10 July 2006

TCB. I was an idiot when I ordered our phone service and forgot to order voice mail, so I set that up this morning. And the AC did not work this weekend, so I just called with a maintenance request. Apparently other people had the same problem because there's quite a wait for the AC guy to get here. It got up to nearly 100 degrees yesterday! Today's cooler, and I don't even need the AC on. But I'd like it fixed before the next hot spell.

Speaking of yesterday and the heat, we decided to get up early and hike
Mount Diablo. We drove most of the way up, then parked and hiked the last mile, gaining approximately 1,000 feet in that mile. It was hard, and the heat hadn't even reached it's peak for the day yet. My year Back East has left me weak when it comes to hot, dry mountain hiking. Coming down was much easier. Mount Diablo has the distinction of being the place where you can see more of California than from any other peak in California:
Many visitors to Mount Diablo head straight for the summit to enjoy the famous view. Summer days are sometimes hazy, and the best viewing is often on the day after a winter storm. Then, you can look to the west, beyond the Golden Gate Bridge, to the Farallon Islands; southeast to the James Lick Observatory on Mount Hamilton at 4,213 feet elevation; south to Mount Loma Prieta in the Santa Cruz Mountains at 3,791 feet elevation, north to Mount Saint Helena in the Coast Range at 4,344 feet elevation, and still farther north to Mount Lassen in the Cascades at 10,466 feet. North and east of Mount Diablo the San Joaquin and Sacramento Rivers meet to form the twisting waterways of the Delta. To the east beyond Califomia's great central valley, the crest of the Sierra Nevada seems to float in space.


After the hike there was much napping and eating of lunch, then we decided to cool off by heading into the city. We went to Chinatown and had super-tasty Chinese food. It was chilly there! We had been sweltering in WC, waiting for the BART in long pants, but glad to have them and our windbreakers when we got to SF. By the time we finished dinner, the fog was rolling in and as we walked by the TransAmerica Pyramid we could barely see the top of it.

On Saturday we had the first normal, quiet evening in we've had in a long time. We made quesadillas and watched
The World's Fastest Indian. It was a great movie, a little "feel-good," but very well filmed. It looked like it was filmed in the 60s, when it took place. The color palette and some of the special effects were very retro and they added to the fun of the movie.

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