The long goodbye

It has been a busy couple of weeks, with a recent whirlwind trip back East to visit with family and do some pre-move groundwork. It was good, and strange. More on that later.

Around here, I've been trying to cram in as many restaurant visits as possible. I've enjoyed terrific meals at Dottie's True Blue Café (best breakfast in the city), Antica Trattoria (Wow, real Italian, not Cal-Ital!), and Pescheria (Noe Valley's charming--as if that needs to be said--Italian fish house). San Francisco sure loves Italian.

I would have really enjoyed my meal at Maverick if the dining room didn't hit junior-high-cafeteria decibels. Seriously folks, there's no reason it has to be that loud. Stick some foam under the damn tables.

As for going home, I'm fully in the "What have we done?" phase of cross-country relocation. Not that I don't know, fundamentally, that it's the right thing. Not that I'm not excited about many, many things. Not that I don't love the energy of the New England food scene. But I'm also well aware of everything we're leaving behind. I want to spend every spare moment at the farmers market and drive every back road of Sonoma between now and July. A Boston friend recently said, "Don't worry. The restaurants here are really good. It's just the shopping that sucks." Except during the growing season, of course. And there's Formaggio, which is wonderful (though they certainly haven't embraced the localvore trend. I saw Flemish strawberries for sale at about $9/lb). There's the great seafood and cheese (again with the cheese!). And Vermont. And Wellfleet! But it's an adjustment. Like going back to your childhood home and finding it a little bit smaller than you had remembered.