Less than 24hrs in San Francsico

I mentioned in my last post that I felt like I had to write a little bit about very short stay in San Francisco.
After the madness that was CTIA in Las Vegas, stepping off the plane that Thursday evening at SFO was like a breath of fresh air…

I flew to Las Vegas (via Dallas Fort Worth), on Sunday March 31st.
Did a bunch of SpinVox things (worth a click through – great video) for them whilst I was at CTIA.

Lots and lots of fun.

I hung out with some cool folk, took part in some cool events and generally just had a good time… You get the idea.

The following Thursday however, I had to fly to San Francisco.

THANK YOU LORD.

I don’t think I can actually find the words to say how much I love that place. Really. It’s just… Brilliant.
Regular readers will know that this wasn’t my first trip to SF, so I kind of know my way around a little bit.. which was nice.

I landed at something like 9pm and I was scheduled to fly home the following evening around 7ish so I had :
*adopts film trailer esque voice*

“Less than 24hrs in San Francisco!”

🙂

So what did I get up to?

Well, after sharing a cab with some new friends that I met in Vegas, I must’ve got to my hotel around 10ish I guess?
Checked in, took my cases up, chilled out… I was gonna hit the sack then and I thought…

“Y’know what? I love the bar here. If I’m only here for a short amount of time, I best make the most of it. I think I deserve a Gin & Tonic…”

 

So off I trotted down to the Redwood, (beautiful bar this – it’s got Harry Potter Paintings on the walls… if you know what I mean), ordered myself a glass of Tanqueray & Tonic (extra lime) and just sat… and chilled.

Lovely stuff. About a half hour or so later I decide to go for a wander outside, get some air etc… and I end up chatting to this random guy, Tomas was his name, Danish chap, chatting to him about SF.. where’s good to go out etc.. He was in town on business with a couple of friends and had just been turned away from a club as they weren’t allowing large groups of men without any women. It happens.

Anyway – he and I head back into the bar and there are his (also Danish) mates talking to these women.

“Right, I can see where this is going…” I thought to myself “…I’m gonna have one more then head to bed”

I got it half right…

I was chatting away to Tomas just off to the side of the group when one of his mates called over to get the round in…

“Gin & Tonic!” I replied… and suddenly I had a LOT of attenton!

“Oi! You’re not Danish!”

“I never said I was!”

 

Que much laughter and explanations etc… These girls were in SF for a friend’s wedding. Great bunch they were too. The lot of us all ended up going clubbing together. (A place called ‘Slide‘ – Yup. It had a slide. Brilliant).

Fantastic night. Great company too.
Was really refreshing to be out with a group of girls who weren’t out on the pull or who weren’t looking for anything etc… They just wanted to have a drink and a chat and maybe a little dance and generally just enjoy their evening.

The Danish guys were mental. But we loved them for it. Hehehe…

All in all a great night was had   🙂
Friday rolled around so I went shopping… Bought LOADS of T-Shirts (more on that soon), some new boots, some DVDs and, surprise surprise, a new suitcase to bring it all home in. Heh heh…

Before I sign off – A blog post wouldn’t be complete with me adding in some relevant media…

First – some photos from SF.
A few from my recent trip but most from my trip in October last year… Hope you enjoy them.


Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

Oh – and as a point of interest – ALL of the photos above were taken with a Nokia N95.
LOVE that phone! 🙂

San Francisco

And second…

One of the great things about being in the States is you get to see some of the latest shows/films etc…

And you also get to see some of the awesome posters etc and you often get a hint for what’s coming too…

So for instance, last year, there were Heroes posters everywhere.

This year however I kept seeing things like this one —–>
And variations thereof…

Had no idea what it meant. No idea what it was about. Nothing.

For some reason I kept thinking of The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Good thing is these posters became suddenly very clear to me upon my return, when my new (and actually quite cool) friend Sizemore invited me along to a ‘Blogger’s Screening’ of the new comedy, ‘Forgetting Sarah Marshall‘.

And bloody good it was too, (thanks dude).

Full write up to follow…
🙂

Life is good…

Yesterday I had one of the best conversations, EVER.
It was only when I had this conversation did I realise how good life actually is at the moment.
An old friend called me up and it went a little something like this…

“Hi James, s’been ages! How are you?”

“Me? I’m good man. Yeah, it’s been SO long! We should definitely catch up sometime soon.”

“Great idea, you free tonight?”

“No mate. Not tonight, going to see R.E.M. at The Royal Albert Hall.”

“Oh. Nice!”

“Yeah. I thought so. Random ticket appeared in my hands from up high. Can’t say no. Got a box and everything!”

“Cool! Ok, how about we do lunch one day this week? When are you in London next?”

“I think I’m in town tomorrow…”

“Ok, we’ll do lunch tomorrow. Sushi or something?”

“Oh. No. Can’t mate, sorry. Bugger. Got an interview at the BBC.”

“WHAT?!”

“Yeah! I know! Cool huh?! Rory-Cellan Jones, Technology Correspondent. Should be good!”

“Right then, the weekend? We could have a lazy pub afternoon on Sunday. A few beers, roast dinner.. proper Sunday y’know? How’s that sound?”

“No can do mate. I’m flying to Las Vegas on Sunday…”

“WTF?!”

“Yeah! Flying out with SpinVox on Sunday afternoon for a big Wireless conference called CTIA. Looking forward to it, should be cooool! Never been to Vegas before….”

“Ok ok ok! When do you leave Vegas?”

“Thursday…but…”

“Ok! We’ll go out Friday!”

“No, I didn’t finish. Thursday I fly to San Francisco to host a lunch for some west coast bloggers… Fly home Friday night. Land Saturday afternoon.”

“Jeez, you’re gonna be knackered!”

“Yeah man, I know. Then I’ve got my show on the Sunday at Madam Jo Jos!”

“Right then. I’ll come see that then.”

“Hehehe… Yeah! Ok, do that!”

🙂
On top of ALL that, found out today one of my dear friends (who has NOTHING to do with the mobile industry) just so happens to be in Vegas at exactly the same time as me!
So we get to hang out and stuff which is just all kinds of cool…

This, by the way, isn’t some massive brag of a blog post. Life is going well at the moment. And I’m loving it.
Had my 6mth review with SpinVox this morning.

SIX MONTHS!

It seems like only yesterday that I was handing in my notice at Refresh Mobile…

How times flies when you’re having fun eh?
Speak soon folks..

🙂