Randomized aka....

[jamiebk]

Well Bonnie and I had a wonderful time in the land of the Sandy Eggans. The flight in on Friday evening was dreadfully late (4+ hours) leading to a very nervous time wondering if Budget rent a car would still be open at midnight. We made it with 3 minutes. Saturday was a pleasant day browsing shops in Temecula and hitting the spice shop, Temecula Olive Oil Co, The Cheese Shop, Antique stores and The Edge for cocktails.

Sat night was our "wine dinner" which is a combo tasting and feedbag...yum...loin chops and Old Vine Zinfandel...a case of wine was consumed in the process. Sunday was a slow start but we ended up at San Diego Wild Animal Park for the day then on to O'Sullivans Irish pub in Escondido for live music and libations. Then we headed to Fat Ivors for those incredible ribs...most ordered babyback...I went for the beef ribs and stalled at 4 (plus a couple of shared babybacks). Man those guys can cook! No meal is complete without wine so we took 3-4 bottles in with us and paid the modest $10.00 corkage for the priviledge of drinking some of Sonoma County's finest.

Monday found us heading south to Torrey Pines for some light hiking/walking along the coast, picnicking and then to La Jolla for sightseeing and...yep, more cocktails. Finally we made our way to San Diego airport for the ride home. The plane was late again dammit...this time by about 1.5 hours. I arrived home around 12:30AM. This basically sucked since I had to get up at 4:00AM for work.

At any rate, I promise you that one of these days, I will break from our group of oenophiles to (finally) meet some of you all in person. I regret that it was not possible this time. The SoCal weather was uncharacteristically cool (cold, actually), but with all the rain, the southland looks verdent and fresh. It was a wonderful visit and now, I hanker for those ribs that I will long remember. All told a few rounds of drinks and a couple cases of wine and a whole lot of great food dropped off the face of the earth. Our hosts said that they would meter out the recycling of the empty bottles so as not to appear too overindulging. Too late.

[Haggis@wk]

to (finally) meet some of you all in person.

It's quite the experience and well worth the effort, with the possible exception of OT, unless copious amounts of Whiskey are involved. He becomes quite the delightful fellow, funny to listen to, erudite and conversant on any number of subjects. Although in all truth the exact subjects remain vague and slightly out of focus and I find I can't remember any specific ones.

Missus OT is the graceful and charming hostess, 'toid was a smallish human at the time of my visit. I suspect she's more reflective of her mother than whatshisname now. There’s a feathered “jaws of life” at the OT residence that should be experienced…once.

Selma and her good sir are exactly how you imagine her from her post. Selma is a one woman GPS for at least San Diego.

The jewel of the visit for this conservative was Piq's father.

He is a man born in the self deceiving clutches of a socialized, de-humanizing society who recognized his own worth had the fortitude to abandon his home country and escaped to raise his family in an environment more conducive to the individual seeking independence; and quite the astonishing trencherman when it comes to Fat Ivors fare!

[piqaboo]

Somehow I missed this description of my dad before.
Yup, 'escape' they did - complete with bottles of french wine to bribe the stewards.

Dayum, I do wonder why they landed in CA instead of TX (and I thank my lucky stars, tho I would have been a good rodeo girl, and maybe even one day got to be rodeo queen. My sister fer shure would have).