Wrong Number

Wrong Number

This is a story of a text gone so wrong it was great.

I’m sitting at home on a Friday night recuperating from my week with friendship and tasty beers when I receive a text. My first thought is it’s my sister letting me know how amazing the Rasputina show is. I open the message and it’s from an unknown number. 707-xxx-xxxx. Sonoma. Most of the people I have met here in the Bay Area have either have a Marin-San Francisco area code of 415 or a home state number outside of California. I’ve had my current number long enough to know that the previous proprieter was, well, less than honerable. The following “conversation” ensued. (All typos are direct copies from the texts)

707: So my friend katie and I are out drinking you should come out with us. I’m sure you will say no. And no I’m not going to hook up with you I just think it would be fun. I’m in petaluma.

Me: Who is this?! This is his wife. (When I received the above text I immediately had to figure out how to mess with this person. I was in proper company for this. We played all the right angles..was it a jealous girlfriend? A man? Someone I actually knew and didn’t recognize the number?)

707: It was a joke lol. Haha. I was dared to do it haha. My name is jason butler.

Me: Haha syke! You have the wrong number! Fun!

707: Aww damn…Well sorrif I woke you. I have stupid friends…

Me: No worries! Beer + wrong number = hilarity!

707: It does!! Hahaha!! Hey I covered you ass good!! Come out and hang out with tipsy me I’m so fun!!

Me: Goodnight! Have fun! :-)

707: You too!! Hahaha! This is too funny!

707: Ya know what really funny is the dude I was texting has a crazy ex wife. You really did scare me. Hahahahaha

Me: Oh man!!! Literally laughed out loud! Glad it was mistake! :-)

707: Lol I know!!! I even texted him saying “ahh…Ihave you other number saved and I think I just messaged you wife”.

707: I’m drunk so I’m not gonna text this number anymore hahaha!!

Me: Sounds good! :-) good luck!

707: K. Nice chatting. Haha :)

Year of Change Indeed

Where do I begin? I guess where I left off is a good place as any. Well after the toughest (and strangest) break-up I've been through, life just kept throwing me curve balls. It was strange to start dating so soon after (during) breaking up, but I just had so many emotions running through me, to force myself not to feel the good ones would have been insane. So I went with the flow and I gotta say, it's working really well. In fact my new budding relationship has been the only steady happy thing in my life right now.
This has been a year of firsts, such as...March was the first time I have had my car window smashed and my purse stolen out of it! Oh joy! My wallet, my favorite purse ever, my iPOD!!!! So angry and upset about it, still to this day. All the music I lost is insane! Let it go Asha. (It's pretty much my mantra).
Let's see, oh yeah, it's the first time I have ever been fired. Yep, that's a new one that happened about two weeks ago. In that first came the first time I filed for unemployment. Oh the joy of bureaucracy. Getting fired was so surreal and intense. A lot of crying, sobbing, cursing and the like. It's hard to explain why I was fired, but I missed some important trees that were currently out of compliance - it's a big deal. Things weren't going well with the job anyway. I had made a major mistake that had come to light just the week before and was suspended for two days.
The silver lining of all of this is that I finally had the push to look for a job that will better suit me. Ironically I applied for a job (online) the day I got fired that I got an interview. It is acting as a public liaison for projects going on in the Golden Gate National Park Recreational Area. It's temporary, but as they told me in the interview, it's a great "foot in the door" position. In any event I think it will be very helpful at getting an even better job.
Some more positives going on with are that I have started running. Or should I say jogging? Kayla and I discovered we run about the same pace so we've been running on the weekends (and now that I'm unemployed I run during the week as well). Cali has been running with us too. It's fun to tire out a high energy mutt! I am also having a ton of fun getting to know Kayla! This Sunday she is doing a triathlon sprint! That is a triathlon but all the events are shorter. I am excited to watch! Yay! I already want to do a 10K run that is put on by the same people as the triathlon. I am also a big fan of Kayla's cooking and baking! Good thing I started running! :D
Anywho, that's all the news from Petaluma!

xoxo

Keepin' Keepin' on.

I have not had much to write about, but now that I do I am just not ready. I just need to put it out there that I am now a single girl figuring out how to live in the world. It's been a rocky start but C and I are finally on speaking terms. I can even see a friendship in the distant future, though it will be strange, I'm sure. My main goal is to figure out what the hell I am doing with my life. I have realized that I don't have a dream. I don't have a vision of what I want out of life or what would fulfill me (career or otherwise). As much as I would love to have it all figured out, I am looking forward to the journey that is self discovery. Will I stumble? Certainly. Will it be uncomfortable and nerve racking? I would say so. But it's my journey, my bumpy road to walk, stumble and fall all over.

Music festival rocks, Muscles Protest.

Phew! What a wonderful and tiring weekend! Outside Lands Festival was amazing. It started out a little rough (or shall I say late and we missed Cold War Kids-arg!!! Don't mention it, sensitive subject). Despite that, we ran ourselves ragged trying to see all the wonderful music waiting to invade our ear drums.
On Friday we got to see Manu Chao who was so full of energy I have a renewed respect for their music. We also saw a few songs of Radiohead and renewed my feelings of ambivalence about them. I know they are really talented, but try as I might, they just don't get me going. Saturday was more full, but we still had delays getting there. We stayed with our friend Holly in the Mission and rode the bus to Golden Gate Park. The bus ride should normally take about 45 mins, however it took us 2 hours!
We got there in time to see Primus, which rocked me so hard I was jumping higher than guys 1ft taller than me! ;~) After that we headed over to Tom Petty where we were rocked even more! I had no idea how many Tom Petty songs I actually knew. When we (the collective "festival we") headed out one of the exits, we had to leave through a tunnel with everyones voices echoing. One group started to "wooo", and then everyone following afterwards "wooo"ed too! It was a woo wave that continued for about 10 mins or several hundred people! Wow! It was spectacular! Already getting stiff in the calves and one more day to go.
Sunday was probably the best because every band I saw was new to me! We started out at Toots and the Maytals. The reggae grove was a great way to start off a beautiful Sunday in the park. After that we saw Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings. The smooth doo-wop sounds got my shaking my booty, and I just didn't stop until the walk home from the bus stop! After that I high tailed it over to see Grace Potter and the Nocturnals. These are some talented musicians and I highly recommend you click on the link up there and check them out! No, seriously, do it now! Then we meandered over to see Widespread Panic, which I now is a name brand band, but I was just introduced and we were grooving. By then, my legs were so tired from dancing Crystal and I went to post up near the next stage where we going to keep the groove flowing. Even sitting down I could stop dancing because we could hear Rodrigo y Gabriela. Amazing! Spanish guitars that were chill and rocking all in the same song! Another one I highly recommend is the band we saw las which was Los Amigos Invisibles. Spanish rock disco? Interesting and fun and got me dancing all over again. The last band to play was Jack Johnson, whom I have little interest in, so we decided to beat the traffic and head on home.
Phew! My legs are still aching, and I have to make up taking Monday off by working (walking) 4 ten hour days! Yikes! Worth it? Hell yeah!!! When is the next festival? I'm hooked!

Seester Sara I miss you already!

After a short recovery week from pride weekend, it was time for my favorite sister to head west for a visit. We had a wonderful time showing her the Haight where we shopped till we dropped. We showed her many delicious restaurants like Cha Cha Cha's, Herbivore, Squat and Gobble, and last but certainly not even close to least, Bacar. We wined and dined ourselves until we closed the place down and made a few friends in the process. Bacar had such a wonderful atmosphere and menu to boot. In addition to an excellent server that urged us to try different things so we could all share (which we did gladly) we enjoyed the experience of a wine server (?) who not only presented our wine in proper fashion, she also knew about the region the wine was from and other such detail. Impressive! She even had an excellent accent when pronouncing the wines that we asked her origins. It turns out she's from England but lived in Paris for a year and a half. She has been in the bay area for sometime now, but ironically is dating a girl from, get this, Austin, Texas! Har!

We filled Sara's visit with trips to Armstrong State Natural Reserve as well as the Petaluma Farmer's Market, filled with more than just fresh vegetables grown around the region. We entertained her with some live music and a bar-b-que in the Mission overlooking the city and all the illegal fireworks visible through the fog. We also had a day at the river, where we relaxed from the hot day in the cold water. We saw some kids make a bee line across the way and queried to thier mission. Turns out there is a boulder you can jump off, so of coarse we had to check that out. Although we all jumped, Sara definitely wins the most jumps award! :)

On our way back from the farmer's market, we had the pleasure of meeting a neighbor couple down the street (that also have a greyhound) that recently started a garden. This was our first conversation longer than "hello, how are you?" and it was held due to enormous zucchini! They had them coming out of their ears and asked if would like any. One or two, I thought, instead, they handed over 5 huge suckers! They told us to come by anytime to get some greens (chard, kale etc) which we will as soon as we run out of our market's stash. The squash is store bought and for size comparison. :~)

Over all a wonderful time was had by all. Alas, my friends, my eyes are growing weary and it's back to work for me in the wee hours of the morn so I leave you with lots of love heading your way.

Bleep...blip...blip...Back on the radar again!

The following broadcast brought to you in part by a good romp around the neighborhood with the canines and Pinot Noir ...

Hello Friends!

Well! Have I been busy! The past few weeks have been chock full of a march, a parade and a visit from my seester!

Gay Pride weekend was amazing! We started the weekend at a "party" where one of the cast members of the L Word was to attend. The journey to this party was quite an adventure. We had to find this new part of the city and after many turns and u-turns and references of the map, we did. (I added miles to my mental map that weekend). We arrived to the party and it was different than I expected, but we still had a good time. A good warm up for the things to come.

The next day we ascended upon the Dolores Park just in time for the Dyke March. {Quite possibly the highlight of the weekend. } We began the journey in the line for the What is bathroom or port-o-potty rather. A never ending row of them and there was still a wicked long line! Eh, well, what do you expect when you are in a huge group of women. Then, hark! that I hear in the distance? Why it's the Dykes on Bikes revving their engines letting us know it is time to get this show on the road...Hooray! Crystal and I walked alongside the hordes of lovely lesbians towards the noise, each of us struggling to watch the bikers rumble by. Once the last bike rolled by, ladies left and right just started falling into line, and thus the Dyke March began. I have never been in a march of any sort before but I must say...hell yeah!! It was like a reverse parade. As we all wove through the streets of San Francisco in mass, people (also in mass) lined up the on the sidewalks to cheer and entertain the marchers. There was even this one group that would throw confetti and yell/sing LESBIANS! The reactions they received were so amazing that we stopped behind them for a bit and watched the show. The march wound its way over to Market and Castro where a huge block party ensued.

Crystal and I took a break back to our car to eat some pasta salad we had in the cooler. I wish I could say it was a short and breezy walk back to the car, but this is San Francisco and we are not well versed on the lay of the land, which lead us to the Dirty Sanchez, as we have now coined the road. This road was so steep it had my legs shaking. Great way to end a march (!) through the city! Even despite our fatigue, we mustered up the courage to continue back to the block party. And I am glad we did! Every corner had a different DJ with non stop gay fun everywhere! The killer of the whole the was, at the end of the night, we headed back to our car with our friend Cody (who has a much better grasp of the city than we) and directed us to a ridiculously shorter, less steep route back the Fit. Live and learn.

As exhausted as we were, we still dragged ourselves out of bed to make it back to the city for the parade that began at 1030 am. Luckily, our friend Cyndi let us crash at her pad with all of our canines. :) The parade was the most beautiful and enthusiastic site I have had the pleasure to experience. Although the 4 hour parade tested my endurance, it was so entertaining, I didn't notice until much later when I finally settled down for the night to get back to the grind the next day. The parade started with the now familiar (and exhilarating) sounds of a large mass of motorcycles seated by lesbians grumble to a start. The amount of motorcycles (and a few scooters) that turned up in force for the parade both astounded and exhausted me. Exhausted? Yes, because I had to let every one of them know how much I loved them by screaming my head off! :~P I swear they went on for miles. The rest of the parade was just as exciting and invoked tears of joy on more than one occasion. The was so much love present on the streets that weekend it is difficult to express. Hopefully you will come and see for yourselves one day. :)

Me in my office!