A trip to San Jose

If you can believe it was Stitches West weekend and we were in San Jose and I didn't go.

It was mostly about the Friends
There was the Friday lunch with Maria Robinson at Gordon Biersch in downtown San Jose. We worked together at Adobe in the days. She's still there working hard, but enjoying "new" management. (The picture is from last year...I forgot to take my camera out...oops!)

Dinner was at our old neighbors' house, where we hung out with Joe and Connie Cronin, their daughter Anne Stenseth and her husband Dave, and two kids, Emily and Nathan. It was a great evening of catching up. They are doing some serious remodeling so they currently have not front door.
  

Saturday we were on our own till dinner, but at the last moment, as we headed to Los Gatos, we called Ron Solorzano, who luckily for us was home, and free to meet us for lunch. Gilley's has always been a favorite lunch spot and for a Saturday it wasn't too busy. (Also an older picture.)

For the past 20 years, since the Apple days in the "DeAnza 3" building, I've made Bill a pineapple upside down cake for his birthday. Even after the move to Oregon, I've managed to continue the tradition and we delivered the cake to him on his birthday. We had a great time and nice dinner at Park Place at the Cypress Hotel where we stayed the weekend.

Sunday was the busiest. First there was lunch at Miyake with Aistair Woodman, another Apple friend. I remember that Alistair was the first person I went out to lunch with that didn't talk business, and in those days that was something because everyone lived and breathed Apple.

Next we visited Ichun Lin, a former Merlin Media employee. We met her four month baby, Natalie, who—as all little girls he meets seem to be—taken with Tom.


And finally, there was dinner with the Roses. I met Thomas when I was a Management Trainee at Weinstock's as assistant buyer for computers, books and luggage (how's that for a product combination?). He was the manufacturer's rep for Atari and thought I'd be a good addition to their company. Kelly made a great dinner and award-winning (at the family crab fest the night before) mango mousse dessert.

There were dogs
Shamus and Casey are the Cronins' dogs who have calmed down quite a bit since we moved. Joe attributes it being tired out by the grandchildren.

Dexter is a border collie-springer spaniel mix adopted by Thomas and Kelly (and son Andrew) from Nike Animal Rescue Foundation (NARF), from whom we adopted Cody.
    

And the folks who didn't include Los Gatos as one of the more dog friendly towns, must not have visited there on a Saturday afternoon. It was quite a treat seeing all the dogs and visiting one of our favorite stores Bow Wowser.

Honorable mention goes to the Cypress Hotel
Our favorite hotel group is the Kimpton Hotels and the Cypress Hotel lived up to their reputation. In addition, to the snack they always leave to greet me as a loyalty member, there were the warm cookies and the Forgiveness chocolate and wine after we reported the rude, loud, (probably drunk) 20-something swearing on his cell phone in the hall. (He was ultimately told to leave.)


And we can't forget the yarn shops
I didn't go to Stitches because of time and the fact that I really didn't need the temptation. But we did visit two shops (because they were "there"). Elisabetta is in on Santa Cruz in Los Gatos. I saw Lace Style for the first time and anxiously await my copy from Amazon, but purchased Erika Knight's Glamour Knits for the Lace Top (which I just found free on the Random House site). Oh well, there are some other good patterns in the book.

As always there are more pictures on TheHudsons.com.