San Francisco is a lot like Amsterdam – free, open-minded and casual – though I expected better weather. ~ Marcel Wanders

A Happy San Francisco Day

I often walk in the city on the weekends. For a lot of reasons, a death in the family, lots of travel, a chilly winter season I haven’t been in the city much lately. For me a great walking day in the city includes a few things. First, some nice weather and of course good food. Additionally, although this has absolutely never been a problem, some interesting and/or weird things to see or experience. Yesterday was a good walking day.

Today the Superbowl is happening at the 49ers home stadium, and while technically that’s a San Francisco game, the stadium is almost an hour south of the city. However, San Francisco is officially the host city, so there were a lot of Superbowl events happening and signs everywhere including the official host site near city hall, hence the sign in the picture above.

The weather yesterday was perfect, high 60’s, lots of sun, a little breeze just really perfect walking weather. My first stop of the day was Tommy’s Joynt, an old school, long standing San Francisco restaurant. I’d known about Tommy’s for a long time but had never gotten up there before last year. Both of my heart procedures, the catheterization and my open-heart surgery happened at Kaiser near Tommy’s. Both procedures happened insanely early in the morning so I booked a hotel near the hospital in Japantown for both procedures. Before each procedure I walked down to Tommy’s Joynt for dinner the night before. It’s a perfect comfort food kind of place, their dinner plate with some roast beef, mash potatoes, salad and a roll reminds me of a really good dinner from my childhood. Topped off with a funky atmosphere inside and really great free pickles I really love this place. Having eaten there before both procedures has also given me a real emotional connection to Tommy’s and so it was my first good city food for the day.

On the way on my walk up to Tommy’s San Francisco didn’t disappoint. There was supposed to be a rally for the March for Billionaires at Civic Center, it was a bust, literally no rally. I really hope the march was a prank. But on the way up Van Ness there was an anti ICE rally that was really well attending and growing the whole time I was eating at Tommy’s and the image below really epitomizes how San Francisco makes protests their own.

After Tommy’s I needed a little dessert so I headed over to Hayes Valley and got myself a little dessert, it will not be shocking for regular readers to see what it is.

Finally, a few images of the interesting things I saw along the way including the former president enjoying a beverage in front of City Hall and a little bit of street art. Have a happy day my friends and get out in the sun and walk. ~ Rev Kane