Sky Captain and the Weekend of Wine and Fog

Slow down, you move too fast,
You got to make the mornin' last,
Just kickin' down the cobblestones,
Lookin' for fun and feelin' groovy.

"The 59th Street Bridge Song" by Simon and Garfunkel was on my mind all weekend. If every day was a road, then weekends should have a lower speed limit than weekdays. In between all of the places to go, people to see and things to do, there's hardly a chance to stop and reflect. By the time the chance appears, so much else has occurred that the desire to record the details disappears. That's not going to happen to this weekend.

On Friday, I saw Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. It seems strange for a new movie to use today's technology to simulate the look and feel of a movie made seventy years ago. It's like producing a 2005 version of King Kong and making the CGI gorilla look like a man in a monkey suit instead of hiring a man in a monkey suit. Yet, I liked the film. It reminded me of movies like Indiana Jones, The Mummy and The Rocketeer. The visual effects were snazzy and well done. Other appropriate adjectives include spiffy and neat. The music was heroic and the banter between Joe (Jude Law) and Polly (Gwyneth Paltrow) cracked me up. During a this-may-be-our-last-moment-on-Earth scene, Joe says to Polly in exasperation, "Just once, can we die without all this bickering?"

After the movie, I tried North Beach Pizza in San Mateo. I understand it has delicious pizza. Too bad I was in the mood for lettuce. Instead of trying the Golden Gate Special, I opted for the North Beach Chicken Salad. It was decent as far as lettuce is concerned.

On Saturday, I checked out the Half Moon Bay Wine Walk, a charity event to raise money for local schools. Sponsoring wineries set up booths along Main Street and sold glasses of wine. The name of the benefiting school hung above each booth. I don't know, but it seemed weird to say, "Hey, go check out John Doe Elementary! They have a great Cabernet." Because of Sunday's run, I only browsed the wine selection. Afterwards, I had dinner at Two Fools Cafe & Market and tried the salmon special with orange jalapeno sauce. The sauce made the dish.

After Sunday's run, I went to the Pacific Coast Fog Fest in Pacifica. It started out foggy, but eventually the sun won out. Vendors lined the length of Palmetto Avenue. I didn't acquire any ooga booga sticks, dawgkerchiefs or other everyday items, but it was pleasant to simply slow down and "window shop". On a sad note, it bummed me out to see the surf shop I photographed during last year's festival had gone out of business. That just seems wrong in a coastal town.