Brutal Re-entry

If I were an astronaut , I'd say my space shuttle had lost some important heat protective covering or something when I re-entered the atmosphere. I feel exposed. My brutal re-entry to Brooklyn from Seattle started with a red eye flight, included a hazy day of jet lagged roof partying, another day of not wanting too leave my house then ended with food poisoning and 24 hours in bed recovering. Now it's back to the routine... but I'm still not ready.

Some people say that the happiest New Yorkers are those who leave the city often. But what if the re-entry is like this every time? Is this just a coincidence, or am I missing a pretty obvious sign? I don't think I can handle either option right now, to tell you the truth, so I think I'll put my space ship on auto pilot and try to at least enjoy the zero gravity.

Oops, I forgot!

These are the cool stores I enjoyed browsing in Seattle:

The Bouncing Wall, Queen Anne. Local indie designers. Lots of cute tees and jewelry!
Hilltop Yarn, Queen Anne. A lovely old house converted to knitting store.
Blackbird, Ballard. Lot's of fancy pants mens stuff, see right.
Velouria, Ballard. More Indie designers! Yeah!

Go shopping!!

The Seattle Rundown

Days in Seattle: 9

Neighborhoods visited: 9

• Queen Anne
• Ballard
• Freemont
• Greenlake
• Downtown (public market right)
  
• Capitol Hill
• Blue Ridge
• Eastlake

Parks Visited: 4

• Carkeek ( right) A lovely walk from Kj's house. It has a nice grassy part with a childrens play area and then you cross a bridge over train tracks to get to the beach. The view of the mountains is amazing!!
  
• Kerry Park This spot is pretty much where all the photos of the Seattle skyline are taken. It's located about halfway up Queen Anne Hill (or mountain as I call it!)
• Golden Gardens We went here at night and it was cool because the mountains looked all eerie and blue in the distance. This park has fire pits and many groups of people were there, sitting by their orange fires, dotting the beach.
  
• St. Edward Park (left) We went here with Kj's niece Abby to play on the playground. It was a pretty awesome castle... with room for grownups too!

Restaurants visited: 12 (!)

• Greenlake Bar & Grill Burger with fries, yum
  
• McMenamins- Queen Anne Burger with tots, yum. Local beer sampler, double yum. I recommend the terminator beer!
  
• Macrina Bakery & Cafe I ate here twice! First a brunch of eggs & brioche toast and then the Heirloom tomato salad with a lemon tart for dessert! Double YUM!!
• A place I don't remember More burgers & beer. Seattle loves burgers... or maybe it's just me?
• La Carta A wonderful Mexican place in Ballard. I think I ate three bowls of salsa! Triple yum!
• Blue C Sushi Conveyor belt sushi, need I say more?
• Another Mexican place I don't remember Tacos a go go! Yum.
• Another Burger
• Eastlake Bar & Grill I highly recommend sitting on the patio! Yum.

Coffees purchased: 9 (probably more like 12)
I can honestly say that I found all of my coffees in Seattle at least 3 times better than any I've had in New York. Even the local chains of Starbucks and Tulleys produced a superior brew... My favorites were

• Macrina Bakery & Cafe
• Cafe Fiore
• Verite Coffee
• Top Pot Doughnuts Who doesn't loved a plane themed establishment that serves great coffee and fresh old fashioned doughnuts?

Movies Watched: 5

• Forgetting Sarah Marshall It was an ok film, but the joy was seeing it at the Big Picture, an awesome underground movie theater that actually seams more like a speakeasy. You can grab a cocktail beforehand and even arrange to have one brought in to you during the film! Sitting in the front row means having a comfortable leather footstool. I recommend the "Bogart" which mixed muddled lime & sage with gin.
  
• Lord of the Rings:Fellowship of the Ring extended edition
  
• Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull We saw this in the packed theater on opening day. It was pretty fun and totally Indiana Jonesy!
• Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers extended edition
• Lord of the Rings: Return of the King extended edition

Yes we watched the last two in one day! Sometimes when Kj and I get together, we just have to visit Middle Earth. We also watched the entire third season of Arrested Development.

New flickr set: Seattle

www.flickr.com

Seattle 2.0

The pieced together panorama:


The far away shot

The testing my digital zoom shot. (You can see people, people!!!)
I just had to try this rhubarb soda...
and then there was the cocktail sampling at Kjs work...

Seattle so far...

I love flying! You go from flat flat farms

to mountains appear out of nowhere! Window seats are always for me.

My first day Kj took me to work with her in the Seattle Center. This crazy fountain was playing Nirvana! The kids loved running around in it. Oh yeah, did I mention that it's been 8o degrees??? I was expecting rain and cold!





Yesterday I climbed Queen Anne Mountain...er...Ave to the top a found a lovely yarn store!

Hilltop Yarn & Needlepoint

They were super nice and the house is totally amazing inside!! I had no idea, but this weekend is a little Puget Sound yarn crawl. If you make it to all the yarn stores and collect your stamps, you can enter a raffle, but I doubt I'll be able to do that.

That's all for now.... I'm off to the Seattle Cheese Festival!

Seattle here I come!

For some reason, Elliot Smith always reminds me of Seattle. It must be because my first college roommate introduced me to him and she was from Seattle, so I associate the two. I guess Portland OR was his place which my limited (read: non) knowledge of the pacific north west imagines to be quite similar. Anyway, I'm listening to Smith's drizzly music as I pack my suitcase, because it just feels right.

I'm leaving today to visit my second college roommate and best friend Kj who now lives in Seattle. I'm having a really hard time packing, as usual. I always want to bring six pairs of shoes!! Arghh. You never know right? I have to get it together in the next two hours though! Woo hoo! Vacation! I'm so excited.

I hope to visit all the important places like the space needle and Pikes Place Market. If I can figure out how, I also want to go here:


The photo is from Olympic National Forest, the only rain forest in the US! It's ridiculously beautiful and I would hate to be so close and miss it!

Oh yeah... coffee...coffee....coffee... buzz, buzz, buzz.

Any other suggestions?