Happy Anniversary! And, a day out.

Happy six years to me and Terri! Well, approximately. Everyone measures anniversaries differently. This is the anniversary of our first date. Well, and actually it was earlier in the week, but things have been so crazy lately that we BOTH FORGOT. Oh well. That just means we get to stretch out the celebration, right? Right. Happy six years to the love of my life and the most amazing person I know.

Today I walked in from doing morning errands and Terri suggested we go to the downtown Oakland Art and Soul festival. So we decided to go. This is kind of a big deal. A year ago, it would have been unthinkable to go to a downtown music/art/food street festival. Just too much stimulation and effort required. She was just too sick. So the fact that she a) wanted to go and b) we actually went is SO encouraging and exciting to me!

It was a perfect day in the Bay Area. About 80 degrees or so, sunny and clear, everyone in a great mood.

After needing to acclimate for a few minutes (way more people and stuff to see than we had anticipated -- we are both out of practice with street festivals!), we got into it.

You know, the usual. Trying on hats...

Eating street food...
And listening to amazing gospel music. Well, maybe that's not so usual. However, Oakland has quite a few outstanding gospel choirs and groups, and there was a whole stage devoted to them today. We hung out here for quite awhile. I don't think it's possible to be in a bad mood while listening to high-energy gospel music. It was so much fun. Everyone was dancing and singing, smiling... it felt pretty dang good to be there with everyone. We liked it so much we're going to try to go to the church where this group sings all the time. (no, I'm not really Christian, but I do love African American gospel music, especially live. It's pretty awesome)

Although Terri is pretty worn out (an understatement) we'd like to go back tomorrow. There's a big hiphop/crew dance stage tomorrow which would be fun to see. Oakland has some pretty great culture hidden behind all the bad-rep. Also there was some fantastic people-watching today. The full gamut of fashion. Apparently some of the festival was dedicated to Michael Jackson so there were a lot of MJ tribute stuff around. I'm assuming that's why this lady was wearing one sparkly glove. (she totally rocked, by the way)

Anyway. It was a pretty terrific day. We are sunburnt, tired, and thrilled that we got to go.