Through HELL-A and back

Why oh why can't I get from here to San Diego without going through LA???

Oh well. Drove down Thursday; back Saturday. Not a very long trip but I took care of some important things. I stayed with my father-in-law; and, as I knew would be, I was greeted by a rose from his garden in my room.



I haven't been to SD alone in a long, long time. It was great to spend time with Hughie. I saw some friends, ate at a couple of my favorite places, shopped a bit. Typical SD weekend. I visited my old (in both senses of the word) friend Mae Lou who is in a nursing home. Her brain goes in and out, but when it's "in", she's just as sharp as ever. She motioned for me to bend down for a hug and kiss as I was leaving, ran her fingers through my hair (which I'm wearing a bit on the spikey side) and said, "Your hair's a mess." Yep, that's Mae Lou.

No photos from the nursing home. It's too depressing.

I had breakfast Saturday AM at the Broken Yolk in Pacific Beach with Michelle (left) and Dawn. Michelle's 53rd birthday!! They are going to plan a weekend trip to visit when both can take a day off work.



Also got one of the greatest quotes ever from friend Tom. Tom is an anesthesiologist. He's had some serious health problems and is retired on partial disability, but trying to do some part-time work at Kaiser to supplement income. That wasn't working out well, so he was thinking about other work. Then he said. . . . ready?? Here it comes: "There's always food in the rat trap." So, he's trying to come to a way to reduce costs rather than look for other work. Made me think of the book Watership Down. So, I'm now trying to pay very close attention to what may be my personal rat trap.


And, then there's LA. Going down was awful. Coming back not quite as bad. This photo is coming back. Had I thought to take a picture going down, you'd see traffic in both directions completely stopped. The air was even dirtier than it looks in this photo. I've got a sore throat just from driving through twice. The human animal was NOT meant to live this way.

One more of those just magical things: Hughie and I went to our favorite Italian restaurant, Venetian in Pt. Loma, Thursday evening. As we were getting ready to leave I looked up and saw a couple I'd lost track of several years ago after they moved from SD to Louisiana. I tried to find them post-Katrina via Google (they have an unusual name and he is a doctor so it seemed reasonable), but had no luck. So, there they were. Moved back? Nope. In town for a wedding, just for the weekend, and we ended up at the same place. So, now I have contact info for old friends. Pretty cool.

I'm making a pact with myself to get to San Diego more often. Mae Lou doesn't have a lot of time left, and Hughie is almost 96, though in great shape. I just have to suck it up and do it, LA or not.