The BART doors opened, and as I started to enter, I noticed three very tall, stunning, unusually dressed ladies with musical instruments. I edged as close as I could towards them. I was curious 1 – if they were drag queens and 2 – what they were doing. One played the guitar, one the xylophone (such an underrated instrument!) and the third a violin. As the train pulled away from the station, they started playing a folk version of a song that sounded familiar, but I couldn’t quite recognize. One man was filming them, another was sound recording them. I watched, intrigued.
At the next station, they stopped playing long enough to hold on to the bar so that they wouldn’t topple over. A man entered the train with a newspaper bundle full of fresh flowers. He walked up to them (was this staged or real life?), asked them where they were from (Amsterdam), and said beautiful ladies from Amsterdam should always be offered flowers. They laughed and he continued on. As the train started again, they played another song.
The next stop was mine, and it was honestly one of the few times that I was sad that my ride was over.
Today I received an email from a former colleague that reminded me of one of the best pranks that I ever fell for. Even though I was the victim of this prank, it was so cleverly executed that I still think fondly of the instigators.
When I worked for Room to Read, we had an annual retreat for the headquarters employees. It was usually two days, somewhere in the Bay Area. We usually had a speaker or two, team building activities, and wine/alcohol with dinner and after.
We had two Asian men that joined close to the same time, Eric and Paul. They were close in age, both worked in Finance, and both Asian, but the similarities stopped there. For some reason, though, many employees in the organization confused the two of them.
At one of our annual retreats, a group that was going to the beach to go skinny dipping picked up my camera (not realizing whose it was) and took it with them for the evening (did I mention that I was the HR Director for the company?). The next day, I was flipping through pictures, and was very surprised at what I saw.
I sent an email to group in the photos, which included Paul, with the photos attached, and said I hoped they enjoyed their excursion to the beach, and let them know that I was deleting the photos from my camera. Paul immediately wrote me back and asked me why I had sent him naked photos of Eric. Absolutely mortified that I had confused the two employees, and potentially had sent naked pictures of one to the other, I scrolled through the pictures.
As I realized that no, the pictures were indeed of Paul (not Eric), Paul sent a simple email, “Got ‘cha!”
I received the following text from a friend this morning:
“How’s it going? We are long overdue for a catch up. So much big news to share.”
I probed further – what’s the big news? Do tell, do tell!
“Well… I kind got married a few weeks ago. Shotgun style. Crazy, huh?”
I immediately realized that today is April 1, the day of pranks and tomfoolery. I replied with a hearty “hahahahaha – April Fool’s!”
We worked together from 2006 – 2010, and early on in our work tenure, we started playing pranks on each other, not just limited to April 1. Since then, both of us being the competitive people that we are, we’re always trying to one up each other. It’s become more and more difficult, since we don’t work with each other anymore, and don’t see each other as often, but one thing is for sure – we always think of the other on April 1.
Monday
I decided that it was time to start thinking about buying my own place. Not particularly encouraged that I could afford a place in San Francisco, I established my game plan. I’d look in the city for three months and if I didn’t find anything, I’d start looking for a property somewhere I’d like to retire.
Wednesday
I met with a real estate agent who had been recommended to me. She pulled up properties in my price range. I chose a few that interested me, and she called the selling agents. After each call, she hung up the phone and said, “I’m sorry; it’s in contract. They’re not showing it.” I wasn’t too discouraged. I had heard it could take a long time to find a place. The last agent she called, however, agreed to show us the place on Saturday. I asked her the address and when she told me, I laughed. “That’s half a block from where I live now.”
Saturday
We met the selling agent at 1:00 pm. He took us to the roof deck first and I was in love. We walked through the condo and I couldn’t find anything to change my mind.
On the sidewalk, my agent asked me what I thought. “I love it. Let’s make an offer.” An open house was scheduled for the next day. “I won’t get in a bidding war. I’ve seen how that turns out.”
She thought for a moment. “Okay. We’ll make an offer tomorrow morning at 8 am. They’ll have until 2 pm, when the open house is scheduled to start, to accept or reject it. If they don’t accept it, it will expire.” “Sounds like a plan,” I said.
Sunday1:55 pm. I receive an email that my offer was accepted. Several signatures later and we were in escrow.
Three Weeks Later
Today I signed a very large stack of loan papers. Next week, keys. Looking forward to making San Francisco my home for another twenty years.
We walked down the sidewalk huddled closely together, catching up after having not seen each other for a few months. The two men followed closely behind us, talking loudly, but we were too involved in our conversation to notice them.
“LADIES!”
At that we stopped and turned around. His eyes struggled to focus on us. “So… where is McTeague’s?” and he started pointing in multiple directions.
“Actually, it’s that way,” I pointed, the opposite of where he had been pointing. “On Polk Street.”
“THANKS!”
As he and his friend stumbled away, he shouted, “NOW THAT IS SOCIAL MEDIA!”
This adventure began two years ago when I won an auction item at a charity event: a night at a Napa hotel/spa and hot air balloon ride for two. When I won, my friend Danielle said, “Whoa. That will be the best date ever. If you don’t have a boyfriend, can I be your back up?” A year later, I called her and asked her what dates she was available to go to Napa. We went, and the weather gods didn’t cooperate. We were grounded.
A couple of weeks ago, I called the hot air balloon company. “That certificate expired six months ago.” “Oh. Hm. I didn’t realize that. Is there any way to extend it?” With a harrumph, she said that they’d still honor the certificate. We made our way up to Napa, once again.
Sunday morning at 5:45 am came way too early. We stumbled out of bed, quickly ran a brush through our hair, and made our way to the meeting point, the Marriott hotel. As we were walking towards the sliding glass doors, I mumbled to Danielle, “This feels so deja vu. I’m experience PSTD. No, that’s not right – PTSD.” We made our way into the lobby and were greeted by the same smiling woman in the “Balloons Above the Valley” sweatshirt as we had been greeted by last year. She signed us in, and invited us to help ourselves to coffee or tea. As we sat down, she began her spiel. “As you noticed when you drove in this morning, there was mist and fog…” I turned to Danielle. “We’re being cancelled.” The guide continued, “So we’re going to go to Windsor, about 45 minutes from here, where we’ll launch.” Danielle turned to me. “This is the same spiel we heard last year.” We boarded the vans. And waited. And waited some more. Our driver finally told us we were on standby. The fog had rolled into Windsor, and they weren’t able to launch. Danielle turned towards the window as she said, “If we’re cancelled today, I’m not coming again. It’s a sign. We’re not meant to do this.” I closed my eyes.
A few minutes later our driver told us we were cleared to go. I was reluctant to get too excited. As we drove towards Windsor, I noticed the fog like I see in San Francisco so often. Thick, opaque, zero visibility fog. I wasn’t optimistic. I was tired.
Forty minutes into our drive we crested a hill. And, like magic, there was no more fog. As we arrived to the launch site, the balloons were growing as fans blew air into them. We followed JP to our basket. We awkwardly climbed in. And then, a few minutes later, we rose, ever so slowly, ever so gently. Like magic, our basket ascended into the air, slowly at first, then more quickly. Higher, higher, higher. We watched the other balloons launch below us.
Balloon launching below us
And then all was still. There was no wind. Which evidently isn’t a great thing when you’re in a hot air balloon. So we hovered in the sky, thousands of feet above the barren fields, which once housed tomatoes, rice, or other crops. Nothing could be heard except for the intermittent roar of the gas burner, heating the air in the balloon. We drifted slowly over more barren fields, then the highway, then agriculture processing plants. We hovered above the eery wisps of fog, blanketing the earth.
Misty mist
We didn’t go far. Maybe a quarter of a mile. The pilot said it was unusual, but we had to work with what we had. We watched other balloons ascend, and hover above their launch area. No balloons moved much.
Other balloons launching
After an hour of hovering, we began our descent, floating down quickly, skimming an alfalfa field and a couple of flocks of sheep and baby lambs. The taking off and the landing were my favorite parts, those transitional moments when you were just airborne, or just about to be grounded.
Danielle, enjoying the viewComing in for a landing
I just returned from an inspirational evening which essentially came about because of a misunderstanding.
A couple of weeks ago, while at a bar, my good friend Bryan asked me if I knew who Richard Dawkins was. He had tickets for an event with him and couldn’t attend because he’d be out of town.
Wide-eyed, I replied, “Yes! The science guy! With the books!” Clearly not a highly defining description.
A week later, I emailed Bryan, asking him if he had been serious about the tickets to see Stephen Hawking. I mean, we had had a couple of drinks, and it was possible that the offer had been made in jest.
His reply, “You’re drunk. The event is for Richard Dawkins.”
In my head, I thought, “The Family Feud guy? No, no, he’s not a science guy. Or, maybe he is.” A quick Wikipedia search revealed the former game show host Richard Dawson, not Richard Dawkins, who would not be speaking, as he’s no longer alive.
Wikipedia, however, did provide me information on who I was looking for – Richard Dawkins. After reading his biography, I was intrigued. I was especially interested in reading one of his recent books, The God Delusion, as someone who considers herself spiritual, yet has struggled with concepts presented by organized religion since a young girl. I made it about half way through the book before tonight’s event, which was enough to give me a good feel for Dawkins’ philosophy.
There weren’t many people at the event. What I noticed, though, was that everyone I met was passionate. One person shared his experiences living in Des Moines and meeting political candidates leading up to the caucus. Another talked about her love of robots and making things. Yet another talked about a campaign to return America’s government to its secular roots. Another shared about software that taught children to read. And, Dawkins talked about atheism. And the unfairness of tax laws that favor religious organizations. And science. And how to get involved with his foundation.
Misunderstanding notwithstanding, a lovely evening all in all.
Eight Years Ago
I was very close friends with four other women. We had a tradition of indulgent birthday celebrations. Whatever the birthday gal wanted, the other four made happen. We took ski trips to Lake Tahoe, saw musicals, planned trips to Vegas, the sky was the limit. When my birthday came around, they asked me, “What do you want to do? Anything you want, we’ll do it.”
“I’ve always wanted to go kayaking on the Bay. Could we rent kayaks for the day?” They exchanged looks. Finally, one of them spoke. “Well, we’d prefer not to do that. What else would you like to do?” (To be fair, one of the gals had recently had surgery on her arm, so kayaking might have been difficult.) “How about if we hike to Point Bonita Lighthouse and have a picnic?” A few moments of silence passed. “I think that would be really windy. Do you have something else you’d like to do?” Feeling somewhat defeated, I suggested the back up option that always seemed to work. “Okay, how about we go wine tasting in Napa?” “Yeah, that would take all day. We don’t really want to do that. But let us know what you want to do, and we’ll plan it.”
Not wanting to be rejected again, I said, “What would you like to do? Why don’t you plan something and we’ll do that?” And we went to dinner and a movie. Which was perfectly lovely and we had a great time.
Earlier This Year
My dear friend Emily and I were hiking at Land’s End. As we walked along, admiring the Bay and reflecting on how lucky we are to live here, she noticed a lighthouse across the bay. “I wonder if we could hike there. It looks like there would be great views from there.” I stared at her, on the verge of laughing. “Emmy Lou Lou.” She looked at me. “That’s Point Bonita Lighthouse. I’ve been wanting to hike there for the past eight years.” She smiled. “Great! That’s what we’ll do for your birthday this year!”
Today
Ten of us met at a picnic area. I was shocked there weren’t more people there. It provided a perfect view of the Golden Gate Bridge and the Bay. After a glass of wine and some appetizers, we set out on the easy hike. We walked down a winding path, towards the point where the lighthouse stood. We walked across the suspension bridge, swaying with the wind. We reached the tip of the point, where the lighthouse still stood from 1855. We marveled at the beauty of the sea, the lighthouse, and the surrounding cliffs. It couldn’t have been a more perfect day. Usually enveloped by fog, today Point Bonita basked in rays of sun. We walked back to the picnic grounds and lazed the remainder of the afternoon, enjoying great food and even better company.
It may have taken eight years to execute, but it was well worth the wait. I couldn’t imagine a better birthday celebration.
Last year Automattic introduced the Automattic Worldwide WP 5k. The idea was simple – invite all Automatticians (from 79 cities in 24 countries) to walk/run a 5k and blog about it. We work in a distributed environment (no offices, everyone works from home) and this was a way to have a shared experience, even though we weren’t physically together. We’re a friendly bunch, so we decided not just limit it to Automatticians, but to invite the whole internet to participate. It was so fun we decided to do it again this year.
This year the date for the 5k is on Sunday, April 29th. If for some reason (say, you’ll be on a plane) you can’t do it on the 29th, we encourage you to do it anytime the week before. I’m one of those people who will be on a plane on Sunday, so I joined another Automattician, Warren, and we walked our 5k this week. Here are some of the things we saw on our jaunt through Golden Gate Park:
beautiful flowering dogwoods and cherry blossom trees (this is my absolute favorite time of the year in San Francisco)
the clock made of flowers at The Conservatory of Flowers
a trumpet player practicing jazz beside a statue
the California Academy of Sciences
a man DJ’ing his own private concert in the bandstand
evening fitness bootcampers running up and down stairs
the stark architecture of the deYoung museum
clear blue skies and white fluffy clouds, right after the rain
an impromptu hacky sack game on Haight Street
We ended our walk at the iconic intersection of Haight and Ashbury. I hope you’ll join the Automattic Worldwide WP 5k and share your experience!
LoriLoo 