Special Edition: Portland

For my awesome 23rd birthday Grayson and I went to Portland, a favorite city, because of 1. Powell's and 2. You can get there by train. Grayson and I have never been on a train, unless you count my jaunt on the Boston subway once. The whole ride was about 4 hours (technically longer than driving) but it was scenic, and unstressful, and awesome.

Tuesday, 9/9

The train, as said, was AWESOME. Spacious, comfy, pretty, scenic and RAD.


There was even a conductor in a lil conductor hat.

Here's Grayson on the lounge car, we got breakfast on the train and ate it in this great car, with tons of pretty windows. There was even a tour guide lady on the train point out sites and history. The train went through Tacoma and Steillicum and all these pretty watery areas.

Grayson got me a surprise present (since buying a bunch of books at Powell's wasn't a birthday surprise)
It's a Lucky Cat, whose head bobs and hand waves in the sun. Too cute!

Once in Portland, we stayed at the Ace Hotel on Stark, which is the Portland branch of a hotel we stayed in Seattle on a visit before our move, it was very modern and hip. They had a vintage photo booth, bikes to rent (Portland is bike-crazy!), nummy smelling soap in the rooms, and a PowerBook to surfs on for free.


Here's our daytime view:



And night time:

Wednesday, 9/10

My official birthday passed in the spacious corridors of the West's biggest bookstore, Powell's...my Mecca:

Damage done:

After some other adventures and walking around, my birthday dinner was a delicious pizza from some gourmet place near our hotel:

and then I got my birthday cake!!! Grayson and I found a cupcake shop in the Pearl District, and they had so many tasty cupcakes, that I couldn't settle on one, and was able to get four mini tiny ones:


We even got candles at Whole Foods for them, made from organic beeswax or something. They came with matches! Score!


The flavors are, from left to right, Chocolate-covered pretzel, "the Pearl" which was vanilla on vanilla, "Downtown Chocolate Brown," chocolate on chocolate, and Rice-krispy treat, which had real rice crispies on top, and was very nums.

Thursday, 9/11

The rest of the trip was spent pallin' around different sites. We went to even more bookshops, the Hawthorne District, Queen Bee studios, and the Gorey store. Navigating the bus system was wicked easy with our Seattle skills:


We had a delicious breakfast (Challah french toast and latkes with sour cream and apple sauce):

and exchanged our return tickets for earlier ones since our checkout was 6 hours before the train was supposed to leave. We came home, picked up kitty from his luxury hotel, and have spent the rest of the weekend chillaxing. In the time we were gone, four new restaurants in our neighborhood popped up. INSANE.

Tune in next week for: A visit from your humble narrator's MOMMY :D

PDX, here I come!

My forthcoming 23rd birthday shall pass in Portland, Oregon, at the City of Books! My birthday cake will probably be a Voodoo Doughnut. This weekend passed mostly in preparations for the trip:

Packing

Hobbes wants to go, but he can't. He will be put up at a ritzy kitty hotel, to keep him from eating wires and starving while we are gone.

Planning

Preparing...
...a list of all the books I want. Because when you spend a whole day being distracted by the biggest selection of books you've ever seen, you're bound to forget the ones you meant to look for.

Watched kitty stick his tongue out at me...

...and sleep...

...then went to Wallingford, where you can buy Trainspotting at a children's bookstore...

...and eat cupcakes at Trophy cupcakes...

(there is, from left to right, carrot cake, cafe au lait [with a coffee bean on top], and triple chocolate)

...and on Friday, before work was over, I made a collage of pictures, to shun beige far away. Look and see if you made the wall of shame, if not, send me pictures!

Extra Long Weekend Edition Spectacular

What did I do with my eeeextra long weekend? NOTHING! And it was grrreat!!!

On Saturday, Grayson and I loitered in the super sweet downtown library. I figured out how the spiral works (like a parking garage! You just keep walking along, to the shelf you want, and blam-o, you've "climbed" three flights of stairs but felt like you were walking down halls of books), and got to check out books! Woohoo!

Here's Grayson reading in the library:

On Sunday, Grayson and I sent all the dirt in our apartment to the land of wind and ghosts, then we went downtown for piroshkies and cupcakes:

I cannot stress enough how awesome it is to have at my fingertips the ability to sate any insane desire that pops into my head. If I start cravin' a piroshky, I can think of two places at the top of my head that will gimme what I want. It's AWESOME. If I want cupcakes, there are like EIGHTY places I can think of. I haven't even tried them all yet. Too awesome.

This weekend was Bumbershoot, the big music festival at the Space Needle. I opted out because there weren't enough bands I wanted to see to justify the ticket prices and standing around in a crowded, hipster hell. But it did draw Marcus in, and we had brunch at my place on Monday. Then we went to Ballard for cupcakes and record stores. Then I came home and spent the rest of the day reading books and drinking tea.

And then I was well rested and able to face a grueling four-day work week. Next week is my birthday, everybody. It will be a special edition post from/about Portland.
The End.

Lions and Tigers and Otters, oh my!

This weekend, Grayson and I went to the Woodland Park Zoo, and then downtown to Pike Market.

In the morning, we went and sold some books and had breakfast, and then ... we submitted our applications for our passports! Grayson and I are planning a trip to Europe next summer, and hopefully to Canada in February for Grayson's birthday (to which you need a passport now). Behold: here are the photos you will see on tv when Grayson and I have committed some weird murder high on Dutch pot:


After that, we made pilgrimage to the Woodland Park Zoo, which is in an area of town called Phinney or Phinney Ridge, right next to Greenlake (a big ol' lake in the middle of town). This is only a couple of miles from where Grayson and I live. The zoo was MASSIVE, and it had a price tag to match. There were tons of animals, including gross bats. There were NO bunnies in the farmyard :( Here are some aminulz they did have:

A lion('s butt)

Hungry, hungry Hippos!

This otter was a total show-off, all swimmin' super fast and whatnot.

Tigey!!! (Grayson's favorite. He was taking a bath most of the time).

We also saw African wild dogs, wolves, and a million other aminulz. Even wilder than the animals were all the children...banging on the glass at the lion, running into me and touching me and trying to push against me to get me to move so they can see an animal that is hiding from them in the first place. One kid was screaming and crying in a stroller, though he was clearly of age to walk (why can't parents make their kids walk and just sit and take a break every once in a while?) just whined without saying anything and pointed in the direction he wanted to be pushed. And the parents DID IT. Holy crap! Then there was one kid that was crying, and his dad was a metalhead about Grayson's age, and he says to the kid: "What do you want?" (Kid) "Whiiine," (Dad) "What the f***?!" Yeah, wow, nothing like a trip to the zoo to realize that I am just fine with not having children. EVER.

After the zoo, we went downtown, which I don't get to do that often. We mostly went through Pike market, trolling through book shops I hadn't been to since before we moved here, and then to that cool poster shop. Grayson and I took a rest at the waterfront, gazing out at Bainbridge Island. (I think that's what it is).
Stay tuned next week when we possibly, maybe go to Alki beach. Though we will probably only to Ballard to get my camera repaired.

A weekend in pictures...

In despair and sadness at the convalescence of my camera, here is our weekend in photos:

Friday night: Bellevue-We checked out the upscale suburb to the East, which is mainly shops, new skyscrapers and McMansions.

Also, Chihuly waterfalls indoors:


and, a LEGO store!!!
The art museum also apparently commissioned a huge shopping bag for the art displayed outside by their entrance. And the closest bookstore to their huge shopping district was quarantined two blocks away. I do not think I like this town a whole lot.

On Saturday, we walked through the Washington Park Arboretum:
Beware, the dark forest:
And then I got super-excited because there were a lot of lily pads around, which I have always liked. And then there were beautiful white lotuses growing from some. Grayson got down and reached his hand into the buggy, murky deep to retrieve for me a single white enchanted lotus. Because I am not a fan of receiving gifts that require effort just to watch them die, I do not usually like getting flowers, but because they were so pretty, Grayson stole for me what would be the first flower he has ever given me from the State of Washington!


After that, we went to the Museum of History and Industry (MOHAI), which is a Washington History Museum which just happened to be about to close their GEORGE EASTMAN HOUSE EXHIBIT!!!

I saw-in the FLESH-some of my favorite photographs ever:

Imogen Cunningham's '2 Callas,'
a Steichen print I can't find digitally, and Ansel Adam's 'Clearing Winter Storm,'
they also had Dorothea Lange's 'Migrant Mother'
After that I went to a book club in Capitol Hill and Grayson and I wandered around Cal Anderson Park, which has cool fountains and black metallers playing fetch with their dogs on a sunny summer day.

Gasworks Park and Ballard

Grayson and I went to Gasworks Park on Saturday, a park that once was a plant that converted coal into gas, and was bought by the city in the '70s and converted into a park...where all the rusty, industrial bits of the plant are surrounded by Lake Union, vegetation, and people with kites.


It's a fun place, with plenty to take pictures of: the downtown skyline with the Space Needle, the hills and bridges of Seattle around the lake, wild berries:

and thistles:


...until one's camera breaks. My camera decided to not only NOT connect fully with my lens over and over again, but to make nice plastic crunches whenever I tried to fix the problem. So all was lost, and I got off a whole four pictures or so before it decided to be a big ol' broken lame-o. Now I get to take it into the shop. Maybe while I'm there I'll get a new lens...

After that, the sunny day started raining, and Grayson went home to study and I went to Queen Anne for a meetup group. The rain kept pouring until just as I got to the University District it stopped raining, as the sun was setting. Grayson and I met for pizza, which after only one meal and a day full of walking, two slices ended up not being enough for me, but Grayson insisted that we find a treat in Ballard, one of the last few neighborhoods to explore on our list. So we made our way to Ballard, where Archie McPhee's was closed and it was mostly boring and lame, and I felt grumpy and sad that the trip was for nothing. And then...


...we found a Trophy Cupcakes, a happy little cupcake shop. It was a perfect treat, and super fun to boot. They had chalk-drawings of bunnies, and delicious cupcakes of many flavors, and delicious Stumptown (local roaster) coffee. My lame trip to Ballard was justified! They even made a pretty design in our lattes:


All in all, a great find. Grayson had a MoFro cupcake (chocolate cake with mocha frosting), and I had a Coconut cupcake (chocolate cake with coconut shavings frosting). I also got a LEGALIZE FROSTITUTION t-shirt. Because this is an issue I support strongly. More frosting, regulated safely by the government.

Also, Hobbes got his first bath:

Do not feel bad for him: as you may know, kitties usually give themselves baths and do not usually need help from humans, but not when a kitty commits the unspeakable evil that Hobbes committed. Then, you get help from humans. He didn't seem to hate it, though. Freak.

Next week, I swear, we are going to go to the Arboretum. I will definitely want a working camera, though.

Weekend of Gustatatious Delights

Because last week's post was short, here is a picture to compensate. Instead of showing you the palatial view of Seattle from atop Queen Anne, here is Grayson getting bunny ears from the Space Needle:


With SeaFair going on this weekend, from Thursday until today the Blue Angels have been screaming through the sky above Seattle. It has sounded like a thunderstorm rolling right by. Grayson and I elected not to go (not really our thing), but apparently it's a big air and sea festival. This is the same festival that diverted us via a parade last weekend.


Saturday we spent trolling around to restaurants. We went to Mae's Phinney Ridge Cafe for breakfast, and Dick's for lunch (finally!). Dick's was an experience: they only accept cash, you can not special order ANYTHING on the menu, and they have four burgers to choose from, fries, condiments in a little cup on the side and soda. You can also get ice cream treats. That is it! But, it was a good little burger and the fries were really good.

Today we went to a philosophy lecture in Capitol Hill, and went to some book shops before heading home. My tummy is still over full from awesome Aladdin's falafel. This weekend has been one for food, apparently. Tonight I do laundry, and we shop for food for the week. And I get to try and plan a trip to Bainbridge Island in September (with my mommy!) Still to come on the Seattle To-See list: Waterfront stuff, parks, zoos and museums. I also have been putting off the Arboretum for a couple of weeks, so that is probably what we'll shoot for next weekend.

And here I shall leave you with another picture one could only find in Seattle:


...standing in the sun?