Andy Gapin

Last night, we went over to this podcaster meet and greet thing, but it was pretty crowded so we didn’t stay very long. Though, while we were there I saw ex-CNET star Veronica Belmont who happens to be my favorite internet celebrity (iCeleb?). I’m sure she has a Google alert set up for herself so that’s going to make me feel like a pretty big weirdo for posting this, but meh. I got a picture with her, but it turned out a little blurry. She was super nice even though I felt like a total creep going up to her.

After that we went over to the Mission area and grabbed food at this crepes place that had James Bond music playing the whole time. I definitely caught the main James Bond theme as well as the songs from Moonraker and the Living Daylights. There were a few more that sounded familiar and James Bondy, but it was too loud for me to make out which movies they were from. The bathroom there was kind of crazy too. They had a foreign language training CD playing and the design was this interesting mermaid thing.

That pretty much concludes the trip. I’ll be hopping on a plane back to Jersey soon.

I just saw a very clearly homeless man standing on the street corner with a sign that said “my wife was kidnapped and I’m 15 cents short for ransom.” Honestly, does he really expect that anyone is going to believe that? And there’s no way that I’m going to give my change–yes, it’s only change–to someone who is clearly lying. Just be up front about it, “I’m homeless and I’m hungry. I would really appreciate some change so I can go eat, but I’ll probably just spend it on booze instead.” That might actually get what I’ve got in my pocket.

I also have been amazed that there are some street corners here in San Francisco where you can legally do a diagonal cross. The light turns red in all directions and the walk signs light up for all directions. The cops even tell you to do it. This boggled my mind!

Yesterday, I went to a few of the Macworld conference sessions which were mostly pointless. They were pretty basic and in one of the sessions, the guy pretty much just said “search Google” for an hour and fifteen minutes. I don’t think I could have figured that out on my own!

Today’s sessions were slightly better. I snuck into some of the IT oriented ones which were a little less of “you’re probably a retard.” There was actually some useful information to be taken from them.

Last night, we went to Cirque Du Soleil (it was the KOOZA one). I had never been before, but the others I was with had been. I thought it was amazing. Some of the stuff was super mind blowing. I never thought that I’d see a girl put her butt on the back of her head before, but it happened! There were also some crazy acrobatics, two guys riding bikes on a tight rope with a pole between then and then a guy balancing on a chair on top of the pole, a guy riding a unicycle with a girl standing on his head and while throwing her around. Some crazy juggling too. I could go on and on about it, but I won’t. I didn’t quite get exactly what the story was supposed to be during the show, but I think it’s something about a boy in a field daydreaming in a fantasy world and trying to find his place it all of it.

Today, for lunch, I went to a Chinese food place and found out that the whole “and then…?” joke from Dude, Where’s My Car? wasn’t just some funny thing that they came up with, but a real thing at Chinese places out here. I was sitting there eating my food and the entire time, I just hear a Chinese woman saying “and then?” over and over. It was kind of funny actually.

I only have a handful of pictures to post for this update. Most of the good stuff on the exhibit floor I had already gotten pictures of and during the actual Cirque du Soleil show, you can’t take pictures. It’s kind of reasonable that you can’t though. With some of the stuff that they do, I wouldn’t want to be the one to distract them and cause someone to fall.

Tonight, I think we’re going over to Mission which is where all the action is in the city or so we’re being told. We’ll find out!

Disclaimer: I might not be sober.

Tonight, we went to a reception for Apple sales people which was kind of uneventful. There was free food and drinks so that was nice. I had a decent amount of beers to start off the night.

After that, we went searching for an afterparty, but that was a bit…well, not as we intended. We walked around for a few blocks not knowing where anything was and not finding anything. Then as we were walking by one place and talking about it, this random girl–never caught her name–started talking to us. We said we were looking for a place to go and she took us to this bar that she was on her way to. It ended up being a nice, quaint little bar.

On the way to the bar, she kept talking and it was really weirding us out. She seemed like she was desperate to make any friends she could even thought she lives here and we are from out of town. She was downright crazy and I wasn’t sure what she wanted, but it was the kind of interaction where I almost immediately wanted to just be like “hey, neither of us are single and we’re not going to take our pants off anywhere around you. Just wanted to put that out there.”

The bar itself was alright. It was nice and quiet, but not what we were looking for. It was the kind of thing that I would go to back home, but not when I’m out on the other side of the country. The best part was when I was sitting there and all of a sudden The Gaslight Anthem came on. I was super stoked that they were getting played out here. I asked the bartender who was controlling the music and he said it was this dude’s iPod. I talked to him for a little bit later and he was super cool, but a bit pissed at us because we kind of pawned crazy girl off on him and she was talking to him until she left. He felt about the same way that we did about her.

After the entire Gaslight Anthem full length, the Hold Steady came on which is always awesome. The music really made me feel good about the bar, but I got a text from my company’s Apple rep asking if we were going to the afterparty that one of our distributors was throwing.

We went over to the party being pretty skeptical about actually getting in, but we had no problems when we mentioned the name that we were told to say. We got in and it was like a club, but with old people dancing. Not old like OLD, but old like in their forties. It was a bit weird, but it was open bar so that was cool.

We chilled there for a bit before leaving to come back to the hotel.

Disclaimer: I might not be sober.

Tonight, we went to a reception for Apple sales people which was kind of uneventful. There was free food and drinks so that was nice. I had a decent amount of beers to start off the night.

After that, we went searching for an afterparty, but that was a bit…well, not as we intended. We walked around for a few blocks not knowing where anything was and not finding anything. Then as we were walking by one place and talking about it, this random girl–never caught her name–started talking to us. We said we were looking for a place to go and she took us to this bar that she was on her way to. It ended up being a nice, quaint little bar.

On the way to the bar, she kept talking and it was really weirding us out. She seemed like she was desperate to make any friends she could even thought she lives here and we are from out of town. She was downright crazy and I wasn’t sure what she wanted, but it was the kind of interaction where I almost immediately wanted to just be like “hey, neither of us are single and we’re not going to take our pants off anywhere around you. Just wanted to put that out there.”

The bar itself was alright. It was nice and quiet, but not what we were looking for. It was the kind of thing that I would go to back home, but not when I’m out on the other side of the country. The best part was when I was sitting there and all of a sudden The Gaslight Anthem came on. I was super stoked that they were getting played out here. I asked the bartender who was controlling the music and he said it was this dude’s iPod. I talked to him for a little bit later and he was super cool, but a bit pissed at us because we kind of pawned crazy girl off on him and she was talking to him until she left. He felt about the same way that we did about her.

After the entire Gaslight Anthem full length, the Hold Steady came on which is always awesome. The music really made me feel good about the bar, but I got a text from my company’s Apple rep asking if we were going to the afterparty that one of our distributors was throwing.

We went over to the party being pretty skeptical about actually getting in, but we had no problems when we mentioned the name that we were told to say. We got in and it was like a club, but with old people dancing. Not old like OLD, but old like in their forties. It was a bit weird, but it was open bar so that was cool.

We chilled there for a bit before leaving to come back to the hotel.

Just got back from walking around the exhibitor floors. There’s so much! I only did an overview because it was pretty crowded and my feet are still killing me, but I got some pictures of stuff. I plan on going back later in the week when it’s a little less crazy.

For the most part, it’s just what I’d expect from a room filled with vendors. There wasn’t really a whole lot of schwag though. I was expecting a lot more. I did pick up a few pens and a nice picture from HP’s printer booth, but maybe when I go back later there will be more. It

It’s funny how you walk around these things and every company’s booth is (wo)manned by very attractive girls. For the most part, they were appropriately dressed and not of the “booth babe” variety, but it’s still crazy how much of a man’s event this is despite the fact that at least a third of the attendees that were walking around were women.

This morning when I woke up, my legs were absolutely killing me! I couldn’t believe how bad they still hurt.

The line for the keynote was crazy! I got there at 6am (about 3 hours early) and there were already a couple thousand people there. From what people were saying, there must have been at least 10,000 people total trying to get in. It was kind of cold out and my legs were not very happy standing there for over three hours.

There was a dude walking around in a giant TiVo suit which looked pretty awkward because of how wide it was. He nearly took a few people out with it. There was also a mess of Ron Paul supporters walking around handing things out and holding up signs. One of them got interviewed by Molly Wood from CNet right in front of us. He seemed like he kind of weirded her out. I had no idea that she was so tall! Then there was a guy handing out free energy drinks. I was a little worried that I might die, but it’s been about three hours and I’m still alive. So I think I’m clear.

I didn’t make it into the actual room. We got into an overflow room with a projection screen of the keynote, but they didn’t let us in until like 20 minutes after it started. It was still pretty neat though.

The new MacBook Air looks pretty hot. I’m not usually into ultraportable notebooks, but with a decent sized screen and real keyboard, I could get into that. I can’t believe there’s a full computer in that thing! I also like the new AppleTV interface. I would consider buying one if they played my DIVX movies from my server.

Randy Newman’s performance was really good and pretty funny too. It was a nice way to end the keynote.

Last night, my legs hurt so bad that I didn’t really want to do anything else. We walked around for like an hour trying to find a place to eat. Not that there aren’t a ton, but we went in a bad direction to start and then had trouble deciding.

My camera stopped reading my memory card, so I had to swap the one from my phone into it which is pretty annoying.

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I just walked roughly 15 miles! My feet are killing me, which is why I’m here in my room typing up a post rather than being out and about at the moment. I need to recover a bit.

Since my package for Macworld doesn’t really have anything going on today, I decided to see more of the city. It was a blast!

The first thing that I did was get breakfast at Carl’s Jr. I haven’t been there since I was in LA when I was like 14. I wish we had some better fast food choices in NJ, like Sonic, Carl’s Jr., and Jack in the Box. Not that I like eating a lot of fast food, but it is nice to have tasty choices. My meal really filled me up though. I didn’t even finish it.

I took a cable car for a few blocks which was a neat experience. I can’t believe the city would still have a mode of transportation that seems so dangerous! I didn’t really think they’d let you actually hang off of the sides, but they do! On my way back, I got scolded by the driver for showing my pass to him instead of the conductor. I didn’t know! I knew there was another guy that checks them, but I couldn’t see him. They must really get sick of tourists on the cable cars and streetcars. I saw a few people get yelled at yesterday too.

After I got off of the cable car, I walked for about 3.5 to 4 miles to get to the Golden Gate Bridge. This is what happens when you tell hopstop.com that you don’t mind a lot of walking. It was fine though. I got a little off from my directions so I asked a guy on the street how to get there and he gave me the great way to take through the Exploratorium and then along the beach. It was really nice!

Then I walked across the bridge which is like a mile and a half each way. I liked it though. Such great views from there.

My dad always says that you should never take pictures without people in them, but when you’re alone, you’ve got no choice! I took around a 150 pictures since it was too bright to see the screen on my camera to see if each one was good or not. It was a bit hazy out over the bay, so that kind of sucked, but I think got some good shots anyway…well, as good as you’re going to get with a point and shoot.

I walked back across the bridge and had I known about Fort Point, I would have checked it out. There were signs for it, but I didn’t go down to it since I didn’t really know what it was. D’oh!

The walk back was a bit grueling at the end since the last like 5 or 6 blocks of it were up hill at about 30 degrees (when I proofread this, I actually checked how steep the streets are and it turns out most of them are only about 16 degrees). I was beat at this point, but at the top of the hill, right where the cable car is, is the top of the “Crookedest Street”/”Curviest Road” In The World. So I had to check that out. I walked down to the bottom and took a gander up at it. It sure is curvy!

It was a good day so far and it’s only 3:30! Being on East Coast time is really helping me be productive out here.

I decided that since there are going to be so many pictures, I’m going to post them in groups instead of as one big slideshow at the end of the week.

If you go down to last night’s post, I added the pictures.

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This morning, I learned that while I keep reading things on the internet about using barcodes on cellphones, they are in fact NOT readable from a cell phone screen. Or at least it didn’t work from mine, too shiney. The funny thing though was that while there were macs all over the registration table, there was a lone Dell behind it as well. I wonder what he thought he was doing.

Oh well. Either way, I’m all registered up for Macworld and ready to go!…yet for some reason, posting here instead.

More updates to come!

For the first time in five and a half years, I finally got to leave the Northeast. I can’t believe it’s been so long since I’ve really gone anywhere! At 8:10 AM this morning, I hopped on Continental flight 548 to San Francisco. While technically this is a business trip and I’m here for Macworld, it’s like having a free vacation. My company is picking up my airfare, hotel for five nights, transportation, and food. And I don’t have to use any vacation days. Sweet!

Somehow, our flight got in to SFO an hour early, but no complaints here about having to sit on the plane for an hour less. I was actually surprised how quickly our plane got off the ground. In the past, I’ve always flown out of Philly, this was my first time actually flying out of Newark. All of my flights from Philly involved sitting in the plane waiting for a line of other planes to take off first. Not the case today, there was no wait. It was great.

I also was surprised that I didn’t get stopped every ten feet in the airport like the last few times I’ve flown. Maybe I’m looking less terroristy these days?

The flight was pretty calm and I got lucky that there was no one sitting next to me. I was hoping to get a lot of reading done, but I didn’t get as much as I wanted since I didn’t get much sleep last night and kept fruitlessly trying to take a nap.

By the time we got to the hotel and checked in, it was still only about 1pm so we had plenty of time to get out and about.

I wanted to go down to Fisherman’s Wharf and Pier 39 so we decided to venture on the public transportation system. I was pretty surprised to find out that they don’t use any electronic type of system for the fare. The booth that we went to only accepted cash (I find this crazy in this day), but we got a week long pass. The pass is just a card that you have to scratch off the month and days for which you will be using. It’s like a lottery ticket!

We hopped on a streetcar which was a pretty neat experience. The cars are really old, but they’re fun! Unfortunately for us, we got on in the wrong direction and didn’t realize until the end of the line. In the end, we spent quite a long time on the streetcar, but we did get to see a crazy guy walking around with a microphone–not actually plugged into anything–get on and start singing into it. That was interesting. We also got a pretty scenic ride through the city as well.

We got to Pier 39 and walked around for a bit before going to Pier Market, a seafood place. I had the Cajun Blackened Salmon, which was very good, and a cup of “the best chowder on the pier.” I did, however, get slawed though. The menu clearly stated that the meal came with cole slaw, but I figured that it would come in a little ramekin that I could put off to the side. It did not. It touched my salmon and I nearly had a slaw freakout, but I staved it off. While we were eating, we had a nice view through the window of the bridge and some sea lions.

Then we walked around a bit more and looked out at the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz from the end of the pier–I’m hoping to find time to see both of these this week. It was a really great view. We walked down to the Wharf and then we watched a street breakdancing show as we turned around and started heading back.

Rather than take the streetcar back, we decided that it would be fun to walk the two miles back. We wanted to see how hard it was to walk across the city going up and down all the hills. It really wasn’t that bad actually and we took a few extra turns to go up some really steep streets. I thought it was a lot of fun!

San Francisco, so far, is a really nice city. It’s got a lot of pretty structure to it and has a nice feel. The streetcars also add a nice historical aspect to it. It’s also relatively clean when compared to New York City or Philadelphia. The people seem relatively nice, but I always forget when I leave the East Coast that every thing and everyone just moves a bit slower in the rest of the country. I really am used to the fast paced life in New Jersey.

Tomorrow is the first day of Macworld. I’m really excited for it. It should be a good time and I can’t believe that I’ll actually be sitting in the audience for one of Steve Jobs’ keynotes! I’m definitely not an Apple fanboy, I don’t even own a Mac, but seeing Steve do the keynote should be quite an experience. We walked by the Mascone Center and looked in. The banners all say “There’s something in the air…” I wonder what it could be?!?

I’ve got a lot of pictures so far, but I’m just going to post them all at the end in one big slide show. So sit tight!

Edit: I added the slideshow!