The first weekend of 2011: #3, 12, 13, 24, 28

I was planning on making this weekend mellow, but mellow for me is apparently pretty busy. On the one hand, I thought it might be kind of lame if I said I was going to sit around reading, but the reality was, this was the first weekend where I didn't have to bake something, or be somewhere, or entertain a guest, or attend a party, or get dressed for that matter, in a while. So I was looking forward to sitting around.

But then Running Buddy texted and wanted to know if I wanted to do something, and I sort of have a policy of saying YES! to things unless I already have something else going on. (As much as I love reading, I'm certain if I were diagnosed with a terminal disease and told I had six months to live, I would not spend it reading every good book out there. I would spend it traveling and visiting friends and family. And if that's what I'd do if I KNEW I was going to die, that's what I should do now, since, guess what? I'm going to die. Sometime. Hopefully not for another 40-50 years or so.)

Anyway, Running Buddy and I met up at the Target in Mission Valley, and headed over to Cabrillo. Cabrillo is a national monument at the very southern tip of Point Loma. It has bathrooms with the best view ever. Of course, you can get the same view when you're not in the bathrooms, too. The monument has some very nice tidal pools, which we didn't actually get to play in because apparently Cabrillo is the place to go on New Year's day, and EVERYONE was there, so it was crowded. Not crowded by Sea World standards, just crowded for an out-of-the-way national monument.

We did get to go up in the lighthouse, which I love. It's this tiny little old light house and it's completely cramped inside, and I LOVE IT. And, it has a basement! You can't go in the basement, but you can see that it's there. Not a lot of houses in California have basements, which means everything that is basement-y is in your garage. I would say there are no basements because the ground shakes, but that's pretty dumb considering that parking garages and the like are located underground.

One thing I should inform you about going to Cabrillo is that you'll be driving along the road to get there, and it looks like you've come to a gate, and you might worry that they won't let you in. BUT IT'S ALL A LIE! There is no one at the gate, and you are totally allowed in. I promise. Then, you will drive through the naval base located on Point Loma, and really, you're still allowed to do this. And then you'll drive through the military cemetery, and this is okay, too. And then you'll come to the entrance to the national monument. It's bizarre, yes, but Point Loma is exactly that--a long, skinny point, so there's no civilian road and military road. There's just one road. Relax. You'll be fine, and the views are totally worth it.

On our drive out of Point Loma, we were treated to a lovely sunset. Unfortunately, the park closed before the sun actually set, but it's still lovely from the drive.

We decided to head over to Old Town for dinner. Old Town is a historic section of San Diego with a lot of Mexican restaurants and funky shops, as well as a state historic park. It's great for wandering around during the day, and is located on the trolley line, so it's easy to get to from down town.

We opted for dinner at Miguel's, which just recently changed its name from Zocalo. In fact, I think the web address still has Zocalo in it. They served us these fabulous warm, salty chips, and I ordered some guacamole to go with it. Because we were there during happy hour, I took advantage of those savings and also ordered two fish tacos and a strawberry margarita. My total came to just about as much as Running Buddy's, who only ordered the fajitas. She got a TON of food, though. Unlike many other establishments in Old Town, Miguel's has its own parking lot. Old Town does have many free parking lots, but they usually fill up quickly.

It was a fabulous Saturday afternoon, and next time, the only things we'd do differently is we'd start earlier and we'd bring a camera!

Captain America and I finally had a day off together on Sunday, so after puttering around the house and watching football (I'm pretty sure you can figure out which one of us did which of those things) we decided to go on what Captain America calls a spontaneous date.

We went over to Pickup Stix, which may sound like a ghetto date, but I LOVE their noodles, and they are located close to the movie theater that's closest to our house (and yes, the movie theater is a little ghetto, too). We went and saw True Grit. I am not a Jeff Bridges fan, but the movie was quite good. He plays a drunk, like always, but Matt Damon is very good (when isn't he good?), and Haylee Steinfeld was fantastic. There were some funny bits, and I actually cried at the end. (Spoiler alert: the horse dies. I'm a sucker for that sort of thing).

All in all, it was a wonderful, relaxing, but not dull weekend.