Doing laundry is starting to become the bane of my life! This time I thought it would be easy as I had loads of quarters and there were 3 machines free (1 was out of order, this alone should have given me some misgivings about what was to lie ahead!).

So I load up the machine and set it to wash, then go back to our hotel room to wait. 38 minutes later I go back to put the washing into the dryer but I find that the machine has got stuck on the rinse cycle! So I ask the guy at the front desk to help and he calls the repair guy who tells him to unplug the machine and wait 10 minutes and then the door will unlock. So we wait 10 minutes and hey presto the door unlocks but all my washing is sopping wet! The front desk guy kindly gives me a dollar so I can use another machine and he tells me to put the dollar note into the soda machine and press Coin Return so it gives me 4 quarters (if only I'd known about that the first time we did laundry!). After that I didn't have any problems and luckily that is the last time I will have to use the laundry room as we have a washing machine in our new apartment! Oh joy of joys!

Even though people in San Francisco are really friendly and helpful, there are some real weirdos too. On my way to the shops to buy groceries I saw a homeless guy holding a sign which said his family had been kidnapped by ninjas! An original sob story but a bit too outrageous! And whilst I was browsing around Walgreens this girl approaches me and asks if I can give her $1.75 as she doesn't have enough money to buy her cheese - bloody cheek!