Retiring retirement and Good Times in Santa Cruz

Friday, February 26. Drew and Tony made it to Aptos safe and sound at about 9:30 Thursday night and we celebrated with some chocolate cherry soy ice cream. We discovered the flavor because Steve had half a carton in the freezer, and then we bought another so we had plenty to go around. Friday morning was cloudy and the weather forecast promised rain. We walked Dixie and then the four of us walked down to the Seascape clubhouse for a nice breakfast. The place was practically deserted because of the storms brewing.

Back at Steve's house, we kind of settled in. Drew and Tony decided to take the bus to Santa Cruz, and we promised to drive in and meet them for coffee later. The weather held for another hour or so, and Phil and I thought they'd made it to the bus by the time the rains came, but they missed the one they'd planned on getting and took shelter in a grocery store before making a run for the bus in a downpour.

Phil had an interview to transcribe, but I found myself at loose ends. It occurred to me that this kind of down time is something I'd need to get accustomed to as a retired person. No one waiting for you to call the shots, no one really affected one way or the other what you do or don't do. A humbling thought, but hey a little humility deepens one's perspective. I did a Sudoku, listened to my recorded book, and then curled up under Steve's cream puff of a down comforter and listened to the raindrops clatter against the bedroom window. Doing nothing can be just the ticket on a rainy day, even if it does cramp the ego just a little bit.

By the time we set out for Santa Cruz at 4 pm, the rain had just about let up. We had to circle the downtown area to get to the one way section of Pacific Avenue where Bookshop Santa Cruz is located. Undaunted by the rain, Drew and Tony had visited the Santa Cruz Mission and a few shops before they settled in for a good read at this exceptionally well stocked independent book store. We headed over to Lulu's at the Octagon. The building, on the National Register of Historic Landmarks, was built in 1882 and served as the county hall of records into the 1960s, and yes, it is a perfect octagon made of bricks. Now the shape makes for a cozy coffeehouse and the vacuum press coffee is dee-lish if somewhat expensive.

After the coffee, we headed over to Carpo's to pick up some sandwiches to take to Phil's aunt's house for supper. We had a good time joking about their hamburgers being so good that everything else on the menu tasted like burgers too. Very silly and very fun. Drew and Tony hadn't visited her for almost a year, so there was lots to talk about and lots of joking too. We were happy to see that Sammy the cat was not too shy around us and shared stories about our remarkable cat Fuzz and her unquenchable curiosity.

So Cool, So Soquel

Monday turned out to be relatively clear and warm after a rainy Sunday, so we promised ourselves a little outing after lunch once Phil got his teleconference meetings taken care of. I did some wash and got a list together for shopping at Trader Joe's. I've been trying to maintain a low cholesterol diet with some consistency, but it's challenging to find all the items in just one store.

We decided to avoid Highway 1 and take Soquel Drive instead, which must have been the main drag between all these little beach towns sometime in the past. Phil said it's kind of like driving around in a state park with all the tall trees and deep ravines and I know what he means. You get more of a sense of where one town starts and the other one ends, although we did get kind of turned around looking for Capitola Mall and had to backtrack from Santa Cruz. Getting sidetracked can have its advantages though. We passed a lovely art deco movie theater called the Rio that has been refurbished into a performance space and an interesting looking organic market called Staff of Life. Both Aptos and Soquel refer to areas as Aptos Village and Soquel Village and there are still some vestiges of commercial centers, but they're slowly getting eroded by the franchises and minimalls along the highway.

Once we got to Capitola, we stopped at a Goodwill to pick up some warmer clothes. I got a thermal shirt and Phil got a fleece jacket for wearing around the house. I thought I might learn something about the area from the kinds of things in the thrift store. It was very clean and well organized and had more sports brands like Nike and Adidas in good condition than I had expected, and less furniture and big ticket items than the stores around Long Beach.

The shopping trip at Trader's was a little hectic because Phil had to get back for another teleconference, but we got most of the items on the list. Later, we stopped at Aptos Coffee (Steve very generously bought us a card for 14 cups of coffee). While Phil did a little more work on his laptop, I got more stuff for the diet from the Safeway. While shopping, I noticed many students (from nearbyCabrillo College) and retired people. At the Safeway, I was struck by how many young families (four or five) were shopping together, and throughout the mall, I noticed several homeless people. With as much rain as we've been having, I don't know how they cope. Phil had yet another conference call so we hurried home as soon as I finished shopping.

I got a little blogging time in before supper. We have chicken and tomato sauce with rice and after supper some yummy chocolate cherry soy ice cream as we watched one of Steve's Netflix DVDs, an episode of the PBS series on the National Parks.