It’s Just Justin

A Pearl, an Arrest and the Best Cappuccino

Friday was a day off for me, as is today, so, after laying around the house, bored of packing, I decided to go see Seth in the city, surprise him at work or something.

I get 12 miles from the city and realize… um, I’m almost outta gas! As luck would have it, I exit into the cheapest gas in all of Northern California, as far as I know it. At $3.09/gal, I’m saving 30-50 cents/gal! So I’m super excited about this. Then I get on the road, I have my camera in tow, try to take a picture of the line for gas and see that the cards I brought are both full already.

Full of what you ask? Pics from when Geoff and I were roommates, when he was dating Andrew and I was dating Jim. We are talking, like two plus years ago. Craziness.

Anyways, I hit up Fillmore Street and score a parking spot directly in front of Seth’s MAC store. I pop in and let him know I’m around and then stop by Browser Books for something to read. The lady there recommends to me Einstein’s Dreams.

Einstein’s Dreams became a bestseller by delighting both scientists and humanists. It is technically a novel. Lightman uses simple, lyrical, and literal details to locate Einstein precisely in a place and time–Berne, Switzerland, spring 1905, when he was a patent clerk privately working on his bizarre, unheard-of theory of relativity. The town he perceives is vividly described, but the waking Einstein is a bit player in this drama.

I finished the book, a short 180 pages, in about an hour or so. It really was that good. Here is an excerpt from the book, a story that captured me entirely.

In the hospital on Gerbengasse, a woman says goodbye to her husband. He lies in bed and stares at her emptily. In the last two months, his cancer has spread from his throat to his liver, his pancreas, his brain. His two young children sit on one chair in the corner of the room, frightened to look at their father, his sunken cheeks, the withered skin of an old man. The Wife comes to the bed and kisses her husband softly on the forhead, whispers goodbye, and quickly leaves with the children. She is certain that this was the last kiss.

Oh my.  I sipped a triple small cappuccino at Peet’s while reading this great novel, the coffee was just as good as the book!  I also started writing another book.  One that will be found on me when I die so that everyone will really think I’m crazy.  Is it so crazy as to write a book to make people think you are crazy… does that then make me crazy?  Meh, I just think it will be funny.

Seth and I had hamburgers at Pearl’s Hamburgers on Post Street in San Francisco.  It was probably the best hamburger I have ever had; with sweet potato fries and a small peanut butter shake, what more could you ask for?  It was huge, prime beef (wish I had known about the option of buffalo meat) with fresh tomato and lettuce, 1000 island dressing and fresh-baked buns.

We pretty much crashed at home after eating.

This morning Seth’s awful, ugly inside and out, roommate bitched to Seth about something that was not Seth’s fault and ended up basically asking him for his thirty days notice, which Seth gave him.  This guy is a total ass, I just wanted to kill him this morning.

I drove Seth to work, we got some coffee and watched an American Indian, and very verbal supporter of “the troops” get arrested.  We aren’t sure what he did but an hour after being arrested, he still sat on the corner with the police behind him…