Day at the park

Dan and I went to our favorite nearby park today because it was HOT outside. It was lovely to sit in the shade, eat some cheese and drink a bottle of wine. But mostly, it was lovely to people watch. The following list doubles as "things we saw today" and "reasons why berkeley will never stop being entertaining" **Jugglers **The people who came and popped open a camping tent, big enough for probably 6 people **A big water balloon fight **A VERY unhappy cat on a leash **Possibly the hairiest man alive, showing the most ass crack I have ever seen a man display (niiiiiiiiiiiice) **A creepy guy going around to people on their blankets and towels and asking the women if he could pick them up. As in, literally, off the ground. I pretended to be asleep when he came over our way. **A couple who brought their pet turtle and let him scamper around on the grass for awhile **Lots of pot smoking right there out in the open

The post in which I make you feel bad.

So, it's no secret that since moving to cali I've become even more of a crazy liberal hippie than I was before. I've started getting all into farmer's markets and reusable shopping bags and all that business. And compared to my life before I got here, I feel like I do a lot of things to make sure that I'm pretty sustainable. Unfortunately, some of those "How big is your carbon footprint?" online quizzes out there tell me that if everyone lived like I do, we would need 4.53 earths to sustain all of us. And, that makes me feel bad and wears away on me until I feel guilty and ashamed and take another step to do something else. So I figured if I put everything on the blog, maybe I'll feel even MORE guilt and need to start picking up the pace on all this business. But, I think we should start with the positives - what ways of life have Dan and I picked up AND stuck with since we moved? 1. Reusable shopping bags at the grocery store 2. Local, organic milk in reusable glass bottles 3. More local and organic food - everytime we need something new we try to make sure it's local (origin within 100 miles) and always organic beef, eggs and dairy 4. Buying in the bulk aisle - reuse the plastic bags, avoid packagaing and cheeeeaper 5. Plastic, Metal, and glass recycling (home and work) 6. Paper/cardboard recycling (including junk mail, and anything that gets shredded) 7. No car. (Whatever, it counts.) Lots more walking, biking and public transit (even to the airport people. I'm committed) 8. Non toxic household cleaners - we like Method a lot, and Mrs. Meyers 9. Composting! Hooray for Berkeley for having food scrap composting available. 10. Compostable paper towels and utensils 11. No plastic bottles. Ever. Sigg water bottles as replacement. 12. Unplugging certain appliances at night (power strips, etc.) 13. All laundry washed with cold water. 14. CFLs replace any burned out light bulbs (even in the fridge, which was strange at first, but it's ok now) 15. Using one side clean paper before recycling it. At work: 1. Encouraging staff to use one side clean paper for flyers, copies and in the printer 2. Making sure compost and recycle bins are available at events (still in progess) 3. Cutting down on paper use through online surveys, and evaluations 4. Buying post consumer waste paper products (as high percentage as possible) 5. Reusing everything possible 6. Not allowing any staff funding to be spent on plastic bottles at all. My staff cried about this for about 5 minutes before moving on. Honestly, right now after writing that list, I'm feeling pretty good about myself. But, I feel like I can do a lot more. I do know this is kind of a downward spiral, because there are always people that do crazy amounts more than I do for the planet and such. Not going to focus on that though. 1. Take the reusable shopping bags other places! No idea why I have such a block on bringing them to Target or whatever, but I always forget. 2. Taking shorter showers. While Dan was gone this week, I took the kitchen timer into the shower to try and time myself and...epic fail. I need to be better about this. Showers do not need to be so long! 3. More natural personal use products - lotion, shampoo, face wash, makeup, etc. 4. Kitty litter. mmmmk. So full of chemicals and badness. There are some compostable/natural ones out there that you can flush (seriously!) which are better for kitties and people. Need to look into. 5. Make at least one fully local meal a week. Which means... 5a.Get back to the weekly farmer's market - it is ridiculous that we aren't going every week when it is made so easy for us in Berkeley. We have at least 4 or 5 around that we can walk to every week. Our food should be more local, supporting the actual people who farm. Plus, this helps us eat what is actually in season! Also, buy more heirloom varieties. 6. Trying to cut down on ridiculous amounts of packaging. For example - last time we went to Costco, we bought a big thing of Ritz crackers, which was four boxes of Ritz inside another box. Ugh. 7. Buy compostable napkins and tissues 8. Continue finding out where my stuff comes from - I recently had a bad experience with eggs, thought I was getting free range eggs from happy hens anddd no. I need to educate myself more. 9. Unplugging more things when they are not in use (especially in my office) Long term goals: 1. Make own household cleaners for much cheaper 2. Learn how to can and preserve fresh local foods What are you doing to be more sustainable? Seriously, I need all the help and moral support I can get! If you're not doing anything, here are some links to start the feeling bad about that: Sustainable Dave - this guy is doing about 14 times more than me. and he's funny in his videos. Story of Stuff - fun video

November, one day at a time

Well, it's already the second weekend of November, and I haven't told you all thank you so much for my birthday wishes yet, which is not cool of me. So, THANK YOU! I feel very loved and appreciated. Thanks for the cards, Facebook notes, phone calls, flowers, emails, etc. You are all awesome. A lot of people have asked what we did for my birthday. So... November 1... Hooray for birthdays! We woke up actually later than planned - we had wanted to go to brunch at my favorite place, and by the time we got down there (in the pouring rain) and realized how long the wait would be, Dan realized that I would be late for my birthday present, which was a 90 minute massage! So, we ate birthday lunch at Baja Fresh (fancy, I know) and then headed to the spa...in the pouring rain. Dan had booked a deep tissue massage for me, because of the class I had taken that week, which was great but it was intense. When I left, Dan wasn't back yet, but the ladies at the spa were sure to tell me that my husband would be back soon to pick me up. A little weird. That night we set out for a night out in SF because we had tickets to a Matt Nathanson concert at the Warfield, which is this incredibly historic venue in downtown SF (the locals call it the Tenderloin district. Could there be a more unappealing name for a location?) Anyway, we went to one of our favorite local places for dinner (Burmese!) and then headed across the bay, still in the pouring rain. Luckily, we got to the Warfield in plenty of time, and the concert was GREAT. If you've never heard of him, you should check him out. He's in the Jason Mraz/John Mayer sort of vein. Anyway, he put on a great show, and is a really funny guy, so the in between song bits were good times. November 2... Another day, another concert. We saw Jason Mraz at the Greek Theater (on campus venue, where I went to see Dave Matthews) - it was a weekend full of skinny white guys playing guitars really. The concert strangely started at 3pm, which was especially weird on the same day as Daylight Savings. Anyhow, he's also great live. He was a little too happy, the world is made of sunshine and unicorns, every little thing is gonna be alright for this sarcastic heart though. BUT, I really appreciated that live, he really sounds like he does on his album, which is important to me. November 3... Good things! My staff had broken into my office over the weekend and decorated - all week I was tripping over the balloons that were all over the floor. They were all really proud of themselves, coming by to make sure that I liked it. Also, I left the office early, because I had to get home to watch Monday Night Football. (Early, because that crap starts at 5 pm here. Which is ridiculous). Anyway, I know Redskins fans know the outcome of the game, but I just wanted to reiterate that the Steelers were victorious. And I was happy about it. November 4... So, I'm not sure if I really need to state the fact that the candidate I voted for won the presidential race, or the fact that he won in quite an impressive fashion, or the fact that I am SO HAPPY ABOUT IT. Yeah, I didn't think so. Election day was interesting here - I was still at work at like, 4 pm, when they started announcing that some of the East Coast states were either going red or blue. The polls had barely closed in California before they called the whole election - it was crazy. Students basically rushed out of the buildings and had a celebration in the courtyard, complete with cheering, chanting "Yes we can" and all out screaming. Luckily, they left the unit, but only to join the cheering MOB that took over all of downtown Berkeley and the whole campus. It was pretty intense apparently. There are pictures all over CNN and Facebook. Also - VIRGINIA? OHIO? I am SO proud!!! I couldn't believe it. What a time to be a proud Northern Virginia Democrat. I didn't do any of the rejoicing and running about, which I'm now regretting. I wish I had taken the time to celebrate, because all of my exhiliration was basically completely sucked out when I clicked over on cnn.com to check on the ballot measures and saw that it was likely that Prop 8 was going to pass in California. In case you've been living under a rock, Prop 8 is the measure that banned gay marriage in California. It ended up actually passing 52% to 46%. I was and still am shocked and completely appalled. I didn't realize how much I was emotionally invested in the measure until it passed...and now, I just don't even know what to say. Of course though, I am thrilled to have contributed to the historic moment of Obama getting elected. November 5... Moping still about Prop 8. November 6... Tech beat Maryland on Thursday night. Fear the turtle my ass. November 7... I actually missed the Prop 8 march in San Francisco on Friday night, because I had to teach my class. But, on the up side, class went really well, and I think a lot of them are really starting to make some progress, which is of course what's really important. November 8... Wow, a lot of good football today. Most of the games didn't end up the way I would have liked, but good games. Penn State, loser. LSU (who I was rooting for after the PSU loss), loser. Cal, loser - which is fine, because they couldn't catch a pass to save their lives. And wow, penalties much? In other news, I'm on my second to last book for the year - I'm actually reading the Diary of Anne Frank for the first time ever, and having some trouble getting into it. I find myself forgetting while I'm reading that she was a real person, in this REAL situation. Crazy. Any suggestions for the 50th book? Also, my grandparents (mom's parents) just celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary on Friday. I have a hard time wrapping my brain around the concept of sixty years. Six decades! They are pretty awesome. I updated you all on the status of my grandmother actually, and I wanted to say thanks for the warm thoughts - she will be going into surgery to remove a tumor, but she is in very high spirits, her doctors are positive and the prognosis is good. So, we will keep hoping for things to go well! Saw my first Christmas themed commercial yesterday. Ugh. The rain has started here almost every day, which means winter is actually here. Between that and the sun going down so GD early, I'm kind of depressed about the weather and out of doors. I hope everyone is staying warm! **Update: So, I was reading through my old posts today and realized that I'm a total hypocrite. When it was March, and Daylight Savings Time went the other way, I was all "Woo Daylight Savings! Extra daylight is the best thing ever!" and now...where's the loyalty? *shakes head sadly*

Election Day!

Well, I'm up late studying for election day. Seriously, I'm studying and doing research. Between elected positions, state proposition and city measures, there are THIRTY EIGHT items on the City of Berkeley ballot. I haven't studied this hard in awhile. I have a cheat sheet. Luckily, my polling place is literally in my unit (I can go in PJs! It's right downstairs! I don't even have to go outside!) so if there is any last minute cramming, I'll probably still do OK. I hope everyone is going to take the time to vote tomorrow. Even if the lines are long, even if the weather is crappy, even if you have to wake up early and go before work. Voting tomorrow is a new requirement to be my friend. No vote=no hugs and love from KK. Honestly, I don't care who you vote for (I mean, I care, but it's up to you) I care more that you just actually do it. It's not cute to complain about the state of things and then NOT VOTE. Um, also. NO on Prop 8. and 4. That is all.

Other California goings on...

I am on a posting ROLL people! I hope you're as impressed with me as I am with myself. So what do I actually have to talk about... *I'm 38 books into my goal of reading 50 books this year. It's feeling very accomplishable at this point. Plus, books are moving out of the house as they're being read, which means I can buy more books soon. (If you haven't heard, I'm currently banned from buying more books. Because they threaten to take over the whole of our apartment.) *Last weekend's adult plans to go to Target and Costco also ended up including Michaels, Office Depot and IKEA (twice). Oh my do I feel suburban. *I'm really enjoying the fact that I've actually gotten to watch the first three VT football games! I didn't think I'd be able to watch many this year since we aren't ranked, so I've been very happily surprised. Dan and I are hoping to watch a couple with the Bay Area VT Alumni Association and perhaps even meet some people. Only took a year... *We did go the first Cal game (Cal/Michigan State) although we didn't buy season tickets this year, as we weren't really feeling the games out here. But, I was really eager to see some college football. So, there we were. The Golden Knights (Josh - is that name right? I know we talked about it while you were here) also parachuted into the stadium at halftime, to the delight/horror of the girl behind us, who kept exclaiming "He's landing too fast!" while not thinking through the fact that this was probably NOT their first time doing this. Student Section: *My staff seriously does love Dan. See below. *Still love the fog. Photo is taken from the Lawrence Hall of Science at night (obviously)

More late night thoughts

*So believe it or not, Dan and I have lived here for a year. Our moving anniversary passed last week on July 8th. Crazy I tell you. I think I missed it because I've blocked the memory of our incredibly stressful moving process.

*Public transportation pet peeves: Missing a bus by mere inches. People who talk REALLY LOUDLY on their cell phones continuing a conversation on a crowded bus.

*I have passed my airline curse onto my loved ones. My mom got stuck in Texas for 10 hours while trying to get to California (for work) and then they lost her luggage for three days.

*My new favorite song is "After Tonight" by Justin Nozuka, who I thought was some unknown guy who was playing on my Pandora station. Then I found out he's all over VH1, but whatever, you can give me the credit when you fall in love with the song too. Go download it! But be warned the chorus gets stuck in your head like a beeyotch. Also, Ro, he's half Japanese.

*Blog posts with photos to look forward to: 12 on the 12th - A Day in the life of Dan, the SF Pride Parade and a city walk.

*The AFSCME (no, I do not know what it stands for) union is on strike here all week long because they quite simply don't get paid enough. This union encompasses our custodians, maintenance staff, groundskeepers, and food service workers. Good thing it's not during the school year because this place would be a hot mess. So, many of the RDs and I aren't eating in the dining halls this week to support the strikers, many of whom we know and work with and interact with every day. So, we're alternating people making dinner for everyone. Tonight Dan and I made breakfast for dinner for about 10 people. Good times. Dan makes killer raspberry chocolate chip pancakes.

*I have read 30 books this year so far. Currently reading: "The Woman Warrior" by Maxine Hong Kingston and am about to start "Ship of Fools" by Katharine Anne Porter, and "The Color Purple."

*This blogpost is also the latest edition of the "I am SO EXCITED to see everyone" newsletter. Clearly, there are good times to be had. See exhibit A below.

Superbly Berkeley

Yesterday was a wonderful full day of embracing the Berkeley lifestyle. We only set out to take a walk and get some food, but it turned into an exploration filled with local produce, public services, and the good old random park festival. Oh, did I mention that we must have walked nearly 4 miles around Berkeley to enjoy all these fun things. Who needs a car. OK, so we actually did purposefully want to make it to the farmer's market. There are 3 each week in Berkeley, you think we could make it to at least one. And we did! The last time, we went to the all organic farmer's market and basically stuffed ourselves with giant peaches. Yum! It isn't peach season, but strawberry season instead. Again, yum! There's pretty much everything you could want: the local butcher shop meats, local dairy cheeses and butter, fresh veggies, hand made breads and pastas. Hungry yet? So we bought strawberries, and mushrooms, and locally made challah bread. So right next to the farmer's market is the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Park which is even cooler than it sounds because it has a rock climbing wall sized for babies. It's one of those fun things for kids I wish I could play with. (Not like I can't go use the big boy rock climbing wall.) You know what I'm talking about. Well on this day, there was an interesting looking festival with booths full of fantastical things. By interesting and fantastical, I mean it was a Pagan Festival. Not really our scene, but stumbling through trying not to stare was fun. The children running around with brooms, while their moms who were wearing fairy wings all chatted was...interesting. So continuing our walk, we came across the Berkeley Public Library. Who owns a library card these days? I do. Actually it's in her name, but whatever. Our library is actually really nice, who knew! She's basically trying to find as many inexpensive ways to get books as possible. I count about 7 different ways thus far. As for me, I get to read a lot more now since I commute on the metro... ahem BART. Kristin is excited about using me as her book pick-up and drop-off, since my walk to the BART station takes me right past the library. Anyway, we left the library and then went to do he rest of our grocery shopping that we can't do at a farmer's market. So, we went to Whole Foods. Milk in recycled glass bottles, organic everything, buying in bulk, etc. Good times. Then we walked on home. It really was quite a Berkeley day. And with that, maybe I'll finally post about work too. 2 posts in a day... I dunno, that might be pushing it. Miss you all!

Late Night thoughts v.4

*Our apartment experienced not one but TWO floods this weekend for two completely different reasons. It was pretty awesome.

*I just finished reading Eat, Pray, Love which has been a bestseller for awhile. It's about this woman who takes a year out of her life and lives for four months each in Italy (to experience pleasure, eating and doing whatever she wants), India (to find her version of God while living in an Ashram), and Indonesia (trying to find a balance between pleasure and devotion). So, it was definitely a good read. Didn't change my life. People are RAVING about this book though...maybe I missed it?

*Target on Sundays = not a fun experience. Do not plan on repeating that anytime soon.

*Lots of cultural type things are happening on campus because it's almost the end of the semester, so it's time for all the clubs on campus to put on their large events. I'm kind of a big deal, so students invite me to everything and I can't go to all of them people! The guilt I'm feeling over this is kind of ridiculous. Although, this weekend we did go to the annual Cal community Native American pow-wow. It was awesome.

*Dan has recently been making a big thing about how most deodorants have aluminum in them (did you know? it's actually pretty bad for you...) so today while we were at Whole Foods (yes, we shop at Whole Foods) we each bought a "natural" deodorant that is aluminum free. I told him I would try it for a week and see how it goes. For serious, Dan's is a scent called "Woodspice" and it's uber strong smelling...so, his armpits are going to smell like pine trees. Not sure how I'm feeling about that. I mean, I'd rather pine trees than funk, but really? Pine trees?

*Next week is MAY and during the lovely, beautiful,glorious month of May, students move out. I can't believe the school year is almost over! 4 more weeks. Crazy talk.

*Is everyone around the country getting all this information about plastics of all kind being bad because they leach chemicals into everything that is being put in them? We hear all kinds of commercials and info bits about plastic bottles, plastic bgs, tupperware, Nalgenes, etc are the bane of all of our existence. Just wondering if everyone else is getting this too, or if it's just a West Coast thing.

I overheard this conversation at Target today:
Kid (about 10?): Mom, I'm thirsty
Mom: We don't need a bottle, lets go get some FREE water out of the water fountain! It's yummy!

Also, the mayor of San Francisco has decided that no city office or event can have bottled water (due to mentioned plastic issue but also because the Bay Area has the cleanest tap water in the nation) and so on and so forth. We're crazy liberals out here.

**Just to clarify, we are converting from tupperware to glass, nalgene to stainless steel bottles, getting rid of bottled everything. I was just wondering if everyone else is getting the hard sell about plastics too.

***Also, thanks to David for differentiating all the types - it's unfortunate, Berkeley only recycles 1 and 2. But now I know to stay as far away from 7 as possible (hermaphroditic rat babies? That's not ok).

Also, I know I haven't blogged about my Georgia/Florida adventures, but here's a free photo of Ben in front of Paula Deen's restaurant (in Savannah). Clearly, he's a big fan.

12 on the 12th!

WOOT I remembered this month! Let's jump right in, shall we?

So, today was actually Cal Day, which is like the huge fair type deal for students who have been admitted to UCB to come visit, get a tour, etc. So, my staff and I get to organize and give tours of the residence halls all day. Yeah, it's not our favorite day. And yet, here is (some of) my staff at 9:55 AM looking relatively cheerful.



So we were swamped all morning during my shift, which was from 9 AM - 12:30 PM. Of course, here's how busy we were at 12:19 PM, right before my co-RD came to take over:



2:30 PM - Brunch




3:15 PM - Taking a lovely walk in the 85 degree weather. And here is what it costs to have a car in the Bay Area:




3:30 PM - Someone is clearly kind of a big deal:

4:30 PM - Leaving a super cheap used book store, found some plaques! This one was in a series of events that happened in Berkeley through the years...with Dan's feet.

4:45 PM - Gelato! Mine was panna cotta flavored heavenly goodness. Enjoying the downtown Berkeley scene, sitting across from the second picture, an enormous tuning fork. Whatev, it's Berkeley.

5:30 PM - Back from walk and afternoon adventure, stopped to take a picture of the pretty church right next to my Unit. The tall building in the background is one of my buildings. Attractive, no?







8:30 PM - James and the book I bought this afternoon that I already finished reading. Don't freak out, it was only about 130 pages.





About 10 PM - Durant Food Court, a lovely place for college students that is a bunch of ethnic restaurants that are cheap and open late. We went for Italian tonight, with bubble tea for drinks.





Time for bed:

Living on a college campus has it's perks

So, when students ask for my advice (and sometimes when they don't) about what they should do while they're in college, I step onto my soapbox and tell them that they should take advantage of the performances, exhibits, lectures etc. that come to college campuses. Because in real life, these things do not pop up in your backyard for ridiculously discounted prices. However, I also unashamedly take advantage of these things as well, like last night when I went to see Angelique Kidjo in concert, for less than $20. She is a singer from West Africa, who has been professionally singing since she was 20 years old. She just released her third (I think) album, and she is touring to promote it. As per her usual, it's full of collaborations with other, usually Western, artists. This album feature Joss Stone, Josh Groban and some others I can't remember. Anyway, I first heard her when she did a duet with Dave Matthews (just the person, not the whole band) on her first album and the song "Iwoya." (Your cue to go download it on iTunes) and I really really like her voice. Granted, she sings in a variety of languages, so not always going to get a sense of what she's saying, but the music is pretty great. Anyway, the concert was great - she has some energy, lots of dancing and singing, putting Britney Spears to shame. The whole stage was just her, her five musicians and their instruments. No sets, no decoration. It was lovely. She talked a lot about her beliefs about religion and wars and politics and things. This being Berkeley, people ate it up. People were dancing in the aisles, and this one woman, I'm convinced was having the best night of her life with the enthusiasm she was "dancing" with. I'm not actually sure dancing is the right word, but I think it's what she was trying to do. Maybe the more accurate term is flailing, a la Elaine on Seinfeld. Good times. In not such good times, have you seen this on You Tube? Sally Kern is an ass: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFxk7glmMbo Ellen's response on her show: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBmCA4z8Yzc

Updates

*We finished Season 7 of the West Wing last night. We're both kind of sad actually. I know, it's not like we can't just watch the whole series again (since we now own the complete series) but it'll be awhile before that happens I think. You know who I still don't like? Amy. *Our cats have started sleeping curled up together on the couch at night instead of sleeping with us. I can't decide if I'm happy or sad about it. *Dan is leaving tomorrow to go to New York for a week to put on this big important event he's been working on. I will have an enormous bed all to myself for a week! Also, I'll miss him and stuff. *Ro - I fully intend on actually taking 12 pictures of my life on the 12th. It will not be nearly as exciting as yours. But, I will try it out anyway. ***jk, as Dan will have the camera in NYC. His 12th will be more exciting than mine though. *It's 60 degrees here today, and will be all week. *sticks tongue out in a very immature fashion* *Haven't posted pictures in awhile. Some to come soon.

yuck.

Today, my friends, was a bad day at work. These are the days that I wish I lived near many of you so that I could call you and we could get a drink after work (or a few) and I could vent for awhile and you'd make me laugh and then I would feel better. *le sigh* But, today was also the last day of training that I really had to plan and organize and make sure that things got done. So, project over, but the memory of outrageous ridiculousness remains. We did service projects today - working with various sites around Berkeley who could use groups of volunteers for a few hours. My group helped clean a city park, which happened to be right across from the local high school. So, not only did we get to clean up and feel good about ourselves, we got to reminisce about high school AND we got to watch as a student almost got arrested after school let out because he smelled like pot. Which is kind of hilarious because I'm going to wager that every third person in Berkeley smells like pot. Also, one request - can those with photos from the CC dinner and New Years put them online or send them to me or something? I would love to see them! Dan is snoring and drooling. Might be time to encourage him to get to bed.

The woods

I'm really excited today about buying a vase!!! 1) now we have a large vase to hold the flowers I bought Kristin, but more imporantly 2) it's a really unique piece of woodwork. Besides, if you drool over a piece for a year, it means you really want it, right? If you didn't aleady know, I really enjoy working with wood. I spent months building a maple pool cue which I posted a picture of last month. This vase is a thin single piece of maple on one side and mahagony on the inside, curled and twisted into the form. It's by designer Colin Schleeh in Montreal; he's got a lot of very unique items for the home and office. http://www.schleehdesign.com/




















Also, made of wood are trees! I went on a hike a couple days ago straight up the Berkeley hills. There are roughly 150 hiking paths weaving up and down the hills and valleys behind us. I started at a path just a few blocks from our place. According to Google Earth, we live 300ft above sea level, and within a mile I was up to 1200ft. I'm no mountain climber like Kristin's dad, but it was steep! Apparently, I one should randomly make loud noises as you hike and keep keep checking behind yourself because of the occasional mountain lion. But I figured the view across Berkeley to San Francisco was worth sharing!















Kristin and her staff are hard at work preparing for opening on Saturday. They stay up late working while I get to be the guy that randomly brings in masses of food for 30 people. Starting tomorrow, the mass of students move in. They have an entire week without classes to be obnoxious and torment Kristin and her staff.

Rose Garden

The most natually thing to do after hiking was to take him drivng up the steep Berkeley hills. We found the Berkeley Rose Gardens! It's 3.6 acres of roses, 250 varieties, and roughly 2500 bushes. The terraces and gardens were built as a WPA project in the 1930's. It's pretty amazing, no wonder it's booked a year in advance for weddings.

Redwood pergolas and roses obviously















We found a snail!




















More roses!