On the move: Seatlle
Oct. 4th, 2000 02:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lillibetOn Saturday the domestic moving team showed up shortly after ten. They
packed up our artwork and furniture and the last couple of boxes of random
stuff and loaded it all in the truck for Boston. They finished up around
five and we showered and checked email one last time before the cable modem
went down and took a last box of food to the kids upstairs and cleared all
our stuff out of the house We checked in at the Rose Garden Inn, a couple of
blocks away and then went to Tachibana for a last meal of their excellent
sushi. After dinner we strolled around that neighborhood for a bit and then
went down to Jack London Square. Jason had a gift certificate to use up at
Barnes & Noble, so we wandered around there for a while, but were unable to
find anything he should buy. Then we went over to the cinema and saw _Almost
Famous_, the new Cameron Crowe semi-autobiographical movie about a young kid
who gets to be a rock critic for Rolling Stone. It was *excellent* with
several very good performances and a general period feel that was very
convincing. We were especially impressed with Frances McDormand, who
somehow manages to make kooky, implausible characters seem completely real.
On Sunday I rolled out of bed at 7am and went over to the Ashby BART to pick
up Alicia. I was a bit dismayed to find out that the station didn't open
until 7:45, since we'd agreed to meet at 7:30, but Alicia had convinced one
of her housemates to give her a ride. The two of us went back to the house,
planning to pick up the stuff of Alicia's that had cropped up during
packing, but someone (probably the kids upstairs) had been in and locked the
doorknob, to which there is no key. So we left a note asking them to call
Alicia when & if they get back in and went over to the Rose Garden to wake
up Jason and get some breakfast and sign all the papers regarding the sale
of my Camry to Alicia. Once that was all taken care of, we hopped in the
car one last time and she dropped us at the Oakland airport for the first
leg of our trip. After so much preparation and anticipation, it was very
good to actually be on our way.
The flight up to Seattle was almost entirely uneventful. Just after Jason
called Trish to let her know what time to pick us up, they announced that
there was a weather hold on the flight due to strong winds in Seattle. So
he called back to say that we might be late. Two minutes later they said
nevermind, we can go ahead, so he called one more time to update Trish again
and then we were on our way and made it to Seattle on time. Trish found us
and our bags were among the first twenty off the belt and Steve was waiting
with the car just outside the door, so we were out of there pretty quickly--
the one problem was that something sticky, like pitch, had gotten all over
my backpack.
For lunch we went to the 5 Spot, one of the several diner-like places on
Queen Anne Hill. I had a grilled ham & cheese sandwich with their bean soup
that was reasonably taty. After that we went back to the house to drop off
our stuff and then went over to the local Greek Orthodox church for their
annual festival. We bought a bunch of pastries, but just weren't hungry for
any of their other treats. We took the half-hour long tour of the sanctuary,
with a talk by a parishioner, who is a professor of history at the
University of Washington. He mostly focused on the history of the Greek
Orthodox church, which was quite interesting. The mosaics and icons of the
church were lovely, though not as elaborate as either the one in Albany or
the one in Oakland.
We drove arond a bit and ended up having dinner at Uptown Chinese. We had
very good hot&sour soup, dry sauteed string beans, possibly the best
Mongolian beef I've ever had, and chicken in tangy garlic sauce that
suffered from too much celery.
After dinner we went back to the house and watched the closing ceremonies of
the Olympics while showing Trish & Steve all of our wedding pictures.
On Monday we slept very late, catching up from the last several weeks of
stress and sleep deprivation. When we woke up, Trish had excellent news--she
had managd to completely remove whatever was on my backpack, using only soap
& water. She had called their cleaners, wondering what wold be best to try
on pitch and the guy there pointed out that it was much more likely o be
honey or molasses that had broken in someone's luggage, which proved to be
the case. That was such a relief.
For lunch we went to Ivar's (a local chain) with Trish and had pretty
mediocre fish & chips, but their chowder was excellent. Jason mourns how
far downhill they've come since his childhood. After lunch we went to the
Seattle Aquarium. We were just in time for feedings, so we watched the
divers in the dome tank feeding all manner of salmon and rockfish and
sturgeon and halibut and dogfish and wolf eels and the like. Then we went
over and saw the new harbor seal pup and the new sea otter pup and watched
the sea otters enjoy their lunch. We watched the river otters play. Trish
ran into a friend and introduced me as Jason's "new wife," the first time
I'd heard that--pretty cool.
After the Aquarium, we dropped Trish off at the house and went to
bookstores. First we stopped at Halfprice Bookstore to pick up some things
Trish had on hold there and then we went by the University Bookstore to see
Dwayne, the science fiction guru. We bought a bunch of stuff I haven't seen
elsewhere and hung out for a while before heading back to the house. Todd &
Sandy came over and we looked at pictures again and then they took us to
Nishino, an excellent high-end sushi place. We had shad for the first time
(similar to mackerel and very good) and a very lemony oyster sushi and a
green mussel sushi that was okay, but not worth repeating in my opinion. We
also had a plate of the chef's choice sashimi. The maguro (tuna) on that
was yummy, but most of the other fish was of the more rubbery texture that I
don't enjoy. The miso was very tasty, slightly red. It was good to see Todd
& Sandy again. She is getting fed up with her job at the bank and planning
to quit in the next month and go back to massage. Todd just had a very
positive performance review and was feeling prett high from that.
On Tuesday we got to the DMV by 9:30am and made it out of there with our new
Washington licenses right arond 12:30pm. A frustrating three hours, but
good to have that off the list. We picked up Trish and went to the Hilltop
Cafe, an English pub-style place not far from the house. I had a yummy
sandwich of Italian chicken & turkey sausage smothered in cheese on a
baguette, with a side Caesar. Jason had their always-excellent chicken
sandwich on dill rye and Trish had their Reuben. We all shared a cup of
their fennel chicken soup with corn; that was very interesting and good.
Back at the house, Trish had piano and flute lessons all afternoon. Jason
and I did some moving-related paperwork and then he went to the post office
while I caught up with email for a couple of hours. We got in the car just
at six, so we listened to the first fifteen minutes of the Presidential
debate. That was enough. Even with a fuel stop and one wrong turn, we made
it to Bothell by seven, pulling up in front of Regis' place just behind her
sweetie, Scott. It was so good to see her and finally meet him and see her
home. After a tour of the place, we stopped by to see Kathryn Tewson and
Erik Heino, folk that Regis has introduced to Elbows, where I have much
enjoyed their input. They had other dinner plans, so the four of us headed
to Grazie, a local Italian place. We had garlic bread with melted
provolone, I had minestrone while Jason chose a side salad and then we both
had the chicken limone (lemon, wine, capers, artichoke hearts). It was all
reasonably good, but the real winner was Regis' roasted garlic soup. We
showed Regis wedding pictures and laughed a lot.
After dinner we went back to her place and watched all but the first quarter
of James Cameron's new TV series, Dark Angel. It had good points and bad.
I think I enjoyed the dialog more than the others, but wasn't as into the
main character's body. I did think the main guy was pretty cute--he reminded
me of a young Michael Biehn (who looked so different/old in Art of War I
barely recognized him). Once the show was over, we took our leave and
headed back to the house, where I spent an hour re-packing all of my stuff.
On Wednesday morning we rolled out of bed, packed up the last couple of
things and headed out for a pilgrimage to Archie McPhee, the store of
everything odd, tacky, wacky and fun. I've been reading their catalogs for
years and enjoying stuff from there that other people have ordered, so it
was fun to see the place. I picked up some gifts and stuffed them into my
suitcase and then we rushed over to Chinooks for some much-better fish &
chips. Thinking back, I think I've had more fish & chips this week than in
the rest of 2000. This was the best fish of all of them.
By the time we were done there, it was time to head to the airport. Trish
had brought a separate car, so she could head home and Jason took me to
Sea-Tac and dropped me at the curb. I checked my luggage and made it
through the ridiculously backed-up security checkpoint line with just enough
time to spare that I could call and check in with Beckie and leave a message
for steve before we started boarding.
They kept us sitting at the gate for a while, blaming the delay on a late
shuttle van bringing the flight crew from their hotel. We took off almost
45 minutes late, but they say we will land a few minutes early in Atlanta,
thanks to over 100 mph tailwinds. That would be nice, since my connection
window is less than an hour. I've been catching peeks of Gone in 60
Seconds, about all I wanted to see of that movie. The flight's not very
crowded, so I moved over into an empty window pair. It's nice to have the
room to spread out. Dinner was actually reasonably good. It was a
tenderloin steak with roasted potatoes and green beans. The steak was a
little dry, but there was enough sauce to perk it up. I'm really wondering
who decided that French dressing was the lowest common denominator--it's so
sweet and icky I'd rather eat salad dry. The "orange buntlet" was moist and
surprisingly flavorful. I haven't flown Delta in ages and so far, I'm
impressed. If they get me to Providence without a hitch, I'll be very
pleased.
packed up our artwork and furniture and the last couple of boxes of random
stuff and loaded it all in the truck for Boston. They finished up around
five and we showered and checked email one last time before the cable modem
went down and took a last box of food to the kids upstairs and cleared all
our stuff out of the house We checked in at the Rose Garden Inn, a couple of
blocks away and then went to Tachibana for a last meal of their excellent
sushi. After dinner we strolled around that neighborhood for a bit and then
went down to Jack London Square. Jason had a gift certificate to use up at
Barnes & Noble, so we wandered around there for a while, but were unable to
find anything he should buy. Then we went over to the cinema and saw _Almost
Famous_, the new Cameron Crowe semi-autobiographical movie about a young kid
who gets to be a rock critic for Rolling Stone. It was *excellent* with
several very good performances and a general period feel that was very
convincing. We were especially impressed with Frances McDormand, who
somehow manages to make kooky, implausible characters seem completely real.
On Sunday I rolled out of bed at 7am and went over to the Ashby BART to pick
up Alicia. I was a bit dismayed to find out that the station didn't open
until 7:45, since we'd agreed to meet at 7:30, but Alicia had convinced one
of her housemates to give her a ride. The two of us went back to the house,
planning to pick up the stuff of Alicia's that had cropped up during
packing, but someone (probably the kids upstairs) had been in and locked the
doorknob, to which there is no key. So we left a note asking them to call
Alicia when & if they get back in and went over to the Rose Garden to wake
up Jason and get some breakfast and sign all the papers regarding the sale
of my Camry to Alicia. Once that was all taken care of, we hopped in the
car one last time and she dropped us at the Oakland airport for the first
leg of our trip. After so much preparation and anticipation, it was very
good to actually be on our way.
The flight up to Seattle was almost entirely uneventful. Just after Jason
called Trish to let her know what time to pick us up, they announced that
there was a weather hold on the flight due to strong winds in Seattle. So
he called back to say that we might be late. Two minutes later they said
nevermind, we can go ahead, so he called one more time to update Trish again
and then we were on our way and made it to Seattle on time. Trish found us
and our bags were among the first twenty off the belt and Steve was waiting
with the car just outside the door, so we were out of there pretty quickly--
the one problem was that something sticky, like pitch, had gotten all over
my backpack.
For lunch we went to the 5 Spot, one of the several diner-like places on
Queen Anne Hill. I had a grilled ham & cheese sandwich with their bean soup
that was reasonably taty. After that we went back to the house to drop off
our stuff and then went over to the local Greek Orthodox church for their
annual festival. We bought a bunch of pastries, but just weren't hungry for
any of their other treats. We took the half-hour long tour of the sanctuary,
with a talk by a parishioner, who is a professor of history at the
University of Washington. He mostly focused on the history of the Greek
Orthodox church, which was quite interesting. The mosaics and icons of the
church were lovely, though not as elaborate as either the one in Albany or
the one in Oakland.
We drove arond a bit and ended up having dinner at Uptown Chinese. We had
very good hot&sour soup, dry sauteed string beans, possibly the best
Mongolian beef I've ever had, and chicken in tangy garlic sauce that
suffered from too much celery.
After dinner we went back to the house and watched the closing ceremonies of
the Olympics while showing Trish & Steve all of our wedding pictures.
On Monday we slept very late, catching up from the last several weeks of
stress and sleep deprivation. When we woke up, Trish had excellent news--she
had managd to completely remove whatever was on my backpack, using only soap
& water. She had called their cleaners, wondering what wold be best to try
on pitch and the guy there pointed out that it was much more likely o be
honey or molasses that had broken in someone's luggage, which proved to be
the case. That was such a relief.
For lunch we went to Ivar's (a local chain) with Trish and had pretty
mediocre fish & chips, but their chowder was excellent. Jason mourns how
far downhill they've come since his childhood. After lunch we went to the
Seattle Aquarium. We were just in time for feedings, so we watched the
divers in the dome tank feeding all manner of salmon and rockfish and
sturgeon and halibut and dogfish and wolf eels and the like. Then we went
over and saw the new harbor seal pup and the new sea otter pup and watched
the sea otters enjoy their lunch. We watched the river otters play. Trish
ran into a friend and introduced me as Jason's "new wife," the first time
I'd heard that--pretty cool.
After the Aquarium, we dropped Trish off at the house and went to
bookstores. First we stopped at Halfprice Bookstore to pick up some things
Trish had on hold there and then we went by the University Bookstore to see
Dwayne, the science fiction guru. We bought a bunch of stuff I haven't seen
elsewhere and hung out for a while before heading back to the house. Todd &
Sandy came over and we looked at pictures again and then they took us to
Nishino, an excellent high-end sushi place. We had shad for the first time
(similar to mackerel and very good) and a very lemony oyster sushi and a
green mussel sushi that was okay, but not worth repeating in my opinion. We
also had a plate of the chef's choice sashimi. The maguro (tuna) on that
was yummy, but most of the other fish was of the more rubbery texture that I
don't enjoy. The miso was very tasty, slightly red. It was good to see Todd
& Sandy again. She is getting fed up with her job at the bank and planning
to quit in the next month and go back to massage. Todd just had a very
positive performance review and was feeling prett high from that.
On Tuesday we got to the DMV by 9:30am and made it out of there with our new
Washington licenses right arond 12:30pm. A frustrating three hours, but
good to have that off the list. We picked up Trish and went to the Hilltop
Cafe, an English pub-style place not far from the house. I had a yummy
sandwich of Italian chicken & turkey sausage smothered in cheese on a
baguette, with a side Caesar. Jason had their always-excellent chicken
sandwich on dill rye and Trish had their Reuben. We all shared a cup of
their fennel chicken soup with corn; that was very interesting and good.
Back at the house, Trish had piano and flute lessons all afternoon. Jason
and I did some moving-related paperwork and then he went to the post office
while I caught up with email for a couple of hours. We got in the car just
at six, so we listened to the first fifteen minutes of the Presidential
debate. That was enough. Even with a fuel stop and one wrong turn, we made
it to Bothell by seven, pulling up in front of Regis' place just behind her
sweetie, Scott. It was so good to see her and finally meet him and see her
home. After a tour of the place, we stopped by to see Kathryn Tewson and
Erik Heino, folk that Regis has introduced to Elbows, where I have much
enjoyed their input. They had other dinner plans, so the four of us headed
to Grazie, a local Italian place. We had garlic bread with melted
provolone, I had minestrone while Jason chose a side salad and then we both
had the chicken limone (lemon, wine, capers, artichoke hearts). It was all
reasonably good, but the real winner was Regis' roasted garlic soup. We
showed Regis wedding pictures and laughed a lot.
After dinner we went back to her place and watched all but the first quarter
of James Cameron's new TV series, Dark Angel. It had good points and bad.
I think I enjoyed the dialog more than the others, but wasn't as into the
main character's body. I did think the main guy was pretty cute--he reminded
me of a young Michael Biehn (who looked so different/old in Art of War I
barely recognized him). Once the show was over, we took our leave and
headed back to the house, where I spent an hour re-packing all of my stuff.
On Wednesday morning we rolled out of bed, packed up the last couple of
things and headed out for a pilgrimage to Archie McPhee, the store of
everything odd, tacky, wacky and fun. I've been reading their catalogs for
years and enjoying stuff from there that other people have ordered, so it
was fun to see the place. I picked up some gifts and stuffed them into my
suitcase and then we rushed over to Chinooks for some much-better fish &
chips. Thinking back, I think I've had more fish & chips this week than in
the rest of 2000. This was the best fish of all of them.
By the time we were done there, it was time to head to the airport. Trish
had brought a separate car, so she could head home and Jason took me to
Sea-Tac and dropped me at the curb. I checked my luggage and made it
through the ridiculously backed-up security checkpoint line with just enough
time to spare that I could call and check in with Beckie and leave a message
for steve before we started boarding.
They kept us sitting at the gate for a while, blaming the delay on a late
shuttle van bringing the flight crew from their hotel. We took off almost
45 minutes late, but they say we will land a few minutes early in Atlanta,
thanks to over 100 mph tailwinds. That would be nice, since my connection
window is less than an hour. I've been catching peeks of Gone in 60
Seconds, about all I wanted to see of that movie. The flight's not very
crowded, so I moved over into an empty window pair. It's nice to have the
room to spread out. Dinner was actually reasonably good. It was a
tenderloin steak with roasted potatoes and green beans. The steak was a
little dry, but there was enough sauce to perk it up. I'm really wondering
who decided that French dressing was the lowest common denominator--it's so
sweet and icky I'd rather eat salad dry. The "orange buntlet" was moist and
surprisingly flavorful. I haven't flown Delta in ages and so far, I'm
impressed. If they get me to Providence without a hitch, I'll be very
pleased.
