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San Francisco - Day 1

Alysia and I took a night flight to SF which got us there at midnight west coast time. 3am, eastern time. Yeah we were tired! I didn't even get to sleep on the plane but I did see some cool scenery on the plane as we were flying over a storm. Marilen picked us up and brought us to her loft where we would be staying our whole trip. Her Loft is REALLY NICE!! It was a lot bigger than I imagined. I don't think pictures do justice to how spacious this space really is. Lets just say I fell in love with it and I want a loft in Toronto now. =)

So Friday we cooked our breakfast (which I just realized we didn't take a picture of!!). Our breakfast for the 3 days we were there were Chicken Longaniza, Chicken Tosino, Fried Eggs, Rice, Hawaiian Bread and Pandesal. We cooked it on Friday and it lasted us till Sunday. Obviously the eggs were cooked fresh everyday. Right after breakfast we all got ready to go to Union Square. We took the bus there and it was just interesting watching the people that take the bus. I don't take the bus so I like to people watch when I do.

We got to Union Square and looked at all the shops and laid my eyes on my very first Cable Car. That thing looks so cool but the lines were so long that I didn't want to ride it. We just walked to Macys and waited for our city bus tour to take us around SF. Just a bit of a background, when Marilen came here, her and leesh took the double decker bus tour of Toronto and they both enjoyed it, so now it's a thing they have to do now. This was my first double decker bus tour and I really enjoyed it.


The tour itself was crap. It was split into 2 segments. The first one was hosted by this Irish lady who had to pee so she was just making jokes until she finally got to go to the washroom. The next one was some old lady who just kept talking about the earthquake of 1906 and 1989. Even though the tour was crap, the experience was amazing. Once I started to tune out the hosts, I just looked around and enjoyed the view. San Francisco is a beautiful city. It has so much character!! It just has a very west coast feel to it. I love it!

We got off the tour bus and walked around for a breif moment at Fishemans Wharf. We had just enough time to see "BUSH MAN" and eat some yummy sea food as you can see on the pic. I really wanted to see the seals of Pier 39 and see the aquarium there but after seeing how many people were there to watch the sea lions I thought it could wait and if I was going to see an aquarium, I rather see Monnteray Bay instead. We were suppose to do the night tour of Alcatraz as well but tickets were sold out the whole weekend and we couldn't go to any of the tours. We should've bought them earlier but that was my fault.


We took the tour bus again back to Union Square and went shopping...well kinda..Leesh and Marilen got some stuff, but I didn't find anything I really wanted. So after walking around the mall and looking at all the shops, we headed back home and took the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) or as I call it..The BA. It was weird...they had carpet in it and their chairs had cushions. Leesh said it felt like sitting in a living room.

We got off 16th street station (I think thats it...) and walked up to go have dinner at Anadalu's. On our way there, we got to see 2 things familiar to the Mission (the area where Marilen lives); we saw Bacon Dogs and Critical Mass aka Bike March to me. Critical Mass is a bunch of bikers that get together every Friday night and a tonne of them just go riding on the street. It all first started as a protest that there were not enough bike lanes in SF so this thing just became now a weekly thing. It was cool to see it. The bacon dog I didn't try since we were on our way to dinner.

Dinner was amazing. I loved the food there. I didn't take my usual food pics cause well by this time, it was 9:30pm and we were dead tired from the day and just wanted to eat. I won't go into detail what we ate but lets just say for dessert we had some DA-NUTS!!
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BACK FROM THE BAY!!

WHOOT WHOOT!! Just got back today from my weekend in SF!! I had a blast and I can honestly say I LOVE SAN FRANCISCO!!! It's so chill! As this week goes by, I'll do my daily travel blogs to keep a record of my trip, but for now I'm just going to relax since I just arrived today. Just a special thanks to Marilen who graciously let us stay at her beautiful loft for the weekend and loved every minute staying there. Yes, cat and all hahahaha! I miss the odd random weather already and it was not a pleasant sight coming home to cold and wet weather! Seriously, wasn't it just like hitting 20's here last week? Whats up with that Toronto?!?!?! Stay tuned..
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FINALLY!!

I finally got some pics from Clecia! There were really only two that I wanted to show and the ones below are it!

At Serendipity 3 after a long ass day only to find out we have to wait an hour and a half for a table!








Me on top of the Rockefeller Center
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The Weekend...

The weekend started off to a rough and "bumpy" start. Friday morning Alysia woke me up and said "Mike theres a new face wash in the bath tub, I want you to try it out" Now keep in mind, I'm blind without my contacts or glasses and I obviously wear neither in the shower. So as I'm taking my usual shower, I see the only new thing thats in the bath tub and proceed to use it on my face. As I felt the tingling sensation of the product, I decided to look to make sure that there were no cucumber extracts in it since I get rashes from them. As I pull the product closer to my face, I see this...
YES! THAT IS FOOT SCRUB!! I friggin put FOOT SCRUB on my face!!! LOL!! No wonder the stupid thing smelt like peppermint! Then as I put the scrub back down, there it was, the new face wash in a SMALL TRANSLUCENT CONTAINER! Thanks Leesh! At least people had a laugh about it. Leesh was dying of laughter when I told her at work! Well at least you can say you know someone who gave them self a face pedicure! LOL

Then Friday night we went out for the first time in a while to Rich and Gina's engagement party. It was good to see most of everyone after a long while and it was just nice to sit down, have a drink and chat. James and Trix were there as well and they asked me to be the emcee for their wedding. Now I usually don't like being the emcee cause I love to get drunk, but I realized that I really don't need to be funny or quirky or entertaining. I'm really just suppose to get the program going and thats what I'm going to do. I know them but I don't know them well enough to start making jokes about them. I do have a few, but they are all of James.

Saturday morning I finally decided to wash the windows. They were pissing me off so I thought it was time to clean them. Lets just say It took me a full 3 hours just to clean the balcony windows and walls of all the nasty dirt that has accumulated there in years. It took me an hour alone just to clean the screen on the sliding door. I do have a story about that, but keep on reading. After everything was nicely cleaned, leesh and I had breakfast on our balcony. As ghey as it was, it was pretty nice to sit outside and enjoy the weather while we people watched. I love my balcony, I hope some of you can get to enjoy it while the weather is good!

By the time Sat night came along, Reggie, Chris, Dwight and Ron stopped by to watch UFC. Now I'm not a big UFC fan, well lets be honest, I don't even watch the damn thing!! Reggie asked me on Friday if we can watch it at my place and I said sure, why not. I figured it was a good excuse to get the guys over and see the new balcony. I actually enjoyed it! I just find it funny that some people walk in there all normal and by the time the match is done, they are just FUCKED up! It was a good event and the fuckin Montreal crowd kicks ass!!

So about that screen door, I guess I cleaned it very well cause when Chris was walking back into the condo, HE WALKED INTO IT! LOL!! I couldn't stop laughing! All in all it was a good time with the guys on Saturday! I also wanted to do it since I won't be here on Friday to celebrate Reggies birthday so I thought that was the equivalent to taking him out for drinks, even though he brought the beer LOL...hey whatever, that pay per view fight was fuckin expensive! lol!!

Anyway and as for Sunday, well thats just starting out. I'm typing my blog and Leesh is fast asleep. Well I hope you guys had a great weekend as well and as you know, we will be leaving for San Francisco this Thursday and I will blog about that when I get back. I'll have to be quick about it too since 2 weeks after that Leesh and I are off to Vegas!!! VIVAAAA LAS VEGAS!!
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SAN FRANCISCO - 1 WEEK

It's official! One more week till San Francisco!! I can't wait!!! I'm going to buy all my summer gear there for this year. No point in buying it here when what I want is probably all there! WHOOT WHOOT!!
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I LOVE DISCOVERY!

Discovery Channel has to be one of my favourite channels. It basically fills the needs of my inner GEEK in me. I was watching The Power Of The Planet last night and this series is about how the earth got created and how it looks the way it does now and it was amazing! One thing I got from the show was how we are basically speeding up the process for global warming. Put it this way, were fuckin ourselves up pretty badly. We all under estimate the power of our planet and we can bitch about the extreme weather that we've been experiencing in the last 2 years, but you know what we brought it on ourselves. The earth is basically trying to regulate it's self. It's not going to let us fuck it up. It's the balance of nature.

Just imagine billions of bacteria living in your body. It's making you ill more each day. Your body has a way to kill that bacteria to help you cope with the attack, it's your immune system. It kills everything that is a danger to your body so that you can survive and live longer. Well thats what nature is to the earth, it's immune system and we are those billions of bacteria living inside it's body. Sooner or later, somethings going to happen that will make us extinct so that the earth can live longer.

Thousands of civilizations have dissapeared on this earth due to it's greed and lack of education about the planet. With all the resources we have now available to us, this shouldn't happen to us right? Well we'll see, cause from what I see everyday from people, including myself, were just dumb and take for granted the air that we breathe and the place where we live. Someday this planet will take everything back from us, and I honestly don't want to be here when that happens.
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Think about it...

...so I was watching TV last night and I realized how many products out there now are so focused on being good to the enviroment. The "Green" movement as they call it. From home appliances to cars, everyone seems to be enviromentally friendly these days. Then I thought, are they doing it for the good of the enviroment, or are they just using the whole "Change your mindset" scare just to get people to buy more expensive things? I understand that these products are good for the enviroment and all BUT, when they made and produced these appliances, cars, etc at the factories, how good was that for the enviroment?....Think about it...
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Is it Friday yet?...

So I jinxed myself. My last post I was saying how slow it was at work and really as soon as Tuesday hit, shit hit the fan. I've been so busy that I haven't had time to blog. So I cannot wait for Friday to come. This weekend is pretty much another down low weekend. Leesh is working so I was scheduled to clean the windows but it looks like it's going to be raining the whole weekend so theres no point in that. If it gets better, I will for sure clean it. Tomorrow we are having ribs at the Daga's. I haven't been there since the summer time, so it will be nice to pop by and say hello. So much to do before my trip to San Francisco. Work wise it's going to be a pain but whatever, it's going to be so worth it! Okay I'm tired, I don't feel like blogging anymore..
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UGH, MONDAY!

I really needed one more day to rest. Like, really! Then again, I shouldn't complain cause Leesh did A LOT this weekend and it was suppose to be her resting weekend! OOPS! Our balcony is now officialy decorated and furnished!! I dragged leesh along this weekend to grab the stuff and lets just say that we were tired as hell by the time Sunday afternoon rolled around. We also took some time to do a little spring cleaning. There are some nasty shit that lingers around your house during the winter time. Things that you don't think you should be wiping are covered in dust and windows that don't even look dirty from the inside are filthy as hell. It was just gross. Next Saturday, I have to clean all the windows on the outside while Leesh goes to work. I actually want to do it today cause it's so damn nasty. We haven't wiped that baby down since we've moved in and I just want to go home now and wipe that thing down!!! Anyway, I'm not putting up any pics of my balcony. If you want to come and see it, you have to come over and experience it yourself. I can't wait till the weather becomes warmer, I'll sure be spending a lot of time out there now!
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HAPPY FRIDAY!


I'm so glad this week went fast. After having 2, 4 day weeks in a row, the first full week usually takes forever. No plans today and work is kind of slow so I'm blogging. I was surfing you tube and looking at acoustic covers as I usually do and I realized that I haven't picked up my guitar in weeks! So I have no plans tonight so I'm going to immerse myself with my guitar, especially since Leesh isn't home. Today I'm finally going to try to learn some Robin Thicke songs. I was just listening to his album and I really love this album. I think it's one of my favourite albums, pretty close to a few of Maxwell's. So wish me luck and hopefully I get these down pact. I think Leesh is sick of all the Beatles songs I've been trying to learn. Happy weekend everyone!
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SAN FRANCISCO - 21 DAYS

Yup thats right! 21 more days and I can't wait to go to San Francisco! We'll be going from the 24th to the 28th and staying with Alysia's cousin, Marilen who came and visited us last summer. I can't wait for this trip since this is the first vacation with Leesh since Mexico last year. My previous two afterwards (Cuba and NYC) were on my own. I can't wait to see the sea lions on the pier! I know Leesh and Marilen kinda don't want to but they've already banned me from museums on this trip =P. I just can't wait!!!! I loved NYC but theres something about the smell of the ocean that I love and this will also be the first time I'll be in California!

Things I want to visit in San Francisco

-Alcatraz..AT NIGHT!!!
-Golden Gate Bridge
-Sea Lions
-Japan Town
-Stinking Rose (Reggie's recommendation)
-Surfers (I just want to see people surfing!)

Thats it. I don't really want to have a list because I just want Marilen to do her thing and take us around she lives downtown anyway. They did promise me the Alcatraz at night so I can't WAIT for that!! I know Leesh is nervous about it MUHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
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New York City Day 5 - The Last Day

Throughout this trip, I was trying to coordinate plans with my other cousin Eric to go meet up. Unfortunately, things were so jumbled and all over the place, I couldn't set a fix time to meet up with him and meet his family! So Monday morning, Jim and Adaiah went shopping and I stayed back because I couldn't walk anymore. So I was fine staying in the room and just chilling out before we had to leave for the airport.

Then I get a text from Eric asking me if I wanted to meet for lunch. He worked just up the street from me and I said SURE! Since this was the only time I was going to be able to see him during my stay there. So I met him at the corner of 40th and 5th avenue and there he was struttin in his business suit! I felt so under dressed and I was hoping that we were going somewhere for a casual lunch but low and behold, my cousin takes me to The Grill in Bryant Park! Now earlier on this trip Clecia and I saw this restaurant and said "OOOO WE SHOULD EAT THERE!!". We never got the chance to but thanks to my cousin my opportunity came up.

I had a good conversaton with Eric. Also finding out that he recently just had another baby girl, about 4 months old. I felt like a dumb ass not knowing this but then again, I haven't seen this guy in 16 years as well. I wish I got to spend more time with him and actually meet his family. Next time I will for sure!

So there you have it, my trip to NYC. I am planning to go back again and bring Alysia since she's never been there but first things first....

SAN FRANCISCO IN 23 DAYS!! WHOOT WHOOT!!!!
 
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