"All these things I should keep to myself
But I feel somehow strangely compelled...."

- Neil Finn, Sinner

Last time I travelled, I came across an article in one of those backseat magazines that had some nifty places to stay; I wrote down all the websites to check out later and I just came across that piece of paper on my desk (putting them here so I can throw it in the recycling). I'd love to try them out sometime. Maybe after the kids have moved out.

Sweden - a 747 that's been turned into a hostel.



Switzerland - The Anti-Luxury Hotel - 0 Starsl

• military-style bunks in place of beds
• hot water bottles to make up for no central heating
• earplugs in case you can’t sleep because of the noise from the fans
• complimentary slippers if floors are icy
• no windows, just four white walls everywhere you look
• hot water to shower in is limited, hence wheel of fortune will determine who will have to shower in cold water

Idaho - For the Ultimate Beagle Lover

Austria - Sleep in a drainpipe.

Netherlands - stay in a lighthouse, a lifeboat, or a crane in the harbor...

And finally, not a hotel, but you can buy one to live in...Tree Pod Houses.

Tired. Seems like I've had one deadline after another lately. Not getting enough sleep. And it's my own fault. I read someone's feelings about procrastination recently (scroll down to Procrastination, or The Mobility Impaired Brain), which I really identified with - actually, I'd read it quite a while ago and only recently found it again. And I was probably continuing to procrastinate reading the damn thing. Anyway...

Sitting in the airport in San Francisco. My plane was supposed to leave in 20 minutes ago and has been delayed for another 40 - I'm going to LAX and a plane going to Dallas is still parked at the gate. I drank two $8 glasses of Merlot in an airport seafood place to celebrate being done with my bit of the Council meeting; I noticed on the menu there, the swordfish was going for the same price as a chicken breast was in the hotel. GODS, was that place pricey. I bought my breakfast in the gift shop (which was about a third the size of my bedroom), and at least the coffee in my room was decent.

I always wonder in airports. There's a family of five travelling somewhere, with their pile of carryons, and each kid seems to have their own Nintendo DS. My family could never afford to fly anywhere, and still, I really only travel by air for work. We've still never visited John's relatives in Michigan - although a large part of that is that, not only could we not afford without saving for a long while, John really doesn't have any desire to, not having been back there since leaving at 15.

............

Blah. I've been trying to get back to this post for a week; despite having several days off, I never accomplished anything more on it. Batteries on laptop went out and it was time to board the plane, finally. Somehow, I scored a first class seat, which was nice although not that much different. I got to drink my cranberry juice out of a glass cup instead of plastic, and my tray table was actually smaller. I suppose it would make more of a difference on a longer flight. Gareth was a little disappointed I didn't bring back pictures from the air, but I didn't have a window seat.

I was hoping I could get together with my old college roomie while at this meeting, but sadly, 'twas not to be. Ah well, maybe another time. The Council meets in Foster City, also in the Bay Area, in September, I think. She left me the best phone message, though. I'll have to save that one! Yes, I should return it.

I had been ready the day before for a 6am meeting that wound up not happening, and I'd gone across the street to the Bay's edge before the sun came up - there's a wetlands and across an inlet, the San Franscisco airport - but I didn't take my camera with me. Today I resolved to get up early again (on a Sunday morning, and meetings didn't start until 10!) to see if I could get what I'd seen the day before. Wasn't quite successful.

Two kinds of wing-ed things...
Millbrae CA
Sharp VE-CG30
5 April 2009

( +2 )

Up in the Bay Area for a fisheries management meeting for about four days. This is the view from the Westin San Francisco Airport - hills in Millbrae/Burlingame? According to Google Maps, there's a reservoir at the top of that hill (?!). The wind was blowing hard the first two days I was there - felt like it just blew off the Artic ice floes. Seems like those clouds just clung to the top of those hills all day.

Westin Airport
Millbrae CA
Sharp VE-CG30
02 April 2009

And yeah, I'm back to the old camera for travel anyway - with airlines charging $15 to check a bag, and only two carryons allowed, I just don't have room for the bulky camera bag.

Heading up to Monterey for a staff meeting. Driving because of the budget, and about 44 miles from Salinas. A few minutes ago, south of King City, we passed half a dozen deer in a dormant walnut orchard; it seemed strange to see them in such an open space, right next to the highway, dark gray-brown antlers among white walnut branches. For that matter, I could've sworn I saw a doe between the bushes below the Getty Center while we were still in LA. And coworker B has been making a game of counting redtailed hawks along the highway. It'll be dark soon. Glad to not be driving. He was just remarking how the last 50 miles seem to be the longest. (sent while heading up the 101...)

Workshop
Berkeley CA
Sharp VE-CG30
04 December 2008

( more public art... )

I cannot stand sitting in stop and go traffic on interstate 5 coming home from San Diego, so sometimes I take Highway 1 along the coast north. I may not be moving any faster, but at least it's prettier to look at. At the stretch of beach crossing the lagoon between Solana Beach and Cardiff-by-The-Sea, I saw these stones stacked up with the lowering sun lighting them just perfectly. Of course, I was compelled to turn around and park to try to take of picture of them, and also of course, but the time I did park and hike a 1/4 mile back to them (not that far, but it still took time, the perfect lighting was completely gone. But still neat to see all these standing piles of stones by the side of road.

San Elijo Lagoon
Cardiff-by-the-Sea State Beach
Cardiff-by-the-Sea CA
Sharp VE-CG30
04 November 2008

( +3 )

I don't think I've ever been in an elevator before that had instructions on how to use the buttons.

Town & Country Hotel
San Diego CA
Kyocera Switchback phone camera
02 November 2008

I had to fly to Boise for a meeting; we flew over the same lake we drove past on our way camping in August...

Lake Success CA
Sharp VE-CG30
07 September 2008

Payday tomorrow...I'm sure the bus driver will be happy; today and Friday I've had to pay my entire fare in nickels and dimes, and not even the option of driving, because the Kia has just about enough for John to pick up Gareth at summer school. $10 yesterday was enough to get 2 gallons and barely move the needle off E.

We have a trip planned in August to drive to Carlsbad Caverns and take a cave tour or two, and camp. We were going also visit the Grand Canyon, but with the price of gas that's out. We're planning on using our economic stimulus check for it, and John thinks even if gas gets up to $5.25, we can still afford it.

I am dubious. I am all for staying closer to home. Driving across the desert in August, with three kids who have never been on a long car trip before (two of whom seem to have problems sitting still for any length of time), does not sound like a wonderful time to me.

Well, we'll see. My family made cross country trips in the summer, without DVD player or AC even. We did have a camper and more room to spread out, though. And a couple of those trips were made when we kids were old enough to share in the driving.

I was kind of hoping to use part of our check to get a new camera, but I don't suppose there's going to be any extra for that...

Driving home from Carlsbad again; the home stretch about a mile away from home this time.

Main Street
Huntington Beach CA
Kyocera Switchback phone camera
04 June 2008

( Blimp! )

Attending another meeting in Carlsbad; had one glass of wine and some appetizers while trying to get fishermen's opinions of some issues (and damn is it difficult to get a word in edgewise with those guys, especially when you're an introvert), then drove back home. The clouds were starting to come in from the ocean, but a break in then over the mountains in Camp Pendleton showed more tall sunset-colored thunderheads that would have made a fitting background to a Maxfield Parrish painting. Massive fail on capturing it.

Camp Pendleton CA
Kyocera Switchback phone camera
03 June 2008

VoicePost 313K 1:37

“I've spent the last 2 days in La Hoya and learning a lot of very interesting things about biology of swordfish and leatherback sea turtles and fishery interaction or something. So all very interesting and so heading up the 405 into the westering sun and just happening I stopped at this Starbucks in Carlsbad because driving back and forth to San Diego for 2 days in a row requires lots of caffeine and I happen to glance at the albums in the store and this has struck me before but I don't think I ever recorded getting anything there but I glanced at the albums and I had this thought well when did David Duchovny make an album? I didn't know a thing and then I looked at it closer and it was Katie Lange's new album and it literally struck me before but at least on this album cover she looks just like him. Anyway I haven't made a voice post in quite a while. Want to see if LiveJournal can actually translate it over the pickup truck engine noise. Anyway talk to you soon. Bye.” Auto-Transcribed Voice Post

Um, that was La Jolla and K.D. Lang...and I didn't realize I spoke in such run-on sentences.

Darn it. Now I'm torn. I was so excited to be able to go to the 7th Annual Trinational Sardine Forum in Vancouver, where I'm supposed to present the California fisheries update. I haven't been there since I was a foreign fisheries observer and the Polish factory trawler I was on ended its cruise there. Oh, and once for an evening visiting my brother when Pacific Northwest Ballet was performing there. However, it's just now sunk in that the Forum starts at 8:00 a.m. on November 1. Which probably means I will have to be up there the night before.

On Halloween. Gareth's birthday. And isn't November 1 a fairly important holiday in Mexico, too, where a good portion of the attendees are from? Hmm. There used to be a lot of complaints about the CalCOFI (California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigations) Conference, when it was held at that time - it's since been scheduled either later in November and this year, December.

On the up side, this is the hotel where it's being held: http://www.listel-vancouver.com/

Pretty fancy!

In October, I'll get to go to Portland again for a CPS Management Team/Advisory Subpanel meeting, so that will interesting. But probably only for the day or overnight at the most. I liked it a lot, last time I was there.

(Yes, I did start on this Halloween evening - I never seem to get them done the same day anywhere near the time it actually happened - I may backdate it later...)

I suppose I should go clean up the pumpkin goop in the kitchen before I collapse.

( Halloween morning - a visit with a locomotive...careful - photo heavy) )

In La Jolla again - we came down this evening so we wouldn't have to leave so early for a meeting at 8 am. I am sharing a room with V. instead of K. thank goodness. Be back Tuesday evening. You'd think these guys would remember the day before is a holiday. Whoopee snort - get to look at sardine earbones for two days. It actually should be interesting since we get to meet up with biologists from Oregon, Washington, Canada and hopefully Mexico, and we can all get on the same page reading them. V. is waiting for me to turn off the light, so I'd better git. This room had better cool down though. We came back from something to eat and it was 85 degrees in here. I can't sleep when it's hot.

I am down in La Jolla for a meeting, and I am staying at the fanciest hotel I think I've ever stayed at! I am normally a Motel 6 kinda gal, but my co-worker K. is pickier. So we are staying at the La Jolla Hotel at the Shores, and is it ever nice. Nice furniture, louvered shutters instead of curtains in front of the sliding glass door, terry cloth bathrobes, cucumber soap in the bathroom, a chaise lounge, and the TV is in an armoire. We are sharing a room because it's over the price The Man will cover for us.

I have gotten 12 hours of sleep in the last three days, so I am going to bed early for a change. Why do these damn meetings have to start at 8 am when they know people have to drive 2+ hours to get there?

Anyway, I'm going to take a shower in the bathroom where the towels are folded like fans, and pass out. I have more stuff to write, but I'm too tired. I think I'll have to backdate some stuff later.