If life gives you limes, make lime butter

It is pointless to complain about the traffic in Southern California. I mean, if you're complaining about the traffic, you are in the traffic. You are the traffic. There's that principle in Bhuddism. Anyway, that said, there was an extraordinary amount of traffic down to San Diego this weekend. I averaged 18 mpg in my small German vehicle: That ain't right. (The Yin to this traffic Yang came immediately, as our hotel upgraded us to a suite. Suite? Sweet! While Jack was experiencing life at sea, hey, Anna and I had a girl's night out! Fancy restaurant, gummi bears, movie and, oh yeah, jumping on the hotel bed and the couch in the suite!). Well, it turns out that the traffic was the byproduct of the convergence in San Diego (in addition to my son's overnight adventure on the Midway Museum aircraft carrier) of two events: The Comicon and the American Idol auditions. I mean, the Comicon, the world's largest comic book and popular arts convention and and the American Idol auditions, the world's largest comical and popular arts debacle? In one place? At the same time?! Not quite the Olympics of people watching, which I suppose might be the Olympics, but this certainly qualifies the regional finals.

Well, I'll need to find a place to caffinate near the convention center to people watch, which means the Gaslamp District. Now, the Historic Gaslamp Quarter is a high-concept redevelopment area, full of high-concept restaurants and high-maintenance stores catering to the fanny pack and big white rabbit feet tennis shoe crowd. I avoid high-concept, especially high-concept restaurants, as the risk of the wait staff singing "Happy Birthday", likely their own copyrighted, brand-reinforcing version of the ditty, to some poor fool is just too great. But I'm not going to miss out on assorted flocks of InuYasha's toting their 6-ft. cardboard and duct tape Tessaigas (yeah, I know this stuff. Should I admit this?), gaggles of Boba Fetts, and The Next Whitney Houston trying to out-Mariah-Carey The Next Celine Dione, even if I must resort to Starbuc--Wait! What is that? What are those? Those look like giant organic galactic pod-shaped baskets in which you can sit and watch the show! Do I want to sit in a giant organic galactic breakfast pod (acutally an "aeons-old Australian Aboriginal fish trap"--also good) to watch the Storm Troopers go by? Um, yeah!

Bondi is the high-concept restaurant/bar/café named for the beach in Australia (pronounced "bond-EYE", right, my mate Cree?). Sort of a flagship store for Bondi beer, I suppose, to wean unsuspecting conventioneers from Miller Lite. A high-concept restaurant/bar/café, for sure, but with aeons-old Australian Aboriginal fish traps! Okay, I'm in! In the fish trap! The food, as you can imagine, was cuisine. (Thank you, Anna, for the bunny ears behind my macchiato!). Served very prettily, but, taste, eh, whatever. Except the lime butter on the pancakes! Lime butter. That will be my focus word for meditation: It's that close to spiritual enlightenment. I will repeat "lime butter" slowly as I navigate SoCal traffic. I must attempt the alchemy of lime butter. I will keep you posted.