Week of November 29th 2010: SF Weekly's Holiday Benefit at the Academy of Science

This was actually a week of deals since I found out about this event through a deal site as well. For $10, we got admission to this open bar benefit at the Academy of Science and how could I say no to that? So Eddy, Try and myself all bought tickets for it and on the first Wednesday in December, we were on our way to the event.

We got there and were instantly greeted by a table full of mini cupcakes and glowing drink mixers. We each grabbed a cupcake and mixing stick and headed to the bar. Eddy got an acai vodka flavored drink while Try and I got some apple cider with rum. We then found another mini cupcake table. I took a picture of the cupcake tower with my rum cider but I was trying to be discrete so the picture wasn't framed well.. oops!

From there we decided it was time to find some food. We walked around and found tables with pizza, mini quiches, chips and salsa, etc. While that may seem like a lot of food, the portions were tiny and we quickly realized the food to beverage ratio was quite small.

So why fight it? We gave up on many of the food booths and started checking out the alcohol sponsored tables. We found it almost impossible to not be holding two drinks at once. The acai vodka had a stand where they were making acai vodka lemonade drinks. They were dangerously sweet.

Eddy also found a booth with whiskey and tequila shot samples. I may have made some man friends at that table when I told them about my prior experiences with Bourbon Whiskey. We both tried one of each although he had to help me finish mine.

After wandering around a little bit more, I found the wine sponsor. They only had two kinds but of course they were Chardonnay and Cabernet which are my two favorites. I ended up just standing around that table for a while enjoying the wines.

At that point, we were definitely feeling the effects of an open bar, alcohol sponsored event so we switched over to beer. Luckily for us, the event was also sponsored by Blue Moon. We ran into my friend Jeremy at the event (who happens to ALWAYS be at the same things as me, but that's another story) and he pointed out that they let you grab two beers at once - so we did and headed down to the aquarium.

I had come straight from work so my feet had started to hurt from my heels so we found a place to sit in the aquarium where we could watch the fish swimming over head. It was nice to rest a little bit and chat with my friends. But too much rest isn't good for anyone so we grabbed our beers and walked around the aquarium until the event ended. Honestly, I would go back to the Academy just to walk around the aquarium. Both times that I went, I didn't go to the aquarium until just before closing so I don't think I've ever gotten to look through it in as much detail as I would have liked. Guess we have to go back?

Week of August 23rd 2010: Night Life at the Academy of Sciences & La Trappe

Here's my first two in one post! I haven't decided if in general, I want to go chronologically or by order of magnitude (more exciting activity first) but it doesn't make a difference this week.

Thursday nights at the Academy of Sciences, they have this little event called Night Life where they open up the museum to over 21-ers only, serve alcohol and let you drink in the whole museum. And by the whole museum, I mean everywhere except the exhibits. Of course, we found that out after we had already gotten our first round. This was pretty frustrating because most of the exhibits didn't have a line at that time but by the time that we finished our drinks, they did. Since we had to wait in line, we only got to see a couple of things. So.. check where you can bring your drinks before you buy if you actually care about seeing museum exhibits and things.

Anyways... since we needed to occupy a bit of time until we finished our drinks, we went up to the living roof. I had really wanted to check this out since I could see it from my Arguello apartment and it took me a while to realize what it was. The roof was cool - it's definitely an awesome concept but there really isn't too much to see once you're up there and it was pretty chilly.

We finally finished our drinks and went to check out the Extreme Mammals exhibit. Don't let the name fool you, it was a little boring. I love animals and was hoping to, you know, see some. However it was just a lot of facts about different features different animals have. Anyway I describe it, it sounds more interesting than it was... the museum managed to take a great concept and arrange it as boring as possible...

I wanted to check out the rain-forest next but it had closed already (stupid drink rule) so we went to the aquarium. Nightlife and the Academy of Sciences is worth the visit even if this is the only thing you see. Like I said, I love animals and it was great seeing all the fish and snakes. They have some really amazing species there and it was amazing. Also, you can take drinks into the aquarium. Of course by this point we had decided to cut our losses and the chances of not being able to see an exhibit.

Overall it was really fun, just figure out where you can drink and where you can't. Roof and aquarium are ok, Rainforest and Extreme Mammals (now closed) are not... and everyone knows science is way cooler with a drink.


Next up is La Trappe. This one will be short - mostly because I was only there for a drink. Basicallly, if you love Trappist monk beers, this is a great place to get them in the city (I'm looking at you Eddy!). They have a wide variety of selections both from bottles and on tap, including the all famous Chimay.
Told you it would be short...

Until next time!