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I got back home last night at about 11 PM. It's now about 24 hours later and I'll be waking up in 7 hours to go to work. I can't face the thought of work quite yet, so I'm going to try to escape with a quick blog entry ( please excuse any typos - I really need to get to sleep soon ).

They'll be plenty of time later to tell you all about San Fran and Yosemite ( and plenty of time for pictures/videos ), but for now I'd like to say a few quick things about what happened on Friday, because it's kinda a natural extension to my recent "Parenthood" blog post. Parenthood is wonderful and rewarding, but it also can be quite exhausting at times, and Friday was a good example. The plan on Friday was to visit Alcatraz Island and do the prison tour, and then meet Ruth's family ( Her Dad, who came with us on the trip; Ruth's Uncle Joey ( her Dad's brother - we stayed at his house in the Bay area ); Ruth's cousin Jeffrey ( Joey's son ) and his girlfriend, Ruth's Aunt Amy ( her Dad's sister - also lives in the Bay Area ); Ruth's sister Debby and her husband Orion - they moved to the Bay Area ( Berkeley ) in March ) for dinner at this small restaurant in Chinatown ).

Things started well. We got out of the house bright and early and got parking right across the street from Pier 33 ( where the Alcatraz boat leaves from ) by 10 AM. We picked up our tickets ( we had reserved the 12:00 boat online - you had to reserve in advance ) and were told that we should be ready to board the boat at 11:40.

We then decided to head over to Pier 39. Pier 39 has a bunch of restaurants and shops. We had an early lunch/brunch there ( clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl - yummy yummy! ), but we then made a strategic mistake. We decided to head to the end of the pier to give the boys a look at the sea lions ( they sun themselves at the end of the pier ). Unfortunately, there were also a bunch of kiddie rides at the end of the Pier. Peter didn't want to leave the ride, but by the time it got to be 11:20 or so, I decided we needed to head back. Somehow, I convinced Peter to let me pick him up without much protest, and we started to walk back to the land side of the pier, so we could head back to Pier 33. I asked Ruth to walk ahead with Michael, so Michael could set a good example for Peter. Peter let me carry him for about 100 feet, but once he started to realized that we were leaving the rides he started to throw a fit. He threw such a fit that I had to call Ruth on the phone ( she was about 50 feet ahead of me - I couldn't yell because allergies had wrecked my throat by then - more on that later ) and ask her to come back and walk next to me, because I was seriously concerned that people were going to think I was kidnapping Peter.
Well anyway, the next 15 minutes were quite an ordeal. Peter weighs about 40 pounds. Carrying 40 pounds for about 6 blocks isn't real a big deal, but it is when those 40 pounds are fighting you the entire way. Not only I did have to lift him, but I had to pull him in towards me the whole way because he was using his hands and feet to try to push himself away from me the whole time ( despite the fact that if he had pushed himself out of my grasp he would have fallen back-first towards the concrete floor below ). Eventually Peter decided that pushing against my chest wasn't effective enough and started to push with his hands against my neck. This obviously made things more difficult as I was now effectively being chocked as I tried to walk and keep him from slipping to the concrete.

Anyway, but the time we made it to the line for the Alcatraz boat, my biceps were burning more than they ever had in my life, and my trachea wasn't feeling all too great. Yes, parenthood is tough - and it was still only 11:40.

It's now 12:02 AM on Monday morning, so I'm going to have to cut this blog short and finish this story later. I would have written more but Peter started acting up about 40 minutes ago ( he's still on West Coast time). He kept bugging Michael ( who was trying to sleep ), so I had to go and defuse the situation before it became a huge brawl. Yes, parenthood is tough.

See ya folks,
Rich