I spent last weekend in the San Jose area for my friend Scott’s wedding. Scott and I met when we were freshman in college. We hit it off right away sharing many techie, geek hobbies and a general interest in how things work (Scott was a EE major). Many a night were spent jawing on and on about computers, cars and numerous other topics. Scott moved to San Jose a number of years ago so we don’t see each other as often anymore. As is typical with guys we are not real active pen pals, so it was great to spend some time with him and be a part of his big day!

I flew into San Jose airport with a sense of deja vu. The last time I had flown into that airport was for my friend Phil’s wedding. Seems SJC is exclusively reserved for wedding use in my book. :-) I landed on Friday around noon with enough time to drop my junk off at the hotel and then go meet the guys for a groom’s day out.

We went to Lemans Karting in Fremont (where Scott and Cara live) and had a blast! 15 of us suited up, got our helmets on, and headed out on the track. The karts hit about 25 mph, but the scale sure makes it seem like a lot faster. I was really surprised by how much force it took to steer them through the hairpin turns. All of us had pretty sore hands and arms afterwards. I did pretty poorly in the first heat placing 9th out of 10 with a best lap of 26.013 seconds. However, I improved greatly in the second heat placing 3rd out of 10 with a best lap of 24.230 seconds. After that we went to City Beach for drinks, appetizers and dinner. Good food, good conversation and a really fun bunch of guys.

On Saturday morning, the big day, Scott and I rode with his friend Roger up to Club Sportiva in San Francisco. Cara arranged for Scott to have a Ferrari 308GTSi to drive for the day and I was accompanying him up to go get it. As an aside, Roger drove a Toyota Prius and I sure found that thing cool. It was a “shiny pebble” moment extraordinaire!

Club Sportiva is a pretty interesting concept. If you have a penchant for exotic and interesting cars, but lack the wallet to own them, you should check it out. We picked up the “Magnum Ferrari” and Scott drove us out on 280 and then up to Skyline drive to stretch out the car a bit. Very nice ride. One of the funnier moments was when a guy in a Ferrari 550 Maranello pulled up next to us, blipped his horn to say “Hi”, clicked his paddle shifters down twice and disappeared in a puff.

We stopped midway on Skyline Drive to have lunch at Alice’s Restaurant. It’s a little unclear if it is the Alice’s Restaurant. It does not appear to be “a half-a-mile from the railroad tracks”. On their menu they specify that it was created around the same time as the song, and the owner’s name was Alice. Good enough for me.

The wedding itself was in Half Moon Bay. Photos were on the beach with the waves pounding in and the ceremony itself up the coast shortly looking out on the ocean. It was a small, casual wedding. A very nice time with lots of laughter and joy. Congrats to Scott and Cara!