Listing Through Life

How much of a particular food do you have to eat for it to become one of your all time favorite foods? Because the half-forkful of chocolate-orange gelato I tasted here order was amazing.

On Tuesday night after working the booth, four of us  decided we wanted pie. My boss found the Chocolat Cremerie on his phone, and we headed into the Gaslamp Quarter of San Diego for a late-night snack.

I had the wild berry tart, and it was very good, but it didn’t match the gelato.

We got back to our hotel around 11:00 pm. We were staying in a La Quinta, which I was convinced was Spanish for “towels like sandpaper.” But it turns out I was wrong. It means fifth, or something of the sort, and refers to an archaic term for inns located every five miles along the road in the days of foot travel.

Our hotel also had this sign above the parking garage which amused and annoyed me at the same time.

I’d always heard three things about San Diego.

1. It’s always 75 degrees.
2. It never rains.
3. There are no bugs.

On our second day there, it was a very windy 45 degrees and raining. To be fair, I didn’t see any bugs.

My boss took some of us to Luigi’s Pizzaria, another place featured on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives.

It didn’t look like much inside or out. Several varieties of pizza were on display in the counter. We ordered slices and had them heated up. I tried two kinds, and both were amazing, although I totally forget what they were.

As we exited, we noticed a coffee/pastry place across the street called Krakatoa. We headed over in search of pie. They didn’t have pie, but they did have some mighty good red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting. There were about six tables in the place, each of them with exactly one person sitting at it, and none of them eating. The five of us stood around for about 15 minutes until one of the guys got the idea and left, and we sat down.

On Tuesday, we drove south to Imperial Beach, the southernmost community on the West Coast. I was behind the wheel, so I asked my boss to take some photos as we drove across the Coronado Bridge.

Here’s the view looking northwest along San Diego Bay.

Looking north toward downtown San Diego.

As we drove south along the coast, there was a rainbow out over the Pacific.

Our main destination was The Wave Cafe, a tiny diner in downtown Imperial Beach.

As we were sitting down, I happened to refer to two of my coworkers by name. When the server came to our table, she called them by name. I thought this was pretty impressive, so to put it to the test, I started calling another coworker by the name Gertrude, but either the server didn’t hear me or she was on to me.

I bought a basic breakfast — two eggs over easy, with hash browns and bacon with blueberry pancakes on the side. Everything was very good. The place was tiny, but popular, particularly with servicemen from the nearby navy base.

When we’d finished eating, we walked down a few blocks to the Imperial Beach Pier. (Fun Fact to Know and Tell — The pier opened to the public on November 23, 1963, the day after JFK was assassinated.) The pier extends 1,491 feet out from the shore, and at the far end, the water is 20 feet deep.

A Rock Dove looks north toward San Diego. The dark line cutting the city skyline in half is the Coronado Bridge.

A Western Gull.

Several people were fishing from the pier, catching small silver fish they said were perch.

Off to the southwest, we could see a couple of the Coronado Islands. These four uninhabited islands are in Mexico. They’re a wildlife refuge and, according to Wikipedia: “Visitors may anchor, watch a donkey-show, scuba and snorkel, but trips ashore are not allowed.” I’ve never seen an off-shore donkey-show, but I’d like to sometime.

Looking south toward Mexico (the higher area in the background of the photo). Imperial Beach is popular with surfers, but there were none there on this 45-degree morning.