going out

So I decided to have some fun yesterday - and I went out to San Francisco with my roommates. The day started off wonderfully enough, 'twas so bright and sunny. 'tis winter in America and we have the glorious sun people, the glorious sun. The original plan was to have some pho (Vietnamese noodles) but since Kevin (Vietnamese boy) got himself filled with some junk food like minutes before, we decided the idea wasn't so appealing anymore. Thus, I mooted the idea of dining at 'In n Out', the best fast-food chain ever. The best.

The picture does nothing to tell of the succulent goodness that are 'In n Out' burgers. Which is quite a shame, because they are SO GOOD. Unfortunately, many of you will never know the truth of my words because not only does the chain not go out side America, it doesn't go outside California (with a few exceptions). It's 'privately owned, family mananged, and not franchised'. T-T

But yeah, it's really easy to get to San Francisco from Berkeley. All you do is hop on one of the subways and you're there within 30 minutes, without transit points and all. And the stations in San Francisco that I always choose to emerge from are in the oh-so-pretty parts of the town, with tall, slightly-old (pre-modernist glass and steel designs) buildings surrounding you. And if you choose to get off at the Powell street station, you come out next to Nordstroms (yaya, for shopping ^^)

And I gave into the shallow sport of ranking floormates based on their looks while waiting for the train to arrive. It started off when I chanced upon Beebe and Louel(he's gay, so its ok) ranking the guys on our floor. And it appears that on that criterion, I fare pretty well o.O And yeah, although nobody Top 3 ranking for the girls are the same, the general taste is well..pretty general. And all of that amused us for about five minutes, which was just perfect.

Train rides are really boring - I should have brought a book. Only that I wouldn't have wanted to be carrying book around for the entire day.

'In n Out' is close to the piers, so we took a short detour to the beach.

the golden gate bridge is in the background

It was such a sunny day - that as I sat eating my burger, I could feel sweat beginning to form on the small of my back. But it was really such a nice day. There was even some random guy swimming in the water. And then we walked up to Ghiradelli square to get some free chocolate samples. *Dark chocolate thins with caramel centers!!*

Sidenote: I've arranged to room with Kevin(blue and black stripes) and Yiding(Chinese guy in foreground) next year in an apartment, be it a university owned one or otherwise. We're going to be learning how to cook!T-T! But at the very least, I'm going to have way more living space.

Then we took a bus to the Exploratorium, one of those places with all the cool science-y exhibits. Right next to it was the Palace of Fine Arts, which was absolutely gorgeous. The scene that we chanced upon, with the beautiful structure in the background, and the lake with the swans in the foreground was totally aww-worthy.

And because the photos that I take with my camera phone totally suck, I'm going to steal some from the internet.

And of course, it was a wonderful place to take some photos.

And then there was the Exploratorium. Which was really cool to us - 'cause we're all (with the exception of Beebe, who's an English major) Science/Engineering students. Woot. But I have few tales to tell of that place, and fewer pictures, because it's all about the experience really.

And I leave you with me trying to blow a really large bubble, which the picture doesn't really show. It was there I swear *grimaces*

p.s. all photo credits for photos without a datestamp on them go to Louel and his real camera