud here and there . . . but nothing like in OH).  The dark spots on the ground are the shadows of the clouds!!

This is over CA and I thought that the geometric pattern of roads and the different uses of land (resulting in different colored areas) was really cool looking.

More of the same--pretty cool looking.

I actually don't know what or where this is.  I didn't ask my dad, and he's in a meeting right now so I definitely can't ask him now.  But, I just thought this was pretty. Kind of looks like it's floating . . .

 So that's all of the plane pictures.  Here's some pictures that I got through the car window on the way to the hotel.  This is the first palm tree that I saw (I might have seen another one . . . but this is the first one that I thought to take a picture of).  I love palm trees.

Here are more palm trees . . . and the reflection of something in the window lol.

 So we're staying in the Hilton Hotel in San Jose.  The interior of the hotel is really REALLY modern looking.  So far I've either been carrying a humongous load of luggage or been in a big hurry every time I've walked through the lobby . . . but I will get some pictures before the week's over.  There are these awesome spherical chairs that I'm going to sit in and have dad take a picture.

Here's a picture of our hotel room . . .  It's really small so i can't figure out why it's so expensive--at least dad's company is paying for it.  And, yes that is my dad in the lower right hand corner lol.  We were incredibly tired . . . and still we stayed up until 12AM (or 3AM body time).  I really don't know how I stayed up so late because I had been awake for almost two entire days--close to 48 hours.

Here's the view out the window.

And here's looking down through the window . . . more palm trees!

So that's it for now.  I'll post pictures of where we went for lunch and where we went in the evening later. I"m thinking I'll post in the morning after breakfast from now on (in the afternoon for you if you're in OH) that's just a very convenient time.

I can see the sun . . . and there aren't any clouds :)

So, if you haven't guessed already, I'm in San Jose, CA right now!  I already took a bunch of pictures, but I don't feel like posting them right now.  I know that sounds lazy, but it's because I have the most horrible headache--I love flying, but I always get the worst headaches and earaches.  I can't find any Advil (I must have left it at home) but I just drank a cup of coffee and it's helping.

I'm sitting by the window in the hotel room looking out at the beautiful sun!  Well, I'm not exactly looking right now since I'm typing--and I can't look that long anyway 'cause my head still hurts.  I'm not sure what we'll be doing this evening but I'll post (hopefully pics too) as soon as I get back.  Hope you all (at least the readers in the cleveland area) are enjoying your nasty weather lol :p

Ok, so the hotel is really close to the airport and really low planes keep flying over.  If I happen to have my phone or the camera with me I'll make sure to get a picture of that.  I was so excited to see the first palm tree.  That was the first thing I looked for when dad and I got into the rental car.  So, I did get a picture of the palm tree.  And, there are a bunch of really cool (but not the best quality because it was with a cell phone camera through a window!) pictures from the plane's window.   Check back soon for some pictures and some updates about what dad and I ended up going to see.