San Diego Neighborhoods

Boy it has been awhile since I have posted! Sorry to be so sporadic.  Just have had a lot going on.

I’ve been saving some pictures to put up a post about something I find neat about San Diego. I think many big cities have neighborhoods, and San Diego is no exception.  It has been fun exploring the quaint neighborhoods, finding places to eat, coffee to drink, ect. (parking in most of them is not the part I find quaint, haha) One of the things I really enjoy is that some of the neighborhoods actually have signs!

Little Italy:

Little Italy is near downtown and the waterfront. Its awesome, because as I’m sure you can guess, it has lots of great Italian food. The other thing that is neat about it is that it has this Farmer’s Market full of fruits and vegetables, flowers, crafts, and food vendors galore!  I first went to this Farmers Market last fall with some gals from church - Diana, Grace, Hong, and Victoria. I had a very interesting food experience here (I think I told you in my post from Sept 2012  that I would tell you about what I ate there and post a picture. Well, here it finally is!)  We all decided to split. . . . A SEA URCHIN!!! And here we all are pictured with it! So, when you buy it, it is technically still alive on ice. They pretty much just cut off the top, and you eat the stuff inside. It kind of tastes/has texture like salty buttery flan. Well, at least I can say I’ve tried it! OH! And Little Italy is home to Extraordinary Desserts, which if you have been following the blog (or come to visit me!) has come up before. I need not say more. :)

North Park:

North Park is also a neighborhood full of awesome places to eat, and people do actually live in this neighborhood too. I was introduced to North Park by my friend Cerise. She’s cool like that. We went to this great breakfast place, and then we went to this coffee shop called Café Calabria. In part, I really like it because it has character, and I feel like I could actually sit and hang out in it, unlike the coffee shops near where I am in University City/La Jolla, where they are all so busy and all chains anyway. (even though I love Peets!)  And this is one of those coffee shops where they make awesome designs in the foam of your coffee. The second picture of coffee is a drink they have there (which I've never seen anywhere else) called Bicerin. It's basically Nutella, shot of espresso, and a bit of foam. Stir and drink the chocolately hazelnutty coffee goodness. Yum.

Birdrock:

So Birdrock is this small neighborhood south of downtown La Jolla and north of Pacific Beach. All I know about it is that to get through it you have to go around 5 consecutive roundabouts, and that there is this fabulous coffee shop called Birdrock Coffee. It is the San Diego version of Stumptown, for those of you who know what that is. They roast their own coffee and you can get a cup of Chemex coffee, purportedly the best way to make coffee ever. And Amy, my friend who I tried out this great coffee place with (see pic below!), thinks its better than Stumptown. :)   The coffee shop is a few blocks from the beach, and its pretty open – all the windows/walls in the front are open, you can feel the cool sea breeze as you sip your latte. Totally chill. The morning we went there, they had live music, and they apparently do this quite often!  It was really great.  Everyone else thought so too 'cause there were a lot of people there!  Means it must be a great place. I need to go back. . .

Gaslamp District:

This part is downtown, near the San Diego Conference Center, so I’ve been here for Society for Neuroscience meetings before I ever even moved here! We would come down here to find lunch and dinner while at the conference. I don’t actually spend much time there at all in now that I live here. It is full of random shops, clubs, and restaurants, and houses the Ghirardelli Chocolate Store. It’s like a coffee shop, only for chocolate and ice cream.  And by this I really just mean, it smells like chocolate! And you can buy chocolate, and gigantic ice cream sundaes covered in fudge and brownies!  (this gives me good memories sharing these sundaes with several good friends on fun trips to Chicago too. . . ) 

And I’m leaving out Hillcrest, Clairemont, all the beaches (Pacific Beach, Ocean Beach, ect), Bankers Hill, Point Loma, and many more. I haven’t even explored them all!  Just wanted to share a few highlights I’ve found though!

So. . . maybe this post really was an excuse to talk about food and coffee. . .

Of Corn and Camping & Friends and Family

Ah, summer vacation back home. It came at a truly needed time. The excuse to get away was to two-fold. One – so that I could attend another annual camping-kayaking weekend with my Iowa City friends (plus see everyone who didn’t go), and two – to go home and see family at our yearly whoever-can-make-it this year mini reunion.

I flew into Omaha, but immediately then next day drove out to Iowa City. Oh how good it was! I hadn’t been back to Iowa City since I moved last June. It was even pretty awesome to drive on the interstate for 4 hours to get there, spending only 25 min in anything that looked like a city and being surrounded by green cornfields stretching to all horizons the rest of the time! Oh, there is something utterly fantastic about being in the middle of nowhere!

It felt so good to be back in Iowa City. It was almost as if I had never left. . . except I couldn’t remember lots of street names and was pretty forgetful about how to get to places I used to know well! However, I had NO PROBLEM getting to Oasis for some hummus and falafel. :) Oh, how I have missed this place! Oh how I have missed Iowa City food in general! Post my Oasis fix, I met up with my friends Katya and Dan to head out to the campsite for the 3^rd year of Camping and Kayaking with Iowa City friends! We went to a different camping place this year than we have gone to in years past. The campsite was. . . so Iowa.  Hehe. It was a picnic bench and a fire pit located on a strip of grass in between a gravel road and a field of corn. Forget camping next to trees. Why not corn? Although it was rather strange, we actually had quite a fabulous time! It was a rather quiet campsite, and I think it is more about the company one spends the time with than where one spends the time at.  A total of 8 of us made it out for this years adventure, and we had quite a blast kayaking down the river, telling funny stories around the fire pit, and drinking our French press coffee for breakfast each morning. (can we say, coffee snobs even when camping? I even brought Peets with me.) And again, it was so great to spend some time in the middle of nowhere, with only friends around. Thanks so much Katya, Dan, Christy, Sarah, Erin, Jenni and Josh for a wonderful weekend! (and thanks to everyone who's pictures I borrowed for below!)

 

I hope this gives you the idea at least, of our campsite next to the corn. The picnic bench is kind of small. And of course we couldn't resist the pictures in the corn!

After the camping I had time to catch up with other great friends whom I miss so much! I got to see Jennifer, and the DuBrava’s, Melissa (and we got to go visit Melissa’s parents, her sister Anna, and their adorable new dog!), Becky, Karen, Jean, Huy, and some of my old lab people. 

Here’s a pic (missing Melissa, who is taking the picture) of a great dinner with some fantastic gals that I miss very much!

After all the fun and friends in Iowa City, it was back to Nebraska for me! I spend the first day and a half in Omaha where I got to hang out with Ani and the kids (and see Jacob for a bit) and then spend some time with Sara and Matt and family in their new house! After that it was hanging out with my family! Although we weren’t a big crowd this year, it was so good to see everyone who did come. I think the life of the party this year was my cousin Jenny’s three adorable girls, so full of energy! And so cute! I felt a little old this year as my youngest cousins Faith and Grace (who recently got their drivers’ licenses) drove my brother and I down to see Grandpa. I remember when they were born. . . now they can drive! We did a lot of eating good food, hanging out around my parents’ house, playing games, going to the park with the girls, and visiting Grandpa. I miss home. One night, a number of us found ourselves on the deck as the sun was setting, just enjoying the actually very nice summer weather, with the smell of grass and earth in the air, listening to the sound of the cicadas. It was so peaceful. I appreciate the chance to have gotten a little bit of time just to slow down, and sit and enjoy such a little pleasure in life with people I care deeply about. Something I forget to do when life get so busy and stressful.

I'm so glad I made it home for the mini-reunion this year, it was so great to see everyone! I didn't get too many good pictures this year of us all, so perhaps I just leave you with a picture my cousin Jenny took (as long as its okay with her if she reads this!) of my brother and Grandpa and I. 

Another Family Visit!

I am very behind in updating my blog! I guess it is time to get back to it and get some summer fun posted up on here. At the end of June my parents drove out to San Diego and my brother flew in and we had a good solid week of fun! We did so many things, I’m not even going to be able to get them all on here! Another packed Gordon family vacation  :)  Could we do it any other way?

We decided to check out both the San Diego Zoo and the Safari Park. I’ve done the zoo, several times, but I guess I always see things I’ve missed before, so it makes it okay! This time we got to glimpse the newest baby panda out on display with his mom. So CUTE! They also had a new Australian outback exhibit so I got to see some koalas. Pretty cool. Oh! And we saw a giraffe drinking. Probably not the easiest task for these tall guys! But I really enjoyed being able to spend more time than I have before at the Safari Park. They have this area of plains that they take you out in in this tram, and the view is pretty cool. Herds of animals out on this plain with the mountains of Escondido in the background. I like it. So much space! The other cool thing we got to see is the cheetah run. They have a strip of grass that they bring a cheetah out on and get him to chase after a fake rabbit on. That cat was fast! You pretty much have to pick a spot of grass to watch and see him whiz by. Only place in North America to see such things.

 

 We continued our touristy activities by touring the Midway, a retired air craft carrier that is in dock in San Diego. Pretty huge! I would never want to spend long amounts of time on something like that. The ship is huge, but rather cramped quarters inside for all the personnel. I have great respect for all those willing to do so. We also went to the Museum of Man in Balboa Park. There are so many museums there, and with the exception of the botanical garden area, I’ve hadn’t made it to any before this. We also drove up Mt. Soledad to see the views, did some hiking at Torrey Pines State Park, went to Cabrillo National Monument, Little Italy Farmers Market, and visited La Jolla Shores beach for a sunset. And of course, who could forget that we went to Peet’s coffee, EVERY DAY! A most important San Diego spot.

 Torrey Pines hike down to the beach and views of the Pacific from the top! (above)

 Sunset at La Jolla Shores Beach

  It was also fun as mom and dad celebrated their 37^th wedding anniversary while the family was there – congrats! We celebrated with dinner in Little Italy and dessert from Extraordinary Desserts. What else?

It was a great trip. I was so glad to have them all come again. There’s nothing like family.     

In Review

A year ago today, I left Iowa for California. Becky took the day off work, and we went for breakfast at the Bluebird Diner. She helped me make all my last minute preparations, pack up my car, and strap my bike on back. We cried.

I picked up Christy, my travel buddy, and we set out across the country. I still have great memories from our trip, getting to see Erin P in Des Moines, my family, and my friend Cari and her family as we traveled west. Touring the Kearney Arch, Boulder Colorado, seeing Mike the Headless Chicken, Hoover Dam, Zion National Park, and looking for geocaches along the way. The beauty of Colorado and Utah. The feeling of strangeness upon entering California and realizing that it wasn't just vacation and I wasn't going home. That this was the end of the trip for me. It felt so foreign. I felt homeless - so in between places. No longer belonging in Iowa, but not yet belonging in California.

The last year hasn't exactly been an easy one for me. I think the hardest part is that I found it to be a very lonely place for quite some time, even though I had a couple of people that I already knew here (for whom I am very thankful). I know it takes time to build new relationships, but it was so much harder to leave behind all the friendships I had built in Nebraska and Iowa  than I thought it would be. I felt so lonely having to suddenly do most of life by myself when I had such a great group of people that I did all of life with for years. I didn't realize how extremely blessed I was by those friendships until I left. And I'm so thankful for the blessings those friends have continued to be by how many have worked to keep in contact and who have come to visit! It just felt like I spent months explaining to strangers (and everywhere I went, there were only strangers) who I was. Although it was okay at first, it became rather exhausting. I think it took until March for me to feel like myself again in general. It also seems to have taken me some time to get the hang of being a postdoc. If I've even found it yet! But it's getting better.  

I did get used to San Diego and the bigness of the city and the number of people more quickly than I initially anticipated. Although I'm still not so sure about parking lots sometimes! It doesn't feel as big and packed in here as in other larger cities. That has helped. I certainly have gotten used to the weather, and love that there are things blooming here year round! 

Things have not all been sad and lonely though! I have now established more friendships that I'm so grateful for. I've found a church home where I have been able to get involved and find some great supportive people. I've had the opportunity to do a lot of fun things in the area, which I've posted about over the last year, and some things I haven't managed to get on the blog too! And even when things are lonely and hard, I know that God has been with me all the way, increasing my trust in Him. And that He has been so good to give me all the good things I have here to be thankful for!

I don't feel homeless anymore. I now feel like I belong. And I'm excited to see what the next year brings.