In spite of our exhaustion (neither Joy or I are morning people) we arrived safely at her apartment in Napa at almost exactly noon. This was three hours sooner than Joy's appointment with the manager, who was not in her office when we arrived. Having several hours to kill, we went off to downtown Napa, where we ate at a wonderful little cafe called Christopher's Fine Foods.
After eating, we went to check out the local fair. After some difficulty, we found the fair and discovered that it was small, most of the the space being taken up with carnival rides and the air full of cheesy Disney music. The price of admittance was ten dollars and neither of us felt like paying that much to go in, so we went to visit the Oxbow instead. The Oxbow is a magnificent (if small) indoor market located not coincidentally by a river oxbow. The market has all kinds of local businesses, including a tea shop, a chocolate shop, an artisan olive oils shop, a cheese shop, and of course a wine shop. Almost everything has samples and it is all of high quality. Also, there's a local food grocer, so it's pretty much total win.
After a short visit there, the apartment manager called to let us know we could come in. Signing the lease took Joy about an hour and in the meantime I texted with friends and tried to keep from falling asleep in the lounge (I'd been an utter fool and stayed awake till one the night before). Finally, my day came to its climax with a rousing nap, from which I awoke with a miserable sinus headache that consumed the rest of the evening.
Around seven my dad arrived with the truck and we unloaded it, while Joy ran for sinus medicine (I felt like my brain was twice it's normal size and was pushing against my head, which was about to explode from the pressure).
It was the headache which prevented me from posting a blog last night, and so I write this one now. Look for a post on our second day in Napa later tonight. I'm going to go have diner, and maybe even some of that famous Napa Valley wine.
