Thanksgiving

I thought before this past weekend that I had experienced some pretty terrifying examples of bad driving. I think that the taxi driver in Lima who got us to the airport in ten minutes, a trip that usually takes over half an hour, was the previous winner. But on Thanksgiving Torrey and I rode with a friend of Torrey’s Grandma to the house where we had dinner (and back again), and it topped all previous rides. This old woman was all over the road, missed a number of turns and made hair-raising u-turns to get back on track, never looking anywhere but straight in front of her, expressed a desire to make a left turn off the freeway where there was, of course, no exit, and all the while talked about how she is such a better driver now than she was when she was young. Ay ay ay. Watch out for Rossmoor drivers.

And so began our visit to Rossmoor. It was very nice to get away from LA for a few days, even though the road was probably as full as I have ever seen it. We drove up to Walnut Creek on Thursday morning, arriving just in time to head off for Thanksgiving dinner at Torrey’s Grandma’s housekeeper’s house. Friday we slept in and enjoyed the break from our normal busy lives. Friday night we went out for dinner and were treated to the beginning of the Christmas season in a small town. The main street was closed down, and restaurants were serving hot chocolate on the street and groups of people were caroling as the rest of us strolled through the town getting into a Christmassy mood. Saturday morning I woke up early, and after enjoying an apple fresh off the tree, chilled by the night air, I hiked around a bit, mostly to take pictures.

Later on Saturday we drove to Berkeley to wander around and see the campus. Torrey’s Grandma used to work at the school, so she was excited for us to see it.

I tried to get some studying done while we were away, but of course, I ended up getting very little done. So I planned on doing some when we got home, but after a long day of driving in traffic I felt less like studying than I had over the weekend. Here is a shot from our drive home (on the freeway, naturally).

Fortunately, my studies have been coming along well this week, and I have just two more weeks before the semester is over!