Mad Dogs and Englishmen

I spent a good deal of time in the noonday sun this weekend. I always forget how much making vitamin D exhausts me, so this was written after a pretty long nap.

Saturday I met up with some book club ladies. One of us is moving out of the country in a couple weeks so we used a going away party as an excuse to drive to San Diego for a sandwich. Sadly, it was about 2 weeks too late to catch the lady merely moving out of state. The destination might seem far for a sandwich, but it's not much farther to SD than to Santa Monica from where most of the ladies live in OC, our inland attendee can get to SD easier, and I like going there. We met for lunch at the Hotel Del Coronado, had drinks and delicious sandwiches then shopped for a bit at the Hotel (no new sandals for me this time) and meandered into town for some decent gelato.

We rescued the car from valet parking about 10 minutes before the parking charges went out of control, and decided not to re-park on the street and head back to watch the sand sparkle in the sun. It was the right choice as we were all pretty tired after getting up early on a saturday and driving, but it still feels weird as that beach is one of the draws. We did walk along it, but didn't get the sand in the tootsies. And the cute valet boy liked my car. Me too. It got 4 of us back safely and in style.

Sunday was slow - I met up with my trivia friend to see Inglorious Basterds. When we got to theater, we realized it was only playing in the spiffy theater that costs an extra $10 so couples can share a loveseat. We didn't really need the date special or the extra cost, and decided to look elsewhere. Thanks to her iPhone, that was no challenge. We did get an hour or so to kill so we headed for Anthopologie and went shopping. I found several things that not only fit, but flattered and were on sale so I went crazy. She found an expensive shirt but it was unique and cute as a button so she splurged too.

The movie was odd. It had little bursts of violence but not anything like what one might be used to from QT. I think the tough thing was that while the antagonist was obvious (antagonists/were), there didn't seem to be a clear protagonist, especially not in the first scene. And even the good guys were not so good and pure in heart and soul - there was definitely the issue of when in war, people do things that are awful, even the ones who are ultimately doing good. Odd bursts of humor were scattered thoughout. I noticed that the movie was a little slower paced, but don't really have a judgment on if that was good or bad. The camera wasn't all jumpy and for that I have to give thanks. Lastly, those were the fastest credits I've seen in 15 years. It left me feeling good about the film.

Today, I met up with another book club friend for lunch and a walk. We checked out a furnishings store near the restaurant that had a really unique square dining table that rotated slightly and flipped out to an octagon. After that brief foray in the shade, we got down to business and went over to get our walk on. In that noonday sun. With hats, water, and a moderate pace, it was a nice little walk, but dang it was hot out. Over the mountains at the edge of the valley there was a largepyrocumulus cloud mar, king the fire on the far side. It looked like a mushroom cloud when I first saw it but had streamed out into a blah sort of thing by the time I got somewhere I could take a picture. We resolved to walk at a more sensible time on our next outing and parted ways. The park was very crowded, the guy who got my space after waiting for me to brush some serious dust off my feet liked the car too :)

I washed the rest of teh dust off my feet by swimming a few laps at the pool. Before I was overcome by napping, I tried once again to use PVC glue to fix the slow leak in the aerobed. But my cement was old and set so I tossed on the hippy housedress and ran out for more. I picked up a watermelon while I was at it. I don't think they like me much, but there was nothing else in the world I really wanted today, so what the hell. After the nap, it's been TV, slitherlink puzzles, and blogging. No scrabble today, since I stayed up too late last night with it.

Well, aside from 2 calls from work, that was my labor day weekend. Not bad, not bad. How was yours?