san francisco, the last days

The rest of the week (Wednesday and Thursday) was spent uneventfully: rainy days in Sean's cool, thin-walled dorm room watching movies such as Megamind, Coraline, and Seven Samurai, while evenings were spent in the hotel room playing sudoku and watching AMC, the only channel that would come through that didn't eventually turn to static or suddenly switch stations. We also may or may not have watched two or three episodes of The Nanny until one in the morning.

My second to last day there, Friday, started off with a trip on MUNI metro, an exhausting wander through a winding, hilly neighborhood to yet another nonexistent place.

Then it was back onto MUNI metro and a walk along Hayes Street (with a stop at Paulette Macarons) to Alamo Square, across the street from the famed Painted Ladies aka Postcard Row.

Picture this: Sitting in front of the picturesque Victorian townhouses in pastel shades of green, beige, olive, yellow, purple, blue and brown while eating macarons out of a sweetly packaged box in pastel shades of raspberry red, almond pink, pistachio green, lavender cassis, chocolate brown and coffee. Cute, right?

Lots more walking ensued to get back to Sean's dorm. We spent the rest of the evening surfing the internet, watching television and eating (almost) an entire bag of double stuf Oreos and milk.

And then the last day. Saturday.

My return flight wasn't schedule until 10:30 that night so we had time to actually enjoy the day. A quick recap:

Checked out of hotel at 11am
Argonaut Book Shop up the street
30 bus from Stockton to Columbus Cafe: turkey club and caramel frappé
Chocolate chip cookies at Mrs. Fields
Walgreens for Coffeemate and sugar
Instant coffee and flipping through magazines
All Over Coffee by Paul Madonna
Lori's Diner
Flight delayed by one hour
BART to airport
And the short goodbye, which for once didn't involve tears

And that's it. It already feels like a lifetime ago, a world away. Which, being all the way across the country, is. And, as is obvious, I can't wait to go back! I've never been anywhere so exciting and so different and so attainable. Being a traveller at heart, I've always had a bit of wanderlust, so this whole trip thrilled me and filled me beyond description. But of course I had to try, so thanks to all of you who took the time to read all of this and for giving me such encouraging words on my writing!

The end.