It’s San Francisco day! I woke up around 6am because I wanted to beat the traffic to the airport, which by itself was almost a 2 hour drive. This did not happen. Turns out everyone else also commutes at 6am, and it was another drive of brake lights and 5 mph driving, until I eventually realized I was actually going to get to the airport way before my parking pass would let me check in. Once I realized this, I pulled off into a Starbucks, went in, and sat and used their wifi for two hours.
I’ve been getting back into OpenStreetMap mapping recently, mostly micro-details like bathroom locations (and if they’re public!), number of floors in a building, prominent tree locations, doors, etc. It’s a very nerdy thing to do, but seeing your changes on the public map is quite a rewarding feeling.
After I was done, I hopped back in the car and headed for the airport. It was pretty easy to find my parking since they label it pretty easily (they have a few lots, such as budget, economy, “premium”, etc. Budget is fine for me). The bus came a few minutes later and took me right to Terminal 2, where despite a decently long line, I still got through security in under 30 minutes.
I got to my gate about 20 minutes before boarding, and boarded the plane last. I found someone was already sitting in my seat, but I told him not to worry about it (since I didn’t want everyone to have to get up) and just sat behind him (in his actual seat). He was very apologetic but I kept reassuring him it’s really no big deal.
The view from the plane as we flew over the channel islands was remarkable. You could even see the clouds being split by the islands, which isn’t something I’ve noticed or really thought about before.
After landing in SFO I needed to get the BART to the closest Caltrain station, and then it was a straight shot to where I was meeting Theo. It sounds simple enough, but SFO does not make it easy to find public transportation. There’s one sign in the gate area that points towards public transit, but then when you get to an intersection with a left, right, down, or straight option, all public transport signs disappear and are replaced by “Uber/Lyft” signs.
After a bit of faffing around, I realized I had to walk downstairs to the Uber area, take the elevator to the 5th floor of the parking garage, then take a right out into the parking spots and then I could walk into the Airtrain station which would take me (for free) a few stops to the BART station. I remember it being convoluted last time I came to San Francisco, and it’s clear they haven’t put much more thought into it since then.
The BART train arrived quite literally a minute after I got to the platform, which was great as they only arrive here every 15 minutes. I was able to hop on using a Clipper card on my Apple Wallet, which was much nicer than last time, when I needed to faff around with a paper card and machine!
I rode the BART one stop (a bit expensive, at $4.50 for one stop but oh well) to the Millbrae Caltrain station. I’ve never taken the Caltrain before, so I was surprised to see a full sized double-decker train show up, looking brand-spanking new (I later learned they just finished revamping the line to be electric in September 2024).
I hopped on and rode about half an hour to Palo Alto, where I walked through the beautiful residential and pedestrianized commercial areas to a Starbucks (that’s becoming a theme) where I could sit and work for 2 hours until it was time to meet Theo after he got off work. I didn’t get much, just a cookie since I wanted to save room for dinner which was going to be at “Zareen’s”, a Pakistani restaurant on California Avenue.
Theo and I met around 6:30 and went right for food, which was fantastic (albiet a bit expensive). We had a great chat, having not seen each other in a few years. We share many of the same interests so it’s easy to find things to talk about.
Afterward, we headed to Mountain View where we met up with some of his colleagues from work for some bar trivia, which we arrived too late to properly participate in, which was probably a good thing since we didn’t know the answers to any of the questions anyway.
We had also booked the cheapest motel we could find since we weren’t able to both stay in the house he’s renting a room in. The only problem was it was in Redwood City, a 20 minute walk, 10 minute train, and another 20 minute walk away. We eventually made it around 11:30 pm and tucked in for bed, completely exhausted from the day.
