San Francisco Part VIII: Random

Okay, I know I pretty much ended my San Francisco story, but I have this handful of moments that I need to write down.  They are the bits and pieces that don't exactly fit into a story.  You are getting that today.  Aren't you excited?

• There were many, many people interested in and praying for Isaac.  I am a mega-slow texter (is that a word?), but since I couldn't talk on the phone in the theater, I struggled to keep everyone up to date.  After the awards, I sat for 45 minutes and texted (is that a word?) everyone under the sun.  Just when I finished sending the last text, Isaac came back to his seat and explained that I could have sent out one massive text.  Gah!
• One night we ended up at a crappy restaurant where my children played an arcade game.  If they hadn't recently seen Wreck It, Ralph, I'm sure they would not have believed that when they died they had to insert another quarter.

• Boys in ballet are much different than girls in ballet.  This is a sweeping generalization that doesn't apply to all dancers of either gender, but it is much different game for the different sexes.  Boy dancers  stick together.  There are so few of them and they live in such a unique world compared to other boys their age that they are super supportive.  I'm sure they do their fare share of sizing one another up (it is still a competition, after all), but they aren't cruel or catty.  They compliment each other, encourage and shake hands.  They will be contemporaries for the rest of their careers and friendships are budding that may continue throughout their lives.

• For the many of you who asked, many things came to fruition because of the dance weekend.  Isaac was accepted, and offered a scholarship, to the Bolshoi Ballet Academy Summer Intensive.  It is a six week course in Connecticut that will include dancing all day, Russian language training, weekend trips to New York to see his first professional ballet, and many other opportunities.  In addition, his competition scores qualified him to attend the International Finals in New York City this April. 
• I am grateful my parents taught me how to use a map.  I am glad I learned how to drive in a city.  I'm glad I know how to parallel park.  I wish I could speak another language.

• One of the secret stresses of the trip was the unlikely chance that I could go into labor.  You know how when you get a new car, you see that car everywhere--even if you had never noticed it before?  That's how I became with hospitals and urgent care centers.  
• SF is a yoga pants town.  
• There were lots of touristy numbers in the city--double decker buses, sidewalk t-shirt stands, ferry rides on the bay, etc.  Our very favorite was the single-file line of reflective vest clad segway tourists.  How very brave of them.  

Okay, now that's really the end.  Until I think of something else.