I recently performed Celebrity Autobiography at the Wells Fargo Center For The Arts in Santa Rosa. I didn’t know where Santa Rosa was nor did I realize that the Welles Fargo Center was a hip destination and the setting for many legendary comedy albums. George Carlin and Bill Cosby to name a few.
My plane ticket had me spending the entire next day there with nothing to do because there were no direct flights back to Los Angeles. I asked the driver who picked me up what the local places featured. For Christsakes I was in wine country!! And that was the thing to do; tour wineries. The problem was, I don’t drink…any kind of alcohol. I know, I’m a sissy.
So, I decided that I’d rent movies that were still in the theatre, (The Apparition, Jewish Ghosts) have room service, read my Stephen Kind novel and sleep late!! Heaven in my book. But there’s only so long you can do that. I got antsy and looked at the hotel ‘things to do’ book to see if there were any restaurants to check out.
There was a map showing what areas were close to the hotel and it looked like the closest place for food and shopping was in Healdsburg. I’m always scared to venture out in a town I don’t know because I can and have gotten lost in a parking lot, but I planned my route there and back as if it were for a five year old. Success!
Whilst in the Napa Valley, this Farmer gave into a deadly sin – no, not drunkenness in the wine country…gluttony! There's no beating around the bush about my love for food - I write about food, I photograph food, I travel to eat and relish in reading a cookbook like a good novel. Between design projects and book tours, I was able to squeeze in a few days in the Napa Valley proper after the ACS convention was adjourned. A dear friend from home said she would meet me there, and our journey through the aforementioned valley began.
Gott's Roadside (formerly Taylor’s Automatic Refresher) in St. Helena has been a Napa Valley institution for years. Everyone talks about wine when they think of Napa, but they should also think of great hamburgers.
Slider Bar Café in Palo Alto recently opened on the popular main drag,
University Street. There were countless restaurants bustling on a
Friday night, including this place. A striking, high ceilinged room
welcomes folks to the café. We sat at the bar as all the tables were
full. Slider Bar Café has a sophisticated take on the slider concept,
also serving several micro brew type beers and mid-level wines. If you
sit at the bar, the friendly bar tender will take your order and get
your wine, while you watch the soccer game or ESPN on the flat screens
behind the counter. If you sit at a table, you have to order at the
counter, take a number and have the food brought out later. 
For several years now I'd been hearing about the taco trucks of Fruitvale, a section of Oakland known for having a large Latino population. After reading endless reports on