San Diego Bound

My friend Jose in December got a job offer in San Diego to work at a pharmaceutical company at director of their Human Resources department.    It's a six month job assignment that is perfect since he gets to spend his winter away from frigid Chicago.

Those benefits weren't immediately realized though as Chicago has had unseasonably warm weather for most of December and part of January.   Of course that changed last week with the Midwest's first batch of wintry mayhem.   And today we're expected to get anywhere from 3 to 5 inches.

So Jose told me that I could come visit him anytime while he's up there.    So I took him up on the offer and will be flying there on Valentine's day.    With my remote job, I can work from anywhere as long as I have an ethernet connection.    So I'll be working from his apartment in San Diego on Wednesday and Thursday.    Then I took off Friday and Monday.   So the great thing about that is that I'll have all of Friday, Saturday, and Sunday to enjoy the sites of San Diego.   I fly back to Chicago Monday early afternoon.



So I need to get an itinerary ready for things to do.    I'm sure I'll want to hit a beach while I'm there to check out the hot guys.   There is this one beach that has a gay section called Black's Beaches.    It sounds like a bit of a hike to get there though, based on one reviewer's comments:

"Once you arrive at the Torrey Pines gliderport, you've reached the main (intermediate) trail. It's the easiest to hike down (none are easy to hike up, so be sure you're prepared for a workout on the way back), but it also drops you in the middle of the straight section of Blacks Beach. Like many nude beaches, mostly nude men who aren't in shape run around naked, but a few hot guys (and even fewer women) can be seen as well. Many more guys are found in the gay section about a half mile north. It can be reached directly from the advanced trail, which is merely a dirt path at the north end of the parking lot north of the gliderport. This trail is even harder to climb back up, without the assistance of ropes, railroad tie steps, etc. that are found on the main trail."


But it might be worth it to get to the promised land.   And actually Jose lives not far from there.   Depending on his location, we might even be able to walk there.

Of course there's the gay bars.   Jose and I have pretty diverse tastes in guys.    He likes them young and twinky while I like them beefy and bearish.    So coming up with a bar that we both agree to might be a challenge.   But probably not.    With such bar names as The Brass Rail, Pecs, Urban Moe's, and Bourbon Street (a shout out to New Orleans no doubt), hopefully there'll be something between the different bars for both us to enjoy.    I especially wouldn't mind hitting Redwing Bar & Grill as they have a karaoke bar for me to get my sing on.

And then there's the San Diego Zoo, which apparently have sleepovers where you can spend the night there.   Not sure I'd want to but that's an interesting option.

I can't forget about the casinos either since I'm such a casino whore.   There's Pechanga Resort, Harrah's Rincon, Barona's, and Viejas.    Assuming Jose tags along, he'd want to check out some of the steakhouses that are housed there.   The websites of all the main casinos make their restaurants sound so good.

So much other things to do.   There's different parks like Balboa and shopping centers to visit.   I could even go parasailing.   I'm definitely looking forward to my trip and to get away from the crazy weather in Chicago.

Commit Yourself

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!

One good thing about the new year is that you can get away with saying Happy New Year even if it's a week or two past the 1st.    Other holidays you pretty much only have that day and then folks look at you weird if you say Happy Thanksgiving in March.

I can't believe another year is upon us.    I rung in the New Year with a hot hookup.   So I guess that means I'll end the year with a hot hookup.   *LOL*.   Of course I do want more.   But I'm getting to the point now that I feel like I'm pretty much going to be single for my remaining time on Earth.   And if I am so be it.    I still would love to have a child even if it means raising him or her alone.   I just have to figure out how to go about doing it.

I was surprised to see my ex Rock's number show up on my caller ID a few weeks back.   I decided not to answer hoping he would leave a message.    But he didn't.    So it's almost like he's putting the burden on me to commit myself to call him since he didn't commit himself to leave a message.   I get he may be afraid to leave a message for risk that I don't call him back anyway but if he's sincerely trying to get in contact, he shouldn't be afraid to put himself out there.   I mean, commit himself.   Take a freaking risk.   While I don't think we would get back together, I would be fine with truly being friends with him.    He did the exact same thing almost a year ago with the random call and no message.    He could've been drunk dialing me for all I know.

I had a good visit with the family over the holiday.   My Dad was my Secret Santa and wound up giving me $100.   With everything he's gone through health wise this past year and still today, I was understanding.   Plus who couldn't use the money (though I blew most of it at a casino...bad boy I know...*LOL*).    It makes for some interesting dynamics adding my sisters' boyfriend and fiance to the Secret Santa mix.    Tasha's boyfriend had my Dad's name and wound up getting him some DVDs on train travel.   His reasoning given was that he recalled my Dad talking about wishing he could travel more and how he enjoys traveling by train, hence his gift.    While my Dad wound up not being too crazy about the DVDs (he said it was literally a film of a camera on a train looking out the window with no narration whatsoever and there were 10 in the set), the thought process behind the gift was cool.    My younger sister Trina's fiance got lucky and had Trina's name so he got her some boots likely from where they both work.    But I can imagine the interesting dynamics if he had to get a gift for my Mom, who to this day is not fond of him.     Or even if my Mom had to get a gift for him.  

But it was me who wound up choosing my younger sister's fiance's name for the second year in a row.   In talking with Trina last year, she mentioned his love for pool.    So inspired by that I thought I would get him a personalized plaque with his name on it establishing a room in his house as his pool area.    I found a company online that I thought would be able to send the gift in time.    They mentioned the 13th of December being the drop dead date when personalized gifts could be guaranteed for a December 23rd delivery.  

Since I knew on the 23rd I would be in Detroit, I decided to have the shipping address be my parent's house.    The company promised once the personalized gift was done, they would send me a tracking number so I can track the package.   It was getting close to the 22nd and I never got a tracking number.   I wanted to call them but it was the morning of my fun train ride to Detroit so I didn't get to contact them till the 23rd.   I called their main number during their so-called business hours and nobody picked up, claiming their associates were busy with other calls, which wasn't true because it kept taking me to their voicemail.   I sent a couple emails with no response either.

Fearing the worst I decided I needed to run to the mall and get a gift.   But only thing I really didn't know what to get.   But fate directed me to JCPenney's at Oakland Mall and I saw that they had a mini-pool table about the length and width of a large size briefcase on sale for 50% off.   I immediately grabbed it and he seemed to like it, of course telling me that I must've talked to Trina.    I wanted to say that I was clairvoyant and just knew but I copped to getting the idea from her.

Luckily I finally heard back from the company on the 27th.   They blamed the vendor for not getting the information for the plaque so effectively not working on it.    So they gave me the option to either have the vendor go ahead with the order or give me a refund.   I opted for the refund.

So gifts aside I did the usual errand running for my parents.    Took my Dad to his weekly blood checkup and to get his new bifocals.    I took my Mom grocery shopping and hitting her favorite spots of CVS and Walgreen's.  

I got to hang with Eugene for a couple hours at the local coffee spot shooting the breeze as well.   He himself had some family drama that he was getting away from.   His younger sister lost her job due to the principal holding a grudge against her that started when she made a complaint about the conditions of her classroom.   But he's hopeful that his sister will find something since she was teaching technology at her old job.  His oldest sister in the meantime had a nervous breakdown.   She was stressed out from losing her job a year back and feeling pressure from everyone.   Eugene himself has found a new teaching job at a different university in Boston after years of dealing with not even having his own office like the rest of the faculty and the bad politics in his department.    It was a bit of a stressful time for him in general.

I even had time to sneak out for a date with a hot older guy (he's 55) from Windsor for lunch at this place called Anita's Kitchen.    He crossed the border to Detroit since I didn't have my passport with me.   Not that I would have time to cross to Windsor even if I did.     He told me he has three kids from a previous marriage all grown, the youngest one living in Amsterdam while on some school study program.   He himself has his own private law firm.    We ended the date with a steamy kiss standing by his car.    It was a bit surreal since we weren't in a gay part of Detroit (I'm not even familiar where that is.).   But he went for it and I didn't push back.   I even reached over for seconds and thirds.   Years ago I would've freaked out on who saw me.   I've progressed somewhat.   So we agreed that I would have to make plans to visit him in Windsor.   So I'll definitely have to do that.

Tasha also invited me to hang out with her for a bit.   I went to her house after my date (and after picking up a few items for my Mom and Dad).   I was greeted by her dogs, well one of them was ready to attack but she's a cute short dog so she can't do much damage, and her boyfriend who was at the house.   She wanted to take me out for a late lunch but I was so full from eating at Anita's Kitchen earlier from my date that I really didn't want to eat.   But since she was hungry we decided on the local Olive Garden.   So we were just talking about general stuff, nothing really significant that I could remember.   We both agreed that somehow we'd have to work on finding somewhere smaller for our parents to live.    For the next few months anyway, we would lose our biggest advocate for the fight, my younger sis Trina.    Her focus is on making plans for her wedding in May.    It'll be interesting to see more of his side of the family since ours is so small.

So all in all it was a good trip.   Coming back to Chicago was a different story.