A ride to the coast or SHOUT OUT #3

With departmental orientation starting tomorrow I decided to replace my day of laundry, grocery shopping & syllabus planning and take the 90 minute drive to Marin County today.

The terrain goes from flat, flat, FLAT to mountainous and for lack of a better word -- interesting. 80W to 37W to 101S -- a drive I highly recommend and much shorter in feel than it's 75 miles.

For most of the trip out there I was on the phone with Melanie, the teacher of record of DRA 10, the class I teach this fall quarter. I have been freaking out about my lack of teaching experience and after our conversation I feel that I'm much further along than I thought. I mean I have a theme and everything. I also have TONS of support, I just have to ask.

I was on the phone with my father as I drove into Sonoma County and got excited about the thought of being surrounded by some great vineyards. Unfortunately you cannot see any of them from the freeway, so with constant changing of the radio, eventually landing on Garrison Keillor, I stumbled into Marin.

My destination was Mill Valley and the Marin Theatre Company -- the new artistic home for Jasson Minadakis. I wanted to see the first show of the new season, Love Song by John Kolvenbach. It was a truly lovely bittersweet comedy. I was amazed that I have not been to a theatre or seen a show since The Servant of Two Masters in the beginning of July.

I emailed Andrea and Jasson on Friday, but due to Yom Kippur I did not finalize plans with them until this morning. After a brief phone call with Andrea at 9:38, we realized if I wanted to meet her and Alexis Weiss at noon, I had to be on the road in 20 MINUTES!!

I took a quick shower and jumped in the car with my bottle of water, DRA 10 file folder, cosmetic bag and hands-free cell phone attachment.

I made great time and had a yummy brunch at TOAST with Andrea and Alexis. It was so refreshing to see familiar, friendly faces. We each moved our lives across the country and are starting new adventures. We each certainly had good rental housing stories to share. It was during this conversation that I learned a bit of news that warrants a shout out.

My third official shout out goes to Andrea and Jasson Minadakis for quitting smoking and becoming yoga enthusiasts (read: obsessed!) They had both tried to quit for a while, but as you may know the crazy West Coast hippies are not a fan of cigarettes. I am not sure what the "last straw" was, but it certainly could have been when someone in Mill Valley SPIT at Jasson as he walked down the street puffing away. Close your mouth, hush that gasp and remember that one, class.

So, let's raise a glass of very well-priced California wine to my favorite non-smokers.

Namaste!