My Mom has lived in San Diego for the past 10 years. So while I have never lived there, I’ve been visiting it for a while, and spent 12 years living a few hours away either in Palm Springs or Santa Barbara. San Diego has eternal spring-like weather right next to the ocean, with nice cool mornings, sunny afternoons, and another cool-down at night. Tropical foliage grows naturally all-year round, it’s nothing to walk past bunches of wild bird of paradise or phylodendren or lily and of course, those infamous palm trees. It’s a paradise, and one of the biggest cities in Southern California.

And it’s true, as Mom said, every chance we got I wanted to eat outside in the sunshine and nice temperatures. You just cannot get good Mexican food on the East Coast, so I made sure to eat some while in SD. The cheeseburgers are better too, or maybe it’s just eating them outside at a patio table that makes them better. Hey, come to think of it, even the ice cream and beer taste better! I think it’s the laid back way, that makes me relax (almost to the point of complacency I admit) but anyhow, it was nice to take a break from the noisy, smelly, sometimes freaky subways and massive midtown crowds.

We went to San Bernadino to the St. Bernadine hospital to visit Bob’s Dad who was recooperating from his triple bypass surgery. Even the Jesus statues look better in California! Seriously, it must be the sun that gives everything a little halo around it. It was funny to see high school surfer kids with long bangs say “have a nice night dude” when they bagged the groceries. Such a contrast to my European grocery here in Queens.

And check out my newly stretched out legs! I’m really this tall, if you didn’t know. Not really, but nice illusion. You can do so much with good natural lighting.