I woke up at 7 am feeling very refreshed from our first day of shopping. I wandered into the living room, and Nene was already awake and looking through her new cookbooks with Navi laying by her side. I showered and looked up when the stores would open on a Sunday, and it turned out that nothing was open before 11 am. We got onto the computer and started a video chat with my parents, and we had a wonderful chat for about an hour and a half. It was really nice to chat with them when Nene was at my side, because when I didn't understand something Nene could repeat it to me. It is hard to read lips through a computer, especially since the video chats aren't crystal clear. I can glean a decent amount of what my parents say since I know them so well, but I still need Nene's help. My parents have gotten a new cat. My mom always comes home with cats from the humane society, which drives my dad bonkers. This always follows the same trend. At first my mom is convinced that the new cat is wonderful. After a while, she will start to doubt herself. Then one day, the cat will leap from a chair and my mom will find gouges in her perfect furnature and realize the cat is slowly destroying everything. After this, my mom will shove the offending kitty into a cat carrier and take it right back to the humane society. It is a never-ending cycle, so when my mom picked up a cat that didn't look like Milo in front of the camera, the red alarms went off in my head. A look at my sister's face showed she was thinking the same thing. The story of this cat so far goes that my mom came home with this cat one day, and his name is Manny. Dad didn't want a cat, but my mom insisted, so they let it stay for a while. Apparently Manny is very active and interesting. He jumps from chair to chair, jumps from the backs of chairs to the tops of curtains, and is just a constant acrobatic act. My mom noticed some gouges in the chairs, so she took Manny back to the humane society. When she got there, they said that the cats were sick and on quarantee, so she would have to keep it for two weeks before she could bring it back. My mom couldn't do anything, so she brought the cat home and put him in the bedrooms that Nene and I slept in. You can close off that section of the house, so she closed it off, put a litter box in the bathroom, and let him stay there. I guess a few nights ago, it was the night before mom could return Manny to the humane society. My dad walked downstairs to our bedrooms to say goodbye, and I guess his heart broke at the notion that he was sending this cat back. He went upstairs and woke mom up and said that they could always buy new furniture. So I guess Manny is now enjoying the run of the whole house and hopefully this cat is another one that lasts.
Tim woke up sometime in the middle of this video chat, and said hi to my parents. We had been chatting for a long time, and we decided we'd say goodbye, and take the dog for a walk since we had time before the stores opened. We walked the dog up the hill behind our house, and had a lot of fun on the rope swing. We took lots and lots of fun photos. Nene was wearing the purple shirt with the Amos Goldbaum drawing, and I was wearing my shirt with the doggy and fire hydrant that we got yesterday.
I couldn't decide which of these photos of Nene on the swing to include because she looks so happy. In the end, I decided to include them all.
Timmy had fun on the swing, too. He is always trying to catch sticks on the ground to throw at the dog. I cringe at the thought that someday a grab for a stick may not end well.
I had a lot of fun on the swing, too!
Even Navi was enjoying herself.
We played on the swing for quite a while, and then headed back down the hill. It was around 10:30 am so Tim and I decided that we'd pack his bike into the car and drive over to 4th street to shop. 4th street has fun stores like doggy stores and toy stores and a really neat gardening store, so I figured Tim would enjoy it for a while. Around noon we would go eat lunch with Tim, and then he could get his bike out of the car and bike home while Nene and I continued shopping. We got to 4th street a little earlier than 11 am, so things were just starting to open. We went into a soap store, and I was impressed because Tim was more fascinated with things in the store than Nene and I were. We finished looking at all the soaps pretty quickly, and turned around to usher Tim out and he was mesmerized with a motorcycle in the shop and photographs on the wall. Then we went into the gardening store, where all three of us found plenty to look at. Tim was fascinated with a childrens book with photographs of bugs up close. There were all sorts of gross insects magnified hundreds of times and some cool critter photos. We found some really cool sake glasses made out of clay. There was a lot to look around at, and we spent a good amount of time there. Then we went next door to the toy store, where they had this wooden set for marbles up. You could drop marbles into various places and they'd shoot along slides, down drops, through tunnels, and I think we played with it for 15 minutes. Tim was especially fascinated with the apparatus, and after Nene and I wandered off, we noticed him frantically scrabbling to catch marbles shooting all over the floor. Then we saw these tornado jars. They are the jars you are supposed to spin in circles and then a tornado appears. I don't know what is wrong with us but we could not get tornados to appear. We even read the directions several times to make sure we weren't missing some odd step. We got these little swirling motions but no tornado. Nene said it was like the tornado she had last week in Illinois; it was a very small tornado, and that was exactly what we were replicating in our tornado jars. Tim came over and tried, and while he was better, we still couldn't get a full blown tornado. On our way out of the store, Tim became fascinated with some bug vacuum gun and tunnel set. I guess it's a lot like the hamster cages with tunnels and all that jazz everywhere. You vacuum up bugs with the gun, and then release them into this jungle gym for bugs. I don't even know what to think. I'm pretty sure that if I bought him that for Christmas, he'd play with it every single day. I think it's kind of cool...but slightly disturbing, too. Maybe I can make him keep it on the balcony. We were hungry at this point, so we finished shopping on 4th street and headed over to a Mexican restaurant called Picante for a delicious lunch. On our walk back to the car, we noticed that the reptile store was open, so we went in. It was very surprising - there were all sorts of huge snakes, huge lizards, huge turtles. There were also some really cute tree frogs, tree frog babies, and all sorts of smaller critters. On our way out of the store, Tim commented, "That's how many poisonous things can escape from this place in the event of a major earthquake." That gave me an entirely new perspective on the store.
Tim left to go home, and Whitney and I drove over to the college area for some more shopping. At this point, we were pretty tired. I didn't think she'd like telegraph ave, but I decided we'd walk down it quickly, thinking that the shopping on college ave was much closer than it was. Telegraph Ave was pretty boring, and I don't think Nene was too pleased with the length of the walk to the College Ave shopping. We finally made it, and went into a store or two, but the stores didn't have as much pizzazz as the stores on 4th street or in the city. Eventually we passed Ici, and I bought the two of us two scoops of ice cream each. She got a scoop of mint chocolate ice cream and a scoop of coffee with candied walnuts in the ice cream. I got the same coffee ice cream and chocolate ice cream. It was delicious. The candied walnuts inside of the coffee ice cream were really nice. The chocolate ice cream reminded me of Schokolade Eis from Germany when Tim and I were in Heidelberg. I loved the ice cream in Germany. Every single day, I had to try two different ice cream flavors. I made Tim come on many mad dashes to try nice ice cream places. Thankfully he is tolerant that ice cream is a severe vice of mine. Actually, I think it is secretly a vice of his, too, but he can hide behind mine. After we sat on a bench enjoying our ice cream next to a man with a very sweet and calm puppy, we wandered around the rest of College Ave. We were pretty shopped out, and the stores weren't too appealing, so we ended up just walking back to the car. We stopped at Target on the way home so I could show her the amazing escalators for carts, and to grab some coffee from Starbucks. When we got home, Nene passed out on her air mattress for a few hours. She commented that ,"I shopped til I dropped...literally!" When she woke up, she wanted to take the dog to the beach so she could see Navi swim. Tim and Navi played fetch for a while on the beach. Nene was very impressed with how Navi will crash through the waves.
After Navi tired out a little, we showed Nene all around the beach and park and had a lot of fun. Whitney even had a good tug of war game with the dog and a very tough plant.
After the beach, we went to Sweet Basil, which is a thai restaurant that Tim and I enjoy on Solano. It was delicious. Nene and I ended up getting the exact same thing. It was a red chicken curry with pumpkin with a thai iced tea on the side. Yum. Tim got something else, but I can't remember what it was. On the way back to our car, Whitney saw another chocolatier that was open. We went in, and the woman was very friendly. We bought a few more truffles and chocolates and headed back home. When we got home, we did some sake tasting at home with our new sake cups! Tim had bought two sakes on his way home from the sake factory, and we had some left over from a few days ago. The first sake was an unfiltered sake, and it was disgusting. The second was a plum sake, which I love. The last was actually a plum white wine, but it is also one of my favorites. I'm not really sure what Nene thought, but I know she hated the first one as much as I did. Every time she took a sip, she shuddered. The truffles were all good, except for the hibascus (sp?) flavor, which was revolting. We ended up just relaxing in the apartment for the rest of the night, which was really pleasant. Whitney got everything packed up, which is pretty amazing considering how much we bought. It was a wonderful end to a wonderful weekend.
Tim woke up sometime in the middle of this video chat, and said hi to my parents. We had been chatting for a long time, and we decided we'd say goodbye, and take the dog for a walk since we had time before the stores opened. We walked the dog up the hill behind our house, and had a lot of fun on the rope swing. We took lots and lots of fun photos. Nene was wearing the purple shirt with the Amos Goldbaum drawing, and I was wearing my shirt with the doggy and fire hydrant that we got yesterday.
I couldn't decide which of these photos of Nene on the swing to include because she looks so happy. In the end, I decided to include them all.
Timmy had fun on the swing, too. He is always trying to catch sticks on the ground to throw at the dog. I cringe at the thought that someday a grab for a stick may not end well.
I had a lot of fun on the swing, too!
Even Navi was enjoying herself.
We played on the swing for quite a while, and then headed back down the hill. It was around 10:30 am so Tim and I decided that we'd pack his bike into the car and drive over to 4th street to shop. 4th street has fun stores like doggy stores and toy stores and a really neat gardening store, so I figured Tim would enjoy it for a while. Around noon we would go eat lunch with Tim, and then he could get his bike out of the car and bike home while Nene and I continued shopping. We got to 4th street a little earlier than 11 am, so things were just starting to open. We went into a soap store, and I was impressed because Tim was more fascinated with things in the store than Nene and I were. We finished looking at all the soaps pretty quickly, and turned around to usher Tim out and he was mesmerized with a motorcycle in the shop and photographs on the wall. Then we went into the gardening store, where all three of us found plenty to look at. Tim was fascinated with a childrens book with photographs of bugs up close. There were all sorts of gross insects magnified hundreds of times and some cool critter photos. We found some really cool sake glasses made out of clay. There was a lot to look around at, and we spent a good amount of time there. Then we went next door to the toy store, where they had this wooden set for marbles up. You could drop marbles into various places and they'd shoot along slides, down drops, through tunnels, and I think we played with it for 15 minutes. Tim was especially fascinated with the apparatus, and after Nene and I wandered off, we noticed him frantically scrabbling to catch marbles shooting all over the floor. Then we saw these tornado jars. They are the jars you are supposed to spin in circles and then a tornado appears. I don't know what is wrong with us but we could not get tornados to appear. We even read the directions several times to make sure we weren't missing some odd step. We got these little swirling motions but no tornado. Nene said it was like the tornado she had last week in Illinois; it was a very small tornado, and that was exactly what we were replicating in our tornado jars. Tim came over and tried, and while he was better, we still couldn't get a full blown tornado. On our way out of the store, Tim became fascinated with some bug vacuum gun and tunnel set. I guess it's a lot like the hamster cages with tunnels and all that jazz everywhere. You vacuum up bugs with the gun, and then release them into this jungle gym for bugs. I don't even know what to think. I'm pretty sure that if I bought him that for Christmas, he'd play with it every single day. I think it's kind of cool...but slightly disturbing, too. Maybe I can make him keep it on the balcony. We were hungry at this point, so we finished shopping on 4th street and headed over to a Mexican restaurant called Picante for a delicious lunch. On our walk back to the car, we noticed that the reptile store was open, so we went in. It was very surprising - there were all sorts of huge snakes, huge lizards, huge turtles. There were also some really cute tree frogs, tree frog babies, and all sorts of smaller critters. On our way out of the store, Tim commented, "That's how many poisonous things can escape from this place in the event of a major earthquake." That gave me an entirely new perspective on the store.
Tim left to go home, and Whitney and I drove over to the college area for some more shopping. At this point, we were pretty tired. I didn't think she'd like telegraph ave, but I decided we'd walk down it quickly, thinking that the shopping on college ave was much closer than it was. Telegraph Ave was pretty boring, and I don't think Nene was too pleased with the length of the walk to the College Ave shopping. We finally made it, and went into a store or two, but the stores didn't have as much pizzazz as the stores on 4th street or in the city. Eventually we passed Ici, and I bought the two of us two scoops of ice cream each. She got a scoop of mint chocolate ice cream and a scoop of coffee with candied walnuts in the ice cream. I got the same coffee ice cream and chocolate ice cream. It was delicious. The candied walnuts inside of the coffee ice cream were really nice. The chocolate ice cream reminded me of Schokolade Eis from Germany when Tim and I were in Heidelberg. I loved the ice cream in Germany. Every single day, I had to try two different ice cream flavors. I made Tim come on many mad dashes to try nice ice cream places. Thankfully he is tolerant that ice cream is a severe vice of mine. Actually, I think it is secretly a vice of his, too, but he can hide behind mine. After we sat on a bench enjoying our ice cream next to a man with a very sweet and calm puppy, we wandered around the rest of College Ave. We were pretty shopped out, and the stores weren't too appealing, so we ended up just walking back to the car. We stopped at Target on the way home so I could show her the amazing escalators for carts, and to grab some coffee from Starbucks. When we got home, Nene passed out on her air mattress for a few hours. She commented that ,"I shopped til I dropped...literally!" When she woke up, she wanted to take the dog to the beach so she could see Navi swim. Tim and Navi played fetch for a while on the beach. Nene was very impressed with how Navi will crash through the waves.
After Navi tired out a little, we showed Nene all around the beach and park and had a lot of fun. Whitney even had a good tug of war game with the dog and a very tough plant.
After the beach, we went to Sweet Basil, which is a thai restaurant that Tim and I enjoy on Solano. It was delicious. Nene and I ended up getting the exact same thing. It was a red chicken curry with pumpkin with a thai iced tea on the side. Yum. Tim got something else, but I can't remember what it was. On the way back to our car, Whitney saw another chocolatier that was open. We went in, and the woman was very friendly. We bought a few more truffles and chocolates and headed back home. When we got home, we did some sake tasting at home with our new sake cups! Tim had bought two sakes on his way home from the sake factory, and we had some left over from a few days ago. The first sake was an unfiltered sake, and it was disgusting. The second was a plum sake, which I love. The last was actually a plum white wine, but it is also one of my favorites. I'm not really sure what Nene thought, but I know she hated the first one as much as I did. Every time she took a sip, she shuddered. The truffles were all good, except for the hibascus (sp?) flavor, which was revolting. We ended up just relaxing in the apartment for the rest of the night, which was really pleasant. Whitney got everything packed up, which is pretty amazing considering how much we bought. It was a wonderful end to a wonderful weekend.
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