One night recently, Mischa and I decided to take an impromptu and long-overdue trip over to San Francisco’s Chinatown. (Granted, it’s less than 10 minutes away by bike, but we still hadn’t been there since moving to the city!)
And as fortune would have it, that particular night was the city’s celebration of Chinese New Year—complete with a huge parade, wild firecrackers, and hundreds of people in the streets. What a fun and colorful night to stumble into!
We wandered through the festivities, found a bustling hole-in-the-wall vegetarian restaurant (Lucky Creation) for dinner, and bought moon cakes and chocolate-covered fortune cookies at a neighborhood bakery (Eastern Bakery) to end the night!
This weekend took me around the city, soaking up the sunshine, including:
- My neighborhood farmer’s market at Fillmore and O’Farrell for garlic & onions, tangerines, and other non-CSA goods–and lots of tasty food sampling with Charlie
- A trip to the library for a new book from my ongoing reading list of business books
- Midafternoon iced coffee at Four Barrel, one of the best coffee shops & roasters in the city
- A visit to Needles & Pens, a new-to-me DIY shop in the Mission–plus revisits to The Curiousity Shoppe and Little Otsu
- Biking through Golden Gate Park – which is car-free every Sunday!
- A first trip to Green Apple Books (a new favorite book store) and a walk to Ocean Beach
- Good people, live music, and Lagunitas on tap in San Rafael on Sunday night
And now it’s Monday morning. Back at my desk, ready to start the week!
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
It’s been raining off-and-on in the city for over a week now. Lots of excuses to stay indoors, to stay in bed, to find any way to stay warm and dry.
So when the forecast promised a sunny Saturday, plans were set. Bicycles tuned up. Breakfast reservations were (mentally) made. And then at 9 o’clock on Saturday morning, it started raining again. But we went out anyways. A morning bike ride through the park, over the the bridge, and into the little town of Sausalito for late breakfast. No raining on this parade! It was my first ride over the Golden Gate Bridge–my feet were soaking wet in my shoes, but I had a big smile on my face the whole time.
Oh yes, and I signed up for a 500-mile bike ride over the weekend–San Francisco to Los Angeles for the AIDS/Lifecycle. Crazy? Maybe. Exciting? Definitely. More on this soon…
How are you fighting back against this January weather, wherever you are?
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Just one instance of the bicycle love (and street art) in this city: the Duboce Bikeway Mural. It marks at the start of “The Wiggle,” the winding bike route through the hills (and our neighborhood) of San Francisco.
This post is part of a series about my favorite places and things that have made Los Angeles feel like my home for the past 2+ years.
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One of the standout aspects of life in LA is that you never really look at the weather forecast. It’s almost always a reliable 60-80 degrees with at least a bit of sunshine each day. We live with our windows open wide throughout the year.
After a lifetime in the Northeast, where the weather dictated everything from my wardrobe to my emotions (Hello, Seasonal Affective Disorder!), this sunny weather has been like a permanent vacation. I think I may be solar powered.
Then again, here I go moving to a city that is known for its foggy, moody weather! But the New Englander in me says that it will still be a vacation compared to bitter, slushy winter Februarys. And (ssshhhh!) a little part of me is looking forward to some foggy, rainy, cozy days in the future.
My name is Lillie Dignan. I'm a designer and maker, living and working in the Bay Area.
