Dogs Are Barking

7 April - My alarm woke up my two roommates in the morning and eventually woke mup as well. Wanted to get an early start on the day to do some exploring - eager to walk around a bit after the lethargy of the automobile. San Francisco is not a big city as cities go but the steepness of some of the hills is verging on the ridiculous. Saw a fair swathe of the city on my journeys including The Mission, the infamous Castro District (the Castro theatre is currently showing 'Adam And Steve' so I guess the would be Aussie pope was wrong) and I also made it out to Chinatown and Fishermans Wharf where I saw a gigantic seal frolicking in the filthy harbour and got a decent view of The Rock but unfortunattly all of the tours are booked out until Sunday and I don’t think I will be hanging around for that long. 1 Post Plaza is the hangout for the city's numerous bike messengers and like the Art Gallery opposite 885 it fairly stinks of weed. The few couriers I spoke to were not particularly friendly but as I recall most of Vancouver's lot ar a fairly miserable lot too. On my travels did see a replica of Baby Blue, obviously kitted out differently but the same frame - there ar quite a few of his brothers in Vancouver, which isn’t surprising as Simon probably sold a few of them - but its nice to see one all the way down here in San Fran - still, putting a rear view mirror on a bike just seems faintly ridiculous to me. Charley seems to get a lot of attention wherever I go and i'm thinking I need to get a better story than 'i fell off my bicycle'. The obvious alternative is to say that I got into a fight and an even better version would be to say that I did it whilst bxing - that story could afford me a bit of protection from people who might want to mess with me but I think that anyone who talks to me for more than five minutes would know instantly that i'm no boxer - in any event, the bike thing is just not working for me. Went out for dinner with Mark, an australian guy in town for an education conference (apparently its the biggest one of its type in the world which explains why all the hostels in town are completely filled up) and Dennis, a young guy from seattle who's in town for an interview for something or other. Got back to the hostel and chatted for a few hours where time got completely away from us and before I knew it the night was over. Was giving my humble but well informed opinion as to why Crash didn’t deserve the best picture award and was interrupted by an Albertan girl who proceeded to inform me that Crash was a great movie that was addressed real issues and it wasn’t about luck and that brokeback mountain was a typical hollywood portrayal of gay relationships but Transamerica was the best film of the year. I was annoyed by the interruption but grateful for the excuse to set a misinformed individual straight about her misperceptions as to what makes a good fillum. The nerve of the girl.