While in San Francisco last week, I was outside of the San Francisco Marriott for all of about 4 hours. Turns out, the hotel was a mere block away from the San Francisco Apple Store. Of course, I had to stop in. This was my first time in one of Apple’s two-story outlets with the glass staircase.

It was crowded, but had a much better selection of iPod accessories (duh!) than other stores. A nice selection on both floors, as a matter of fact.

I wasn’t planning to buy anything, but I did walk out with the Belkin Battery Pack and I’m glad I did.

On the flight to San Francisco, my iPod battery gave out about halfway there. This Belkin do-dad allowed me to watch video on the iPod for as many hours as I had regular old AA batteries to feed it. It’s a bit bulky so I wouldn’t recommend this device when jogging or walking around, but who watches video when they’re running around anyway? It was perfectly comfortable in my hand on the plane.

So now the battery pack sits in my purse, and I never have to ask myself “is this video-worthy?” again, worried that I didn’t have enough of a charge to watch the entire podcast or episode.

Speak of San Francisco…the homeless problem is much worse than in any other city I’ve been in, including New York. I guess the combination of unreal housing prices and mild temperatures are partly to blame. While walking around the downtown area mid afternoon, dressed in my corporate-like attire (so I stood out like a sore thumb), I couldn’t go more than 1/2 a block without being approached for money. Finally, I plugged up with my iPod headphones so as not to be bothered as much. I felt so bad for these people, but there was nothing I could do at that moment to help them.

Oh, and I highly recommend Millennium restaurant. I guess the description on the website says it best:

Millennium Restaurant is dedicated to supporting the essential earthly concepts of organic food production, small farms, sustainable agriculture, recycling and composting. We cook with fresh produce delivered every day, and choose organic whenever possible. We believe that a gourmet dining experience can be created out of vegetarian, healthy, and environmentally friendly foods. We are proud to state that our restaurant is completely free of genetically modified foods.

It sounds artsy-fartsy, but the decor is upscale and eclectic and the food is fantastic. Not cheap, but not ridiculously overpriced either. It’s the one expensive meal I had there.