The problem with my commitment to not using google pictures is that my narrative is suddenly contrained by what I took a picture of. I don't mean to grouse, but I can only tell you with words about some of the stuff that I just ddidn't happen to have my camera for in the past few days. Like for instance, I went to this birthday party, and they had a velvet rope outside this club, complete with apes with hair gel and a guest list. Normally I would have stuck with my policy of not going inside any place with a list, but here I was feeling bad because I had blown off a party the previous night with the same people. Not blown off exactly, but what happened is that I fell asleep at about 7 at night, much as, for instance, a geriatric in-patient might have, but the end result was that I couldn't attend the party, which started at 10 pm. I guess I was a little tired. Anyway, the place I have no pictures of is called Harry Denton's Rouge, and it was like something straight out of Bensonhurst, with overmuscled cologned guidos and women who all seemed to be wearing dresses about three sizes too small. It was quite a situation. Just prior to that, I had come from a very nice meal Chuck had taken us out to, where I tried two items I had never heard of, one called something like Borequones, which turned out to be tiny fish, laid out over arugula and hard boiled eggs. The other was called Crecenza, which was sort of like pot cheese, only with a slightly salty, almost sweaty flavor, sort of like when you drink raw milk straight from a cow's udder. Anyway, it was a lovely meal, followed by a bowl of strawberries.

To get to the pictures:

The next day I though it would be nice to show my Queen the Muir Woods. I was told there were giant Sequoia, which there were, but I thought giant sequoia were going to be like giant Redwood, with 20 foot diameter and thousand foot height. They are more like just plain old big trees. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First, the drive there took the Golden Gate bridge.

Then a little later, we got there.

As you may note, it's quite nice, though no so unlike any forrest you might have seen already, should you have found yourself in the woods. They have poison oak here, which looks like this.

It's very much the same as poison ivy and causes rashes.

This is my Queen. Next to her is a picture of a tiny flower that is growing all over whose name I neither know nor am interested to know. But it is nice just the same.

This is the majesty of the mountain. Plus my Queen.

This is just the majesty, no Queen visible.

This is some other flowers.

This is a banana slug, which are plentiful. Note how much it looks like a regular slug, only slightly more banana like. Also it's like 6 inches long, which adds to the fruity effect.