After checking into our hotel, we took a couple of the free beach crusier bikes they had and went for a short ride in the drizzly rain on the trail near the beach. Not many people were out, and it was very pleasant.
After dark we walked down State St. and ended up at the Santa Barbara Public Market, an upscale indoor food court where we shared a bag of Fritos cut open with chili, bbq meat, sour cream and green onion inside followed by some dark chocolate and Cinnamon Toast Crunch ice cream.
The next morning, we requested the beach cruiser bikes again after breakfast but were told by the college kid at the desk it was a "huge liability" for us to take them out because the ground was wet. This even though it wasn't raining any more, we'd taken them out IN the rain the night before, and we'd already signed a liability waiver. I decided to ask another guy 10 minutes later, and he gave us the bikes no problem. I despise overly protective attitudes and kept making jokes about how brave we were to ride through all those shallow puddles. So much risk.
We checked out the wharf and got a picture:
then rode farther and walked around a cemetery because that's what I like to do. I figured out this one was next door to a summer home estate called Bellosguardo that was owned by the very wealthy Clark family. I'd just read about them in the intriguing book Empty Mansions.
We stopped in Solvang after checking out of our hotel and ate aebleskivers and visited the Elverhoj museum, which is located in a Danish family's former home. The kitchen was especially charming:
Then it was on to the Madonna Inn in San Luis Obispo. A friend had raved about this quirky hotel in a Facebook post, so we stopped for lunch--so good!--and looked around at the decor and grounds. Even the staircase was kitschy:
I had to buy a goblet, magnet, some hot pink decorative bunnies, and a t-shirt:
My sisters included a list of 40 things they remember about or attribute to me with my gift, which was so touching and fun to read through. I'm including it here even though it will be long:
1) You tugging your eyelashes to itch your eyes and rubbing your eyes mercilessly
2) So organized--your bullet point Post-It note lists
3) Papa (my mom's dad) requesting you play "Rock Around the Clock" (a jazzy version of Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree) at Christmas talent shows and the crowd-pleasing slide you did down the keyboard
4) Your funny and thoughtful birthday gifts and your excellent birthday card selections
5) Coming down to your (basement) bedroom and seeing you writing in your journal on your bed in a standard notebook
6) Most athletic sister--softball, tennis, bowling, roller blading, etc.
7) How you'd get in the tub and read for hours
8) The way you can burp and say words at the same time
9) Making oatmeal scotchies or chocolate chip cookies and lining them up on paper towels
10) Mom and Dad surprising you with your senior trip to New York by playing Frank Sinatra's New York, New York song
11) You made a video for school that included you driving off with a dummy dressed like Mom being dragged behind
12) The things you liked to eat: Grape Nuts, Honey Bunches of Oats, ice cream, chips and salsa, Mother's Taffy cookies, Bit O' Honey, Kit Kats, Great Harvest oatmeal cookies
13) Your precise handwriting and doodles
14) Dressing up to go disco skating and your love of disco music
15) The things in your basement room: lava lamp, mannequin legs, Anne of Green Gables and Little House on the Prarie series, Mary Englebreit and David Letterman stuff
16) You ALWAYS having a book with you for any spare moment in life when you could squeeze in some reading
17) Doing those big Disney movie poster puzzles with you
18) Hearing you blow your nose like a fog horn and then your ankles clicking up the basement stairs in the mornings
19) Your ability to slip your contact into your mouth and still be able to talk, eat, drive, etc.
20) You hiding in the ball box from Mr. Grass (my 5th-grade teacher who I disliked) and otherwise making his life hard
21) The way you drove your Mazda Protege stick shift so confidently and zippy up and down the big hills in San Francisco
22) You losing BIG after a Dr. Mario all-nighter (when we stayed up gambling) and crying upon seeing the results of the haircut I won doing on you [2nd Sister]
23) Going to Lenitos and out-eating you by like 4 tacos every time [2nd Sister]
24) Cleaning the Backman's house with you [2nd Sister]
25) Going to Taco Time with you and two friends in high school [2nd Sister]
26) Seeing you emerge from the hide-a-bed all sweaty like a newborn kitten after you talked me into folding you into it and Dad barely being able to get you out [2nd Sister]
27) Kicking grasshoppers out of the bushes and riding Big Wheels with you and your friend [2nd Sister]
28) You pulling me aside to ask me to put on a slip as I pranced around in a see-through dress on the Manti temple grounds (at my wedding). [2nd Sister]
29) Going on walks with you in boxers in the 90s [2nd Sister]
30) Being jealous of the Pirates of Penzance nightgown you got to wear and wishing I could wear one just like it to bed [3rd Sister]
31) Playing a Jeopardy game on Christmas Eve at bedtime with you and 2nd Sister [3rd Sister]
32) So impressed with how you led the Cherubs group and were so calm and good with leading the kids and doing it in your own way [4th Sister]
33) You wore that black pantsuit to a dance in high school--I thought you were so daring and cool [4th Sister]
34) You coming to pick me up from a neighborhood friend's house on the pink scooter and balancing both of us on it all the way home [4th Sister]
35) Staying up late one night with you and 5th Sister while we challenged each other to see who could successfully pick things up with our feet--I won [4th Sister]
36) You let me stay with you in San Francisco while I interned at the Kaiser lab [4th Sister]
37) Pretending to stand on one of your hat boxes without putting any weight on it and then breaking through [5th Sister]
38) Playing Boggle with you and me spelling the F word without knowing it was bad [5th Sister]
39) You bringing your college friends over and me having a crush on one of them [5th Sister]
40) Hallucinating (that she saw an intruder) in your San Francisco apartment and watching the Olympics instead of going back to bed because we were so shaken up [5th Sister]
