Dave Bullock / eecue : Programmer | Photographer | Admin | Human

Last night was our final dining experience in San Francisco, and as it turns out we saved the best for last. On the drive up to SF we asked for recommendations via chowhound, and recommendations we received. For our French restaurant we ended up choosing La Folie and we were extremely satisfied.

Read the rest after the jump. 

There is something magical about abandoned buildings. When I was growing up in the East Bay, my father would often take my brother and I to Point Bonita to explore the old bunkers and gun emplacements. I have very fond memories of climbing through the bars and exploring the spooky cement structures that used to hold artillery and ammunition. I hadn't been to Point Bonita in probably close to 20 years, but somehow I remembered exactly how to get there.

The remainder of the Point Bonita photo set can be found here. 

I don't care too much for the tourist trapping Grant Avenue section of Chinatown, but I really dig the open air markets and hanging duck butchers a block over.

The full Chinatown set can be found here. 

I was really hoping to get a tour of Fort Point, and I even read on the website that they were closed during the week for the Golden Gate Bridge retrofitting, but it didn't occur to me that they were actually doing the retrofit right now. Oh well, we still enjoyed watching surfers with death wishes riding waves that broke on crazy ugly rock outcroppings.

In a way, San Francisco City Hall is partially responsible for me being alive today. Way back in the day, my parents were married there in a civil ceremony. The dome of city hall is really beautiful, it looks like it was restored recently. I took some HDR photos of the civic center yesterday, enjoy.

I love this sign on the playground:

Cable Car Museum:

You can check the rest of the set here. 

You can check the rest of the HDR San Francisco from Treasure Island set here. 

You can check out the full set of my HDR Exploratorium photos here.

There is nothing quite as satisfying as a delicious meal after a long drive. When you start your vacation with hand held nodules of culinary blasphemy known as McGriddles, your next dining experience can only go one way, up. While driving up the beautiful and inspiring Pacific Coast Highway I am a bit embarrassed to admit that I spent a good amount of time surfing the web looking for a good place to eat upon our arrival in San Francisco.

Read the rest after the jump. 

We just checked in to the newly remodeled Hotel Majestic. The first room we checked in to, one of the standard rooms, was a bit smaller than we remembered and had a flickering light, so we called down to front desk and the gracious and pleasant Nisi upgraded us to a junior suite. The suite is lovely, and although neither it nor the hotel smell like old books any more, and we are quite pleased with it. It has a very nice fireplace, which Francisco the bell hop / valet driver fired up for us, as well as a lovely 4 post bed. It also reminds us a bit of home as our windows are facing the street.

We have a reservation for 2 at Perbacco and boy are we hungry!  

After taking a tour of Hearst Castle, the wife and I are almost to SF. I'm posting this from my new Macbook Pro through bluetooth to my Blackberry and out over the EDGE network. We're going to be in SF for 5 nights and are planning on having some good food. I've been saving up for this as it our Christmas present to each other and I'm really excited. I posted a thread on Chowhound SF seeking recommendations for good restaurants. I will potentially be guest blogging on Metroblogging SF. Vacation, yay! 

I love the metro stations. I got hassled taking these photos, according to the engineer tripods are not allowed in metro stations.  

When I first moved in to the Santa Fe Lofts a few years ago, the management would always post the notification for filming in both the elevator and on the front door. Today is the third time in as many months when there has been large film crews invading our building and the residents were not notified. I feel this is totally unacceptable, it is the management's responsibility to notify the building's tenants about any kind of production. 

My work bought me a Macbook Pro yesterday. Actually they cut a check to Apple, Inc. and I brought it to the Brea Mall Apple Store. This is the fastest personal computer I have ever owned, and it totally rocks. It is amazing how much faster this laptop is than my Dual G5 desktop. I have also started using some new software, specifically iTerm and Newfire, before I was using Terminal and NetNewsWire. I really dig the interface on both iTerm and Newsfire. My only complaint about iTerm is that the bottom of the display butts up against the last line of text, I know this is very minor, but Terminal had a tiny bit of breathing room there.  

Untitled, or Bell Comunications Around The Globe is one of my favorite sculptures in Downtown Los Angeles. Created in 1961 by Anthony Heinsbergen and located at 420 S. Grand on what is now the AT&T building, the mural / mosiac is made of thousands of old telephone switching parts. There is nothing like junk to make a geek like me happy. You can read more about it here. [Full gallery here.] 

A few days ago I took a walk around my neighborhood and took some HDR photos of various interesting buildings, fountains and sculptures. I especially enjoyed this shot of the camera that is perched atop Frank Gehry's Walt Disney Concert Hall. I wonder if that was part of the original plan?

Either way I still dig the way that building looks

You can check the rest of the HDR Disney Concert Hall shots that I took here.