Seven things I noticed while in the Emerald City and then some.

The sun was playing a little game with us on Monday and every time we stepped foot outside it started raining and every time we went inside of anything (my car, a coffee shop, the market, a tree) it would peek out and give us a mischievous wink. Maybe that is what is “supposed to happen” in Seattle, but thanks to the sun I spent a little more money than I probably should have.

Here are a few more things I noticed while in the Emerald City:

1. Like Portland, umbrellas are pretty much pointless because either there is not enough rain to justify opening it or there is too much wind to keep the dang thing from flipping inside out every other minute.

2. Coffee is Cheap! Maybe it had more to do with the fact there were three coffee shops allocated to each city block or maybe I just got lucky with the location that I went to, but I WISH I could get a medium latte for $2.50 anywhere here in Portland! The fact that it was delicious

3. I love my car. I guess I should have already known this due to the fact that I drive it everywhere, but after filling my gas tank for $42 (at THREE DOLLARS A GALLON) I was able to make it up there and back on about 2/3 a tank! While on the way up and back I kept wondering why I didn’t fly, but this beats getting a rental car and having to give a strip show for airport security any day.

4. Maybe it’s just me, but isn’t the Space Needle due a facelift? It looked exactly the same as it did when I actually went up the elevators in 1994: dirty, dingy, rusty, smelly, need I go on?

5. “Emerald City” = Seattle. Care to venture to guess who “The All American City” is? Oh that’s right! I’m surprised you knew that Olympia, Washington has this title… which leads me to ask, who comes up with these “titles”? What is Portland’s? The only thing that comes to mind when trying to come up with its “title” are the “keep Portland weird” bumper stickers… oh wait, “The Rose City”… yeah, that is weird enough in itself.

6. I cannot stand the smell of fish. Sure, I have officially been a vegetarian for a month on the 8^th (or 4 weeks on Monday), but seafood used to be some of my favorite dishes! Crab legs were divine! Now? I was gagging while walking through and Pikes Place Market (maybe this was more due to being in the touristiest part of the city? I’m not sure…)

7. I hate streets that are at 89.995 degree angles. I hate driving up them even more. I know it is because of the water, but some of the streets there reminded me of San Francisco (or this one in San Diego that I had to *try* to drive down without screaming too loud, let’s just say it was a good thing I was driving a rental car that time) and since I was in my own car I wanted away from the shoreline as quickly as possible.

When it was all said and done, I have to admit that I had a good time in Seattle. I’m sure I’ll come again, but next time it won’t be on a day that I am boating up and down the freeway.

Live from San Francisco!

This last week, a friend and I made the trek down to the city by the bay to spend the day, well, by the bay.

He had never been there before so I opted to show him the "sights", or moreover, the "sights" that every tourist wants to see but not necessarily the view from the local perspective. In fact, I'm sure that locals stay far away from places like China Town, Fisherman's Wharf, etc etc, but on this day I thought it would be fine to at least walk through them.
Oh, did I say walk?
Walking was definitely on the list of things to do that day because not only did I not want to deal with parking or driving downtown, I didnt want to pay $90 to rent a minivan for the day, or $120 for a compact car. I didnt want to pay even half! Just ridiculous if you ask me. So we rode the train downtown, walked a very, very long distance (all the way to the Golden Gate Bridge! and according to google maps, about 6.6 miles) and took a cab back to where we started.
We were only there for about 7 hrs, but it was a worthwhile experience. Anything that makes my body ache for 2 - 3 days after wards has to be worthwhile though, right?

I have a feeling that I will be making the trip back down sooner than later, but this next time I will be anything but the despised T word...