Today I had the full intention of heading down to Fisherman’s Wharf and perhaps catching one of those famous trolley cars (come on people let’s be real here, they’re trams! They’re not that special) up and down some of the San Francisco hills. Well that was my intention anyway, things didn’t quite work out that way….

I woke up in the morning at about 12:15, oh hang on that’d be “afternoon” wouldn’t it. OK, so I woke up this early afternoon again sleeping through my wonderfully fantastic alarm clock for the third day in a row and made my way down to the bus stop. I’d seen the bus stop many times before so taking in the atmosphere of vomit and urine didn’t really appeal and was reason enough to pop on the iPod and ignore the world. Unfortunately for me there wasn’t actually anyone else at the bus stop for me to physically ignore so I had to pretend (mind you not with much difficulty) that the pungent aroma of the bus shelter had actual life.

As the bus clambered up and down the many hills of San Francisco along Sutter St towards the city centre I realised that the streets had become rather common for me. Luguana, Octavia, Gough and so on whisked passed with me still slowly coming out of a rather stretched, milked-for-all-it-can-be-excuse of jet lag. Fortunate for me the boys from Hundred Pennies keep me awake long enough not to miss my stop and disembark, on the other hand they’re also part of the reason as to why I didn’t make it to Fisherman Wharf at all today. In fact I didn’t really get too much farther beyond the bus stop in the city I got off at.

You see, this is what happened… When I got off the bus my sugar levels were a little low, it was also after lunch time so I went across the street to the big Westfield shopping centre and grabbed a bite to eat in the food court. The guy that served me in the burger joint I went to was weird. He did the same thing as another guy that works in a newsagent near work does and that’s touch my hand or rather “stroke” it as he gives me change. Freaks me out, anyway this kid did it too, I had to go wash my hands before eating. So anyway, after de-ickying myself and getting my food I was listening to Gav & Stu on my iPod still and they broached the subject of a new movie “Superbad” that had come out that I really wanted to see. Hmmm, I’m eating lunch in the food court of a giant mall, surely there’s a movie theatre here too! Funnily enough after spending twenty minutes eating next to a couple of housewives trying to out do each other with there retirement fund saving techniques I headed out of the mall’s basement to it’s ceiling where on the fifth floor was a lovely little fifty cinema complex showing Superbad in five minutes. Ahhh, Bellissimo! (That does mean, good or perfect or something similar yeah??)

Was Superbad, super bad? I hear you asking… I mean that’s a pretty easy pun for someone to make so I will presume you too had that resting on your lips, don’t get me wrong it certainly doesn’t make it funny, it’s a bad one. So, was it a good movie? Short version “funniest shit I’ve seen in a long time”, go see this movie if only for the rather strange choice of graphics in the credits!

It was about 3pm after I got out of the movies, I still had plenty of time to jump on a bus down to Fisherman’s and perhaps stick around for dinner while I was there too. I mean all I really had to do was find the exit which was hidden in Bloomingdales somewhere and get out of there. Eventually after trying out a few after shaves, not sure about DKNY’s men’s red delicious still tossing it up, I got out of there but in a completely strange street that must’ve been on the other side of the block from where I’d entered. I’d not been down this way before so I figured why not check it out, and then there it was, rising out of the horizon as if a shot straight out of [insert your favourite epic here (eg. Titanic, LOTR, Babe)]…. The Moscone Centre!

Right, so now you’re saying “Ahhhh, dude… Moscone Centre? What the?” and fair enough too, well except for maybe three of you who are also rather excited about visiting the exhibition mecca for any Apple fan. I can hear your eyeballs rolling from here! So I like looking at Apple gear, give me a break and go buy another pair of shoes already! This place is pretty damn huge, it also splits into Moscone West & North in addition to the main building. I got bored after walking half way round it so I turned back and went into the adjascent building that oddly enough contained a massive Sony Style store pimping PS3’s like they were something worth buying and a Nintendo store. This is obviously nerd heaven around these parts! Oh and what’s this on the two floors above me? A movie theatre that just happens to be showing the new movie Shoot Em Up that I saw Clive Owen talking about on Conan O’Brien last night, oh and guess how long until the first screening? Yup, five minutes, hey you can’t argue with fate!

Now I have to say sorry to Superbad because Shoot Em Up blew it completely out of the water. This is a must see movie! Absolute bullshit but non stop action fun in a very, very well done black humour type of way.

OK, OK, I know! Yes I went and saw not one, but two movies, yes I’m in a city I’ve never visited before and I’m on holidays but you know what, get ferked the lot of you I had fun and the ocean can wait, it’ll be there tomorrow, opening day for a film only happens once!

From the day I bought my tickets way back in May the question of my excitement towards this now-occurring holiday has escalated exponentially upon a time line up to the asymptotic point of me actually showing any outward emotion to ratify the fact that I may actually be excited about anything let alone a holiday.

You see I’m not exactly what you’d call an excitable person; in fact you could probably go as far as saying I’m not particularly a person of any real public emotional output, actually no scrap that, I do have one emotion that I pretty much permanently stay fixed in throughout the most of the day, angry, no, no… hang on… grumpy, hmmmm, hateful? Noooo, let’s just stick with grumpy, I’m a grumpy old man in boys’ skinny white Indian body. Stop laughing! No seriously, stop now.

So anyway, me, excited, equals no I’m afraid. I just don’t do excitement, generally because excitement is often associated with the expectation of something happening, eg. A holiday around the world, only to have the entire event let you down and squash any dreams for exciting adventuring and happy times. I prefer to take the rather pessimistic view of all the shit things that may be involved in said holiday, expect the worst (well perhaps not dying, but lets just say boredom), and then be pleasantly surprised when things all turn out dandy and I have a rather “hip, hip, hoorah” of a time as the British would say. Actually they probably wouldn’t say that these days but I think they really should think about bringing those phrases back into their vernacular of the current day.

Let’s go through a perfect example of my holiday’s non-excitement, a situation that most overseas travellers will encounter and that is the lovely twelve hour plus plane ride to your destination. I say twelve hours because you sissies that complain about your so called “overseas” journeys to New Zealand, or South East Asia, well you can kiss my non existent pancake arse my friend because that’s a bollocks version of overseas journeying, try taking a man’s flight!
For starters as I’ve so colourfully pointed out the length of ones flight can be a rather determining factor of your holiday’s start. Not being about to sleep, being stuck next to honeymooning morons (as I was last two years ago), having kids screaming or my personal favourite, slobs that were never taught to cover their mouths whilst coughing and sneezing! We’re all completely aware of my hatred of flying but you can see my point here, this is the beginning of your journey, for me and I’m sure many others, the trip of a lifetime, I don’t want some retard screwing it up in the first few hours by giving me a cold! Fuck that, sorry Mum… stuff that!
Fortunately on this particular flying engagement there weren’t any stand out moments of annoyance. I was seated next to an elderly couple from Auckland to San Fran after having the luxury of two vacant seats during the Melbourne to Auckland leg. They weren’t too bad though, and I think after the first few questions, to which I answered very politely I might add, they got the idea I was more in to the 150 channels of Air New Zealand entertainment! w00t to that! Hang on… did I just get excited over something that had to do with air travel? Can someone call the Bureau of Meteorology and check on Hell’s temperature please?

The flight was OK, I only got two hours sleep because well sleeping at a 75 degree angle isn’t my thing, old snorey behind me didn’t have that problem though! The best thing about the whole flight was seeing the waters of the Pacific begin to become more blue as we flew closer to the west coast of the states and the boom, you’re hit with the mountain range hugging the coast and playing bosom to the greater San Francisco area. It really didn’t look that big at first, and truth be told seeing it from a few thousand feet it looked like I’d spent Adelaide seventeen hours flying to Adelaide. All that was before we banked for the airport and out of nowhere comes a city that could probably tackle Sydney. To think that the US has probably got a city this size in every state, California has LA too let’s not forget, is mind blowing. How amazingly insignificant and small is Australia! I can understand how we’re so often forgotten “down under”, it’s unfortunate but true.

And there I was. Little Indian in big smoke, a beautiful 29 degrees day greeted me as my feet kissed US soil for the first time in eleven years. Stumbling with the sleep depravation I managed to hitch a ride on the BART (some train thing) to the city and then wonder aimlessly until I gave up and got a cab to my Japantown hotel. I fell asleep…. rather I collapsed on my bed.

You see there’s still no room for excitement here in this little old story so let’s fast forward a few hours to when I woke up at midday the next day. I’d slept through the alarm I’d set for 9am (I tested it later and it nearly burst my ear drums so shit knows how I slept through it?) and did all the necessaries to get out and explore. Bus ride to Union Square: boring, Walk aimlessly window shopping: boring, Find the Apple Store: priceless! Now, after four months, travelling to the opposite side of the world and spending 24 hours in a city I’d never seen before I got a hard on. Well actually it wasn’t that exciting, kind of let down a little actually because the “flagship” Apple store was probably half the size of London’s and well lets face it, size does matter doesn’t it ladies. Sexual innuendo aside I played with the iPhone! Yeah, yeah big deal for someone that lives in America but for an Aussie Apple Geek (That’s AAG for the acronym freaks) I was one happy little nerd. This thing is coooooooool, I almost bought one, almost… it was hard not to, but when I found out the new iPod touch is going to be able to run Mail and some other stuff after hacking it my impulse buying demon disappeared off my shoulder. I will say one thing about the phone though, typing on it is weird! pressing a screen will take a lot of getting used to, even I had trouble with my girly fingers!

Well you see I was excited, or rather I am. It may have required a little more explaining to show it but deep inside this frail, cold storage unit of body there’s a little man beating the drum of excitement inside my heart. Awwwwww….

Check out photos from my first days exploring San Francisco!

iPHONE RULES!