4.2 San Francisco, 17 October 24

The sky couch was excellent, but nothing short of business class+ can make a 12 hour flight truely more than tolerable. I had my CPAP on the flight and plugged into the seat. The plug was a bit loose, as it was a universal type and not a great fit, so a few times the machine unplugged. Breathing through the CPAP machine without a mask is like someone putting a heavy cloth across your nose - you can breath but you really need to work at it. Over I settled, though, I "enjoyed" a full 6 hours of sleep with the two big kids, though poor Lexie got woken up by the flight attendant because they couldn't see her seat belt. I don't know why they would wake up a child to check when there are two adults with her, but at any rate Lexie didn't get back to sleep afterwards (and she had her belt on). 

We arrived past noon, but without the pressure of the rental company closing we were able to get through fairly stress-free, taking a shuttle to the rental car hub and collecting it without too much fuss. 

Kieran did the hard part, and settled in fairly quickly to the drive. I was struck by how much the landscape looked like Woomera and northern SA. 

After checking into our motel (which is very nice) and dinner (Uber) Lexie and I took an Uber to the Warfield for my Airborne Toxic Event concert. We got let out a little early and I went in the wrong direction looking for something for Lexie to eat (she didn't like her gluten free pizza at the motel). I tried two places before spotting a little side shop. 

I had noticed a lot of people looking a bit worse for wear and as we passed into the store I checked my map and realised we had gone the wrong direction into the infamous Tenderloin. I asked a lady in the shop for directions. She couldn't help but said "be safe and go quickly". Thankfully we were only a couple shops into the wrong part of town and quickly got out without incident, though the number of people was intense and it took a good 20 minutes for me to get the smell of drugs out of my nose.

The concert was great, I was rattled by putting us in danger, but by the end of the warm up act I was less freaked out. Lexie was a bit disappointed that there was another band after the warm up, I think, but his it well. 

TATE came in and I was in a state of delight for the next 90 minutes or so. At once point Mikel went into the crowd and sing 3 from the mosh pit, which was great. They did a big medley/mash up of songs at the end, which was excellent. 

Poor Lexie didn't find it as engaging and fell asleep a few songs in. I felt guilty for keeping her there sleep, but I figured going home wouldn't change anything for her. She did wake up for the last song or two, and rated the night overall as "4 out of 5 stars" for her first concert.

All in all, a fabulous night!