Carole is terrific! I decided at the last minute to drive down for the Silicon Valley African Film Festival, which is less than 2 miles from her cute neighborhood, and messaged her a few hours beforehand. She got back to me immediately and made arrangements for me to get inside her colorful house, while she and her son were out! Bodhi, the cutest kitten of all time, jumped in bed to keep me company.

When Carole arrived, she gave me a hug, and we started talking art, travel, books. Then at one point the phone started ringing off the hook, her son and his friend were doing boy stuff in the living room, and I thought, "Wow, this is not a hotel; I'm part of a family." And it was great.

FYI: There's good wifi, but except for the garden (the lights there at night are stunning!), no place to do work; at night I ended up working on my laptop from bed.