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July 06, 2005
First Impressions of Palo Alto
So I flew into Palo Alto (well, I flew into SFO) very early this morning for two and a half days. I’ll be spending 4 of the next 6 weeks out here, possibly slightly more. And next weekend Matt is flying out to meet me so that should be a lot of fun! So far, all I’ve really seen is the airport and the drive to the office. Thus I don’t have many impressions except that I am tired (I had to get up at 4:15 am) and the weather seems nice here. When you fly all the time you get free upgrades so I upgraded myself to first class this morning which was nice. I don’t care too much about being in first class although the seats are so much more comfortable, and free breakfast is always a good thing. I’m also upgraded for Friday which will be nicer since I will be slightly more coherent on that flight. And it’s on a 747 which is a huge plane so I believe I’ll be in the upstairs – how strange! It should be an interesting experience.
So far the client where we’ll be working seems fine. The thing I’m most impressed with is the kitchen here – it is super stocked. On Mondays and Wednesdays they have fruit brought in, which is cool. I just had a white peach and it was delicious! They also have Ramen noodles, oatmeal, cereal, coffee, and like 15 kinds of tea. Overall everything here seems to be a huge improvement over Arkansas.
Tonight we’re going to dinner with some other people from our company who are working in the Bay Area, so that should be fun. Crawling into bed and sleeping for 12 hours actually sounds like more fun right now but that isn’t much of an option. We are planning to leave the office around 5:00 so I should have plenty of time to run and explore a bit before we have to leave for the big city of San Francisco. I think the hotel I’m staying in is within a mile or two of the Stanford campus so I’ll probably trot around over there, but if you’ve been in/near Palo Alto and know some good places to run, definitely let me know!
I’ll post tomorrow about my run here. I hope everyone is easing back into working after the long weekend.
Posted by barb at July 6, 2005 11:43 AM
Comments
The only place I've really run in Palo Alto is "the dish" where a lot of people seem to go. It's paved (all of the interesting-looking trails have no trespassing signs) but not bad. There are some good hills. I wouldn't have the faintest idea how to describe how you would get there, though. Sorry!
Posted by: Alison at July 6, 2005 02:55 PM
Hi Barb, this is kind of weird I know, but I saw you running yesterday! I was walking on the Stanford campus (I work there now) and I looked up ahead and recognized your form - well, I wasn't sure it was you, but I had heard of this site so when i came here and saw you were in Palo Alto, I realized it HAD to be you. I've only been at Stanford for a month, so I'm still learning the best places to run, but if you want to run some afternoon/evening- email me.
The trailhead to the dish, by the way, is at the intersection of Junipero Serra Blvd and Stanford Ave. There is a nice view at the top.
Posted by: Laurie M at July 7, 2005 09:50 AM