Escape From the Vines, Part II

With so few days in Sonoma, it's hard to imagine that we would take time away, but as it turns out, Santa Rosa is nicely situated amidst people we love. One of those people is Bryan Stillman. Once my boss as a fledgling intern at TBWA/Chiat/Day - he remains to this day one of my favorite people to be around. He's smart, funny, obnoxiously loud and vulgar (only when completely inappropriate - he is otherwise mild and sweet) and totally easy to be around.


I won't say that he's the ONLY reason we visited San Francisco, it happens to be one of my favorite places in the country. However, instead of the usual role we play as tourists, we skipped most of the city, battled with a cracked-out urbanista weaving her BMW through traffic and made our way to Bryan's favorite establishment, Zuni. I would take the time to describe it, but he's already done it eloquently here.

We, sadly, did not have the chicken. But we did manage to scarf down the shoestring fries and Caesar salad along with a couple of our own additions to Bryan's standard repertoire: 12 Oysters from around the Pacific ("Yum", "Yuk and "Oh my!" were all well represented), and a delectable plate of the softest, most palatable gnocchi I've ever had (Tuscany included).

From Zuni we made our way to the wine bar next door (also in the link above). After our two days of wine tasting in the Sonoma Valley, we were experts and ready to give the bartenders a run for their money. The beauty of the place is that they sold "taste" size glasses of wine, so you could be non-committal. Lindsay wasn't having any of that, though, and ordered a full glass of the first thing she tasted. As it turns out, it was far and away the most interesting wine of our week in Sonoma - with undertones of leather, earthiness and still the tang of berry, it was something to speak of, if only we remembered the damn name.

The evening turned into the night, we hugged thoroughly and made clear to Bryan that it is now his turn to come East, and we set off for Oakland, where in a most stark contrast to the shi shi San Francisco nightlife, we met with the indelible Maxwell Macveety & Ali to accompany Max to a show in West Oakland...

That is To Be Continued in: Escape From the Vines, Part III