Pier 39

So I haven't updated this in (let's see...) six days (or so). Here goes, for the important stuff:

Saturday, I went to Big Basin with a few other interns, and walked around for a bit. The trail was fairly uninteresting (almost disappointing), but there were a few really great sights. Not many great views, because of the Huge Freaking Trees Everywhere Around You Effect, but there were a few pretty amazing picture chances (yet another reminder that I need to yell at Radio Shack, again). Also, we did the whole walk-on-a-log-spanning-a-river-to-get-to-the-other-side thing, which was fun. There really isn't anything more to say about that, which is why I wish I had my camera.

Sunday, I finally checked out Fry's Electronics. I don't know if it's because it was the one in Palo Alto, but I was pretty disappointed. Most of it was like a large-ish Best Buy, with one section for Large Appliances (washers and dryers...?). The only interesting section was where they had cases, motherboards, ram, CPUs, etc. all for sale separately, but unfortunately, the selection was puny compared to what I was expecting. I was later told that the original store is in Sunnyvale, so I might have to try that out. Anyway, I continued on my way to the Caltrain, which I took into San Francisco to meet up with Jason (for the uninformed, he was at Stony Brook last year on exchange, and is now back in Hawaii where he will be staying. He was visiting San Francisco, which is why I went to meet him). I biked from the Caltrain station there, along The Embarcadero (the northeast coast of SF), where it was quite windy, up to Pier 39 (protip: The piers are not numbered the way you would expect. Get a map.), where I walked around for a while until I met up with Jason. Yes, I did see the sea lions, yes, they looked exactly like sea lions always do on TV and in zoos, no, they weren't that special, but yes, the view of the ocean was pretty cool. Pier 39 was Yet Another Tourist Trap, so we played some arcade games, walked around, visited a magic shop, and ate dinner at the Hard Rock cafe (which of course made us both feel like awful human beings), and then I biked back to the Caltrain station as fast as I could because it was almost nine and the last train out leaves at nine on Sunday nights and oh my gosh what will happen if I don't make it I don't have anywhere to stay well maybe I can stay with Jason? but how will I get to work in the morning man this hill is steep what were they thinking when they planned this damn city?.... I got to the station just before the train left (I think I was the second- or third-to-last person on), and got home safely.

Apart from those adventures, I've just been working (my code finally compiles! Yay! But some of the unnecessary dependencies are broken! Boo!), eating great food, and relaxing with the other interns every night. This is actually the first time in a while that I've left work before midnight. Oh, and I got (Yet Another) free t-shirt today! Hooray for schwag!