I’ve been navigating Silicon Valley for a good two and a half weeks now.  And after the first trip to the grocery store…when I was looked square in the eye by the cashier and asked if I wanted to purchase paper bags for my loot at a dime apiece…

…and I was all, “You’re kidding, right?”

…and he was all, “You’re not from around here, are you?”

…I realized that there are a several nuances about California living that one simply has to learn through experience.

Or, in your case, through…

Wait for it…

Navigating Silicon Valley

A Multiple Choice Quiz

1.  If you wish to travel around Mountain View in an environmentally conscious manner, which is the best choice?

a)  Carpool

b)  Skateboard

c)  One of these beauties:

A few hundred feather boas, a dozen tubes of superglue, and a week under the influence of marijuana is all it takes to fashion one for yourself.  {I asked}

2.  It’s your lunch break.  You’re hungry as all get-out, but you know you should spend your hour bringing your car in for its state-mandated smog check, which should you do first?

a)  Eat!  For the love of peace, eat!

b)  Do the right thing.  Bring the car in.  It’s what the Terminator would have wanted.

c)  You don’t have to choose!  Just go to Papa John’s and do both!

I had a small pepperoni pizza and an order of breadsticks with a side of brake fluid.

3.  If you wish to make a quick transition from work wear to evening wear, what is the most efficient way to do so?

a) Wear your work clothes out to the bar

b)  Change in the bathroom at the office

c)  Change out in the open, en route to your rendezvous.  No one will notice…unless you are careless with the evidence.

And people thought that “Pants on the Ground” dude from American Idol was a flash in the pan.  Pffffffft.

4.  You’re standing at the locked door to the 500 Startups office.  It looks like so.  What do you do?

Note the key hole. This question is more complicated than it would appear.

a) Use your key.  Duh.

b)  Use the 500 Startups-issued Lockitron app to deftly zap the door open.

c)  Fumble with your smartphone, which you have had all of one month and still can’t operate properly.  After five minutes, manage to find the appropriate app.  Point your phone at the door and hit “unlock” to avail.  Repeat this step thirty-seven times.  Then crouch next to the door and hug your knees.  Rock yourself and weep quietly until someone exits, whacking you in the head with the door.  Rise, blow your nose, and enter, clinging to the shard of dignity that wasn’t left on the other side of the door.

5.  What do you call a man-made raised surface on a street designed to encourage traffic to maintain a safe rate of speed?

a) A waker-upper.

b)  A speed bump.

c)

Does this make you blush and/or giggle uncontrollably? Tell me I’m not the only one.

**Bonus Question**  Which street in downtown Mountain View has the greatest number of speed humps?

a) California Avenue

b) Mariposa Lane

c)  Church street.  Of course.

Pray hard…Play hard.

So…how did you do?

Have you lived in or visited The Golden State?  What oddities have you discovered?

When I was small…

Smaller than The Small One…

We’re talking toddler small…

I was fond of playing with keys.

Makes me wonder why the parental unit dropped the big bucks on wind-up swings and doorway jumpers.

I’m not quite certain what the allure was.  Heck…I was only one year of age…but to hear my parents tell the tale, if you gave me a set of keys, I would play quietly with them until the cows came home.

You know…if we had cows.  Which we didn’t.  It was just a one-bedroom starter unit in suburban middle class New Jersey.

But anyway.

I thought that keys were the bee’s knees.  And one afternoon, so goes the story,  Mom and I were were playing peek-a-boo on the family room floor.  Those were the days…before the concept of object permanence worked its way into my teenytiny brain.

Whoa! Mom?  Mom?  Where’d you go?  Oh…*there* you are, you crafty grown-up person, you!  Don’t be a stranger, now…wait!  MOM? 

At some point during this exchange, Mom realized that she needed to run to the neighbors’ a few doors down the hallway.  And, knowing that she would be gone for a mere 90 seconds, tops, she tossed me her keys by way of temporary entertainment and hightailed it down the corridor after closing our apartment door carefully behind her.

What?  This was during the early 1970s…that glorious era when choking hazards and the danger of lead paint ingestion and child abandonment  hadn’t been invented yet.

Now, Mom was a bright lady.  But we all have our moments, and this was to be one of hers.  As soon as she had closed the door, she realized that the way back in was clenched in my grubby little one year-old fist.

And then?  She did what any good parent in that scenario would do.  She freaked right out.  There was wailing and hair pulling and gnashing of teeth.  After forty-five minutes punctuated by frantic phone calls and a visit from the local fire department {why is the fire department always called, even when there’s no fire?} our apartment door was finally reopened.  And when it was, Mom, along with the neighbor lady, the landlord {why did he not have a stinkin’ key?}, and half a dozen of Matawan Township’s Finest all spilled inside to find…

…Me, contendedly fiddling with her key ring.  Not a care in the world.  Hey, Mom!  Oooh…you brought friends…we can have a peek-a-boo round-robin tournament!  But, hey…can I hang onto the keys? These things rock, man!

Why am I telling you this?

Because, from what I can gather, it captures the childhood me:  Independent-with-a-Capital-I.

And now…some forty years later…not a whole lot has changed.

Okay.  I have more hair.  I have mastered the art of bladder control.  And I don’t shout My kingdom for a ring of keys! Every time that I see a set.  At least I try not to.

But I am still fiercely independent.

I mean…here I am, hundreds of miles away from my family and friends…

And I’m ok.

Oh, I’ve met plenty of people.  The folks here at 500 Startups meet for lunch and dinner and happy hours and ping-pong and soccer tournaments and weekend getaways.  They are always considerate to ask me to join them.

But, more often than not, I decline.

Methinks that theythinks me a wee bit unfriendly at times.

But I’m ok with that.

I go for long runs by myself.

I spend weekend afternoons wandering the hipster neighborhood streets.  In the evenings after work, I snuggle into a booth at Panera with no more company than my Kindle, a bread bowl of soup, and free wifi.

And, truth be told, I’m relishing my alone time.

Don’t I miss my family?

Sure I do.  I touch base daily via text or phone, and they’re doing great.

There’s no Mom! When are you coming back?

My bride!  When shalt thou return?

And I know better to take it personally.

I’ll see them in a few weeks…refreshed, renewed, and ready to tackle the second half of summer madness.  It’ll come soon enough.

But for now…

I’m enjoying my keys my own company.

What about you?  Do you prefer your own company or the company of others?  Or some of both?

Linking with Mama Kat.