We did take a little trip out last night after I blogged. We went to a diner about two blocks away. SF seems to have many diners, and I love diners. It was a 24-hour diner, and I got the must-haves of diner food (other than breakfast) – fries and a shake (oreo last night). Mer got an egg, and we enjoyed the atmosphere very much. There were at least three non-English nationalities on staff at the diner. I commented to Mer this morning that Cuyahoga Falls is very vanilla. I find the mutli-cultural experience of cities to be very exciting.

After eating, Mer wanted to stroll the two blocks down to Union Square, which we did. It was about 10:00, and the square had a bunch of teens in it, and they seemed to be playing 1-2-3-stop, except I did not recognize the language. What a great use of a public space. It was a pretty evening, and although I’m not enamored of big corporations, it was impressive to see the flashy stores of Macy’s and others that faced the square. It was pretty, and it was exciting to be somewhere new.

Mer figured out on this trip that this is the first trip we have taken in nine (!) years where we were not traveling with family, to see family, or for a school-related (missions)  trip. Don’t get me wrong – I love seeing family, and traveling with family has been rewarding, but it take me aback that we had not traveled as “us” for so long. No wonder this trip feels exciting!  

I love weddings! I love the celebration and pageantry and I’m a sucker for them. Julie and Jeff’s wedding was worth coming out for (and the tour of SF is still to come as a bonus!).

The wedding was only a few minutes’ drive from the hotel, so we were there in plenty of time. It was at a restaurant/club house/senior center/activity palace for a retirement community, and it was beautiful. It was an outdoor ceremony; apparently Sacramento’s weather is reliable, and it was a wonderful summer day – sunny and warm (in the 80s). The reception was in a ballroom in the clubhouse.

Jeff looked very nice in his tux, and Julie was beautiful in her dress. I have never seen a bride that looked anything but gorgeous – they just beam and smile. Wonderful.

There were a few Julie moments during the ceremony, and I would have been sad if there had not been. During her vows, the minister said, “Jeff,…” which sounded as if he was now addressing Jeff. It turns out that it was still part of Julie’s vow, and when she realized it, she burst out with a laugh and apologized to the guests – not necessary, but funny. Mer and I had a similar issue during our vows (almost ten years ago!) – it is easy to think the minister has switched to the other person.

When Jeff’s time came to place the ring on Julie’s finger and say his vows, he was intent on repeating the vows and was looking at the minister. Julie quietly but audibly indicated that Jeff should “look at me.” Another grand moment.

I think that is why I love weddings so much – they always have moments that show the personality of the people involved, which is great since I usually know at least one of the people involved if I am at the wedding.

The reception was a very nice meal (potatoes, chicken, beef, and tortellini), and Mer and I got to sit with some of Julie’s college friends and current colleagues. It was nice to finally meet some of the people Julie mentions.

Julie and Jeff ate, cut the cake (yum!), and then danced together. They are a great-looking couple. Then Julie and her dad danced, and Jeff danced dances with his step-mom and mother. Then Julie kicked things off with “Footloose” and the music stayed peppy for some time. Mer and I did manage to dance two slow dances together, and had much fun watching Julie lead a train around the floor.

We left just before things were to wind down (we left about 2:30). We drove back to San Francisco with only one wrong turn (my fault), and we returned the car to the airport. On the way we got to drive over the Bay Bridge, which is huge, so we’ve now been over two of the major bridges in the area. Once we took care of the car, we jumped on BART, the SF area transit.

BART is okay. It is clean, and very fast. The stations are spaced a ways apart, so you feel like you make good progress. It is both a subway (at times) and an elevated train (at times) – the area really is hilly! The downside to the BART is they charge based on distance – I prefer the Chicago style of one-size-fits-all for fares, but the pay-for-distance makes sense. It cost us about $5.50 to go from the airport to downtown.

Once downtown, we made our way to the street, where I noticed that my secure-in-his-manhood Jordache backpack that I borrowed from Mom ten years ago had split a seam. That is sad – it has been all over the world with me.

Our walk to the hotel was only five blocks, but I was glad to get there. The sidewalks seem fairly crowded when you are hauling luggage. The last block was on a hill that is probably 35-40 degrees. Yikes!

Our hotel feels very European. It is very narrow, and several floors high. It is run by a French couple, so the decor is French.

We saw cable cars, but did not ride one yet. I am suspicious of them – they seem crowded and slow (they get stuck in traffic and have a speed of 9 mph when moving). I’m not sure how you pay on them – maybe it is the honor system, because people sure seem to jump on and off all over.

I thought we were going to have a great theater experience tonight – there was a one-man “romp” through all of Shakespeare’s work playing at a theater only a few blocks away. We got to the theater with time to spare only to discover that I’d misread the dates and that it starts next weekend. Sigh. Still, we got to see some street performers, and got to see all kinds of people that you don’t run into in Cuyahoga Falls (race, language, dress, and so on).

I might pop out to one of the many diners I saw tonight to get a light meal and a shake, I think we are going to have much fun here – out hotel is in Nob Hill, right in the middle of the city.

San Francisco looks like a great city! Wow. AND it has perfect weather – 55 at night and 65 during the day. Perfect, perfect, perfect.

Mer and I went west, young man, to come to a friend’s wedding, which is today (Saturday). We decided to make a mini-vacation of it, so we are here for five days, in the greater SF area.

Yesterday was travel day – we got up at 5:00, so we could leave at 6:30, for a 9:00 (non-stop!) flight from Cleveland to SF. This is a big country! It amazes me that I can start out in Cleveland (not the east coast), and still get on a plane and spend almost five hours on it and still be in the U.S. Amazing.

The flight was without incident (one of the two movies was Fool’s Gold, which was the in-flight movie when we went to the DR on another airline – that was funny to me), and we got to SF around 11:30. We got our rental car (a 2008 Ford Focus that I am very fond of) and were on the road by 1:00 or so. We wanted to check out a park north of SF, so we had to go through the city and across the Golden Gate bridge. While not super-efficient, it was very cool to see the city this way. We only have the car through today, so it was neat to see the city by car – after the wedding we’ll explore it on foot.

Our destination was Muir Woods, which is a redwood forest preserve. While not so big or well-known as the Redwood National Forest, it is only about 15 miles from SF. What a drive! It was all winding roads with ocean views from time to time. What fun!

The park was really nice. Redwoods are huge. We grabbed a quick bite in the park center, and then hit the paved trail. Until I saw the unpaved trail. That went up. And up. And up. Guess which trail we took?

It was a nice trail – strenuous enough to keep most tourists away but not so strenuous that we were panting (except for one small section). Meredith did great – I was more winded than she was. I am proud of her – she is in very good shape now compared to how she was with some trails we did in France last year.

The trail wound around all kinds of redwoods (did I mention they are huge?), and wound back and forth while going up the hill. It was called “Ocean View Trail,” so we kept being excited to see the ocean. After about an hour of climbing, we finally made it to the top of the hill, and a road. From the road, we were pretty sure we could see haze that was over the ocean. That’s our story, and we are sticking with it! Later, when we got back to the bottom of the trail and looked at the trail map again, the small print we did not read indicated that you could not actually see the ocean on Ocean View Trail until the very top. Ah, well.

On the wildlife front, we got treated to seeing a huge bird flying below us (when we were on top of the hill) – that is always weird to me to see a bird below me. We also saw two deer grazing on a slope that must have been 45 degrees – they were not concerned about us in the least. I figure they knew nothing could chase them up that slope.
 
It was also heartening to know that foreigners are still coming to the U.S. as tourists. On the trail and in the visitor center, we heard seven or eight different languages, including Chinese, Italian, French, Norwegian, German, Russian, Polish, and maybe more. We also heard U.S. accents from all over. Neat.

We left the park about 5:00, and one of the staff recommended taking Route 1 north. She said it was “fairly” pretty, and would take longer but avoid rush hour out of SF. We took her up on it. “Fairly” pretty turned out to be breathtaking! I have never seen coastline like that, and I have never been on a road like that either. Shannon’s friend Greg needs to get his car to this road! It has more switchbacks and hairpin turns than any road I have ever seen. You can never get faster than 35 mph, and 25 is more normal. It is worth it though. It did turn the two-hour drive into more like four hours, but I don’t regret it. Wonderful.

We got to the hotel about 8:00 and then went out to (walk) to get something to eat. I like the hotel – it is brand new, has internet in the room, and has an iPod-compatible radio alarm, so I can listen to my Shuffle as I write this. Very nice touch!

So, that is SF, Day 1. I’m looking forward to Jeff and Julie’s wedding today – I’m thrilled for Julie, plus I love weddings. More later if I have internet access in my SF hotel room.

We took a break from kittens this weekend to go see two FREE plays in downtown Cuyahoga Falls: one on Saturday and one on Sunday. They were put on by the Cleveland Shakespeare Theater, which tries to build community by presenting free theater around NE Ohio. We saw them perform Richard III last year, so we were quite happy to go see them again this year.

Saturday we got treated to some play called Hamlet that you may have heard of. It was fairly well done, and the actors playing Hamlet and Ophelia were very strong. Hamlet was moody and delivered his lines with ease. Ophelia was very pretty and innocent-looking at the start of the play, and she did a great job of falling apart as the play progressed.

There were some sound troubles early on (it was the first time the company had performed in this space), but Mer and I are familiar enough with the play to follow it even with just catching parts of the speeches. The male actors generally could be heard, but some of the women were hard to hear (especially Gertrude). They figured the sound issues out by about 1/3 of the way in, so it was all right.

One scene that worked really well was when Hamlet greets Rosnecrantz and Guildenstern (his friends from school). He delivers his lines very naturally, all the while fencing with a servant. This was great for two reasons – Hamlet mentions late in the play that he has been “keeping up with” his fencing, so it was good to see it, and it was impressive to see him so active but still able to deliver his lines. Very nice.

One scene that did not work for me was when Hamlet almost kills his uncle while the uncle is at prayer. In every production I have seen of Hamlet, Hamlet sees the king praying and decides to not kill the king for fear of sending the repentant king to heaven, and so Hamlet walks away (with the irony that the king then proclaims that he is unable to pray). In this production, Hamlet actually pins the king with a dagger to the king’s throat, and then when he decides to wait to kill the king, he cuts the king’s hand and runs off. I applaud the bold vision to try something new, but it did not work for me. First, the text has Hamlet refer to the king in the third person all the time, which is weird when he is face-to-face with the king (you would say “and send you to heaven” instead of “and send him to heaven”). Granted, you can make the argument that Hamlet is mad, but it did not come across as a fit of madness. Also, I think the king would have taken faster and stronger action against Hamlet if he knew that Hamlet was actively trying to kill him. The scene did not make sense to me.

The play was edited to fit into two hours, so probably 25-30 percent was cut from the play. That is fine with me, but I was surprised that the director left in scenes that are almost always cut (the gravedigger joking with a friend, the Mousetrap actors performing a speech just for Hamlet).

On the whole, the play was very good, especially once the sound was sorted out.

On Sunday, I met my friends Matt and Liz at the pavilion, and my friend and colleague Brandon came along a few minutes later. Mer was to meet me when she could (she was seeing Wall-e with some students). We got treated to an excellent production of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. Meredith taught that play for the last three years, and I got to guest lecture on the quantum mechanical implications of the play, so we are both pretty familiar with the play. The cast did a very nice job. The play is difficult for actors because the dialogue is snappy and often short, but the actors did well.

I was curious how they were going to handle scene changes because there was no curtain and there were no lights to bring down (it was outside). They handled it by moving small curtains in front of Rosenguild when they need to, and that worked for me.

For the most part (only one exception), the actors in Rosenguild were the same actors as had been in Hamlet. It was much fun seeing Hamlet relaxing on the boat with a fruity drink while “reading” a Maxim magazine. It was also amusing to see Hamlet charge off the stage with a snorkel and water wings when the pirates attack the boat.

Rosenguild is a funny play that is also deep. It raises good questions about post-modernism, religion, fate, and more. Getting to see it (for free) right after seeing Hamlet was a real treat.

Last week, after we had gotten back from the DR, I saw the momma
kitty and two kittens roaming around our bushes. I decided that I
should try to catch the kittens so I could let them have better lives
as domestic kitties instead of wild ones. It proved difficult, but last
Tuesday, I managed to catch one of the kittens, another tiger kitty
that was pretty fierce. We have started calling him Quarto, or Queuey
for short.

I have not blogged any of late because I have spent
most of my free time trying to socialize Queuey. It took a kitty toy to
lure him out from under the dresser, but he did come out on Day 2. By Day 4, I was able to pet him with a minimum of hissing (him hissing, that is – not me), and by now (Day
7), I can pick him up and he purrs and mews. He still hides every time
the door opens (whether we’re coming or going), but he comes right out once I
have sat down.

Queuey and Foley have been good for each other.
They play together a lot, and I thought Foley was being too rough, but
when I took Foley out of the room to give Queuey some time alone, Queuey
cried loudly until Foley was (quickly) returned. Foley has calmed down
quite a bit from his attack-everything moods since Queuey came along –
I suspect he was bored by himself and is better now that he has a
playmate.

We really do not intend to be a FIVE-cat household, so
we hope to give the kittens to a friend. We are seriously considering
giving away both Foley and Queuey since they seem to like each other so
much. It will be hard to give them away (they are SO cute!), but it
will be good for them to stay together.

I have not seen the
other wild kitten since I caught Queuey a week ago. Since then, I have
seem momma kitty with another kitten that I had not seen before, but
the other kitten has disappeared. I hope it is okay.

For your edification, here is a clip of Queuey and Foley playing together.

We all made it here safely. I just finished setting up the six computers we brought down here, including interent connections.

There has been some mild sickness, most likely related to the heat.

This country is beautiful, and the people are very friendly. Our group got to see a lot of the country – we had a seven-hour bus trip across the country to get to Hato Mayor.

The heat has been tough to deal with, but we are doing okay and the students’ attitudes are fantatsic.

We started VBS (Vacation Bible School) today in two Haitian sugar cane villages and at the school here in Hato Mayor. Our small group (teamed with another) had over 200 kids attend! It seems as if everyone had a great time.

More updates later (perhaps much later – I do not know how much interent access I’ll have).

Sorry for delays in Folio updates. Folio is doing very well. His teeth and claws are getting sharper all the time (as evidenced by the scars on my hands). He is drinking milk and kitten formula from saucers, and eats canned cat food one or two times a day. He has refused dry food, even when it has been soaked in milk, but I think that will come when he gets all of his teeth in. He continues to be very playful and is very loud when he wants attention and/or food. He is very very cute!

Here is another Folio original film:

Here are a few clips from a day in the life of Folio (if you have sound on, you’ll hear him too!):

Folio is learning all the time. Meredith called me at work to tell me that Folio finally had a bowel movement. Yay! Sadly, it was on the floor and not in the litter pan. While Mer was on the phone with me and cleaning up the mess, Folio peed on his own. Huzzah! That also was on the floor. Still, progress was made. I asked Meredith to make a bigger litter box out of an old cardboard box, which she managed to do nicely. By the time I got home, Folio had peed in the box. Good kitty! Smart kitty!

We also went to a dual-grad party tonight – a grad party hosted by two different students. These are pretty popular guys, and there were a ton of people there. Mer and I stayed and chatted for two hours, and I ate so much I felt slightly ill for a time. Other than the self-inflicted gluttony, it was a nice time.

We then headed straight to downtown Cuyahoga Falls, to go to the ***free*** Riverfront Irish Festival. We had to park quite a ways away from the festival, and as we were walking there, black clouds rolled in, but we pressed onwards. We wandered the length of the festival (three blocks with two stages), and by the time we turned around, the black clouds had moved on. Whew.

We popped into a popcorn store to see one of my ceili dance students, and we got a festival special – try samples of two kinds of popcorn for free and get a small bag of regular popcorn for free. That was happy. We tried white cheddar for one sample and mint girl scout cookie for another sample. Both were good – I think I liked the cheddar better (it was salty, which hit the spot).

We then went into a tent to hear the group Barleycorn. The consisted of a banjo player, a guitar player, and a keyboard player, and they seemed to be having a good time on stage. They had a good traditional sound, and we heard about five songs when the skies let loose with a huge downpour and lightning for good measure. Barleycorn was wrapping up their set, but most people seemed quite happy to stay in the tent. I looked over the shoulder of a guy who used his web-enabled phone to call up radar, and most of the state of Ohio was covered in rain. As such, Mer and I decided to make the long trek back to the car when the rain slackened. For most of the walk. Happily, when the rain got a little harder, it still stayed shy of a downpour, so we did not get too wet.

The festival looks like much fun. I hope to get there again this weekend (either Saturday or Sunday).

When we got back home, we found that Folio had pooped in his new litter box as well. What a good kitty!

It’s official: Folio is a boy. We took him to the vet’s today, and he appears to be healthy. The vet said Foley should be going to the bathroom by himself and to keep an eye on him, and then proceeded to express Foley’s bladder for us. So we’ll see how that goes.

Foley took a fair amount of food today from the eye dropper, and then, on various people’s advice, I tried giving him some kitten formula in a saucer, which he lapped up after sticking his nose in it (Mer’s earlier attempt with a saucer around noon saw Folio sneezing a lot). Encouraged by this, I tried giving Folio a little canned cat food for his second evening meal, and he ate quite a lot of it, as well as drank some more formula on his own. They grow up so fast!

Folio will attack just about anything he can reach. He weighed in today at 14.5 ounces, and seems to have no problem attacking me, a mere 160+ times his size. Brave kitten!