Whatever happened to the bloggin' rhythm?
Sometimes people (usually family) prod me about the fact that I haven't posted a blog in a long time. Most of the comments on my Eurotrip Blog are from my sister reminding me that I hadn't posted in a while and that I should. See, I go through these spurts where I'm in a blogging sort of mindset where I start looking at things that happen and say to myself, "oh, I should blog about that." When I'm not in the blogging mood I just don't think that way. I don't notice blogging opportunities and generally let myself forget about the blog. This is when people make comments. Well, I've started getting the blogging bug again. This past weekend something happened and I thought, "Gee, I could write a blog about this." I promptly forgot what it was, but at least it was a sign that I was starting to think along those lines again. My new idea is to write this post to try and kick-start the process of getting back into the bloggin' rhythm. Since I don't really have a strong idea for what the post is gonna be about, it'll probably end up being kind of long, and directionless. Kind of like the Switzerland post on the Europe blog. Sorry about that.
Randi (my sister) was just here for 5 days. As I mentioned in my top 50 post (number 2), my sister is my best friend. So needless to say, her visit was awesome. We hung out with the b team lots, walked around the neighborhood, saw some stuff and ate out at some good restaurants. In addition, there were a few good longer term things that came out of the visit:
1) When we rented a movie from blockbuster, they had a remainder bin that was '2 for $20', and there were two movies that I was considering getting anyway that both happened to be on there: Across the Universe and Sweeney Todd. So I bought them both and am rather excited about it.
2) My go-to list of places to take people when they come to Seattle for the first time is starting to firm up, and this is awesome because I usually get pretty up in a curfuffle when someone is coming to visit. I always get worried that I won't be able to think of things to fill the time. When I try and think of "things to do", I experience the same thing I experience when I'm put on the spot to tell a story, or come up with a random idea. The best way I've been able to describe this phenomenon is that when put on the spot you can envision me in my brain, "swimming through black." So the goal is to build up a big enough go-to list, so that I never need to come up with something random. The big wins are that I really feel like the "downtown loop" as I've come to call it is a solid day. On it you see some good views, some sites and get a good amount of walking done. I also added a restaurant to the go-to list: Kingfish. It's this southern restaurant (Louisiana type area?) which is absolutely awesome. I would take anyone ever there.
3) We walked around a couple neighborhoods that I never walked around before and can now add them to my arsenal of places I know about in Seattle, which is embarrassingly small considering how long I've been here (10 months!)
One of the things my sister commented on right away was how nice and happy everyone in Seattle seemed. Bus drivers would have random conversations with people on the bus. The person at the grocery story checkout would actually want to talk to you about how your day was and what they are doing when they finish their shift. She said, "it must be crazy in Portland, where everyone is supposed to be even nicer!" I agreed with that sentiment. It was hard for me to imagine a world where everyone was significantly nicer or friendlier.
WELL.
I don't need to imagine it anymore, and I didn't need to go to Portland to find it. There is a magical way to get random people to be 20 times nicer:
Yup, bring a dog around with you and instead of just minding their own business on the bus, people will just start asking random questions:
"Is it a boy or a girl?" "How old is she?" "I used to have a retriever. They're great dogs aren't they?" "Does she like riding the bus?" "Can I pet her?"
Even people who don't like dogs get in on the fun, "The person who lives upstairs from me has a dog that scratches the carpet all day and bugs the hell out of me. Why do you think they do that?"
Another thing that was in my top 50 is that one day I will own a basset hound named Bunker (recently Randi gave him a middle name: Boo -- Bunker Boo Gordner):
Well, on Saturday it was SO NICE outside. It was 94 degrees or so and perfectly sunny and clear. Now, 94 degrees is probably too hot for me but I felt like I needed to be outside. However, Sean and Urmy, my normal partners for playing outside were off doing a 7k run. So I was on my own.
I asked my friend Alida, who was in Atlanta at the time, for advice. She suggested I either go to this park, discovery park, which has a 3 mile loop trail around it, or pick up her dog Maizie Moo (the relation to the name Bunker Boo is entirely coincidental) and take her to the dog park. I decide to combine the best of both worlds, pick up Maizie, bus her to downtown where there is a dog park (though I found this by accident at the intersection where I needed to transfer busses) so she could run around and play in a little turtle pool and play fetch with me and sniff other dogs and get a treat from another dog owner and generally have a good time. Then we headed to Discovery Park.
Most of the 3 mile trail was shaded with lots of stuff to sniff around for so we had a good time. Then at the top there is this super duper view and since it was clear, it looked great. And there were water fountains and a dog bowl for maizie at the top. I drank a big bottle of water, and Maizie drank two. By the time we got back, Maizie barely wanted to move and didn't even want to stand up to get off the bus. She was so tired. I was a little proud of myself for outlasting the dog. But a little worried that the poor dog would go home, fall asleep and never wake up.
I hung out with Maizie and Alida tonight and it was quite clear that I had, in fact, killed her dog. Almost. She was walking kind of gingerly, and was quite clearly still feelin' the burn from yesterday's adventure. I figure that's a good kind of sore, so I didn't feel too bad.
But anyway, this whole experience made me want a dog even more. Sucks that he wouldn't fit into my lifestyle too well -- what, with me never being home ever. Observe.... here is my social calendar for the week:
Monday: Improv Playground (like a "jam session" for improv -- these things will give me some good practice for our showcase which happens at the end of the term. Performing for real people! yay!")
Tuesday: Indiana Jones practice (last week we watched Raiders of the Lost Ark, on here we are watching Temple of Doom)
Wednesday: Improv class, then midnight showing of the new Indiana Jones (others are watching The Last Crusade beforehand, but improv means I can't go to that)
Thursday: (in the morning) Office is doing a "morale event" where we all go to see a movie. I'm gonna see Narnia, which should be awesome. (in the afternoon) My team is doing a "morale event" with another team (who I get along with very well) and doing wine tasting! (if I were telling this to Sean, he would ask me for the fifty thousandth time, "does your team do any work? at all?")
Friday: Going to see a musical
Saturday: Sasquatch (headlining band for the day is REM, but i'm most excited for Throw Me the Statue)
Sunday: Sasquatch (headlining band for the day is The Cure, but i'm most excited for Death Cab for Cutie)
Monday (Memorial Day): Sasquatch (headlining band for the day is Flaming Lips, but I'm more excited for Flight of the Conchords)
So in conclusion, until I start living in a way that is fair for a pup, I will have to kidnap Maizie.
Randi (my sister) was just here for 5 days. As I mentioned in my top 50 post (number 2), my sister is my best friend. So needless to say, her visit was awesome. We hung out with the b team lots, walked around the neighborhood, saw some stuff and ate out at some good restaurants. In addition, there were a few good longer term things that came out of the visit:
1) When we rented a movie from blockbuster, they had a remainder bin that was '2 for $20', and there were two movies that I was considering getting anyway that both happened to be on there: Across the Universe and Sweeney Todd. So I bought them both and am rather excited about it.
2) My go-to list of places to take people when they come to Seattle for the first time is starting to firm up, and this is awesome because I usually get pretty up in a curfuffle when someone is coming to visit. I always get worried that I won't be able to think of things to fill the time. When I try and think of "things to do", I experience the same thing I experience when I'm put on the spot to tell a story, or come up with a random idea. The best way I've been able to describe this phenomenon is that when put on the spot you can envision me in my brain, "swimming through black." So the goal is to build up a big enough go-to list, so that I never need to come up with something random. The big wins are that I really feel like the "downtown loop" as I've come to call it is a solid day. On it you see some good views, some sites and get a good amount of walking done. I also added a restaurant to the go-to list: Kingfish. It's this southern restaurant (Louisiana type area?) which is absolutely awesome. I would take anyone ever there.
3) We walked around a couple neighborhoods that I never walked around before and can now add them to my arsenal of places I know about in Seattle, which is embarrassingly small considering how long I've been here (10 months!)
One of the things my sister commented on right away was how nice and happy everyone in Seattle seemed. Bus drivers would have random conversations with people on the bus. The person at the grocery story checkout would actually want to talk to you about how your day was and what they are doing when they finish their shift. She said, "it must be crazy in Portland, where everyone is supposed to be even nicer!" I agreed with that sentiment. It was hard for me to imagine a world where everyone was significantly nicer or friendlier.
WELL.
I don't need to imagine it anymore, and I didn't need to go to Portland to find it. There is a magical way to get random people to be 20 times nicer:
Yup, bring a dog around with you and instead of just minding their own business on the bus, people will just start asking random questions:
"Is it a boy or a girl?" "How old is she?" "I used to have a retriever. They're great dogs aren't they?" "Does she like riding the bus?" "Can I pet her?"
Even people who don't like dogs get in on the fun, "The person who lives upstairs from me has a dog that scratches the carpet all day and bugs the hell out of me. Why do you think they do that?"
Another thing that was in my top 50 is that one day I will own a basset hound named Bunker (recently Randi gave him a middle name: Boo -- Bunker Boo Gordner):
Well, on Saturday it was SO NICE outside. It was 94 degrees or so and perfectly sunny and clear. Now, 94 degrees is probably too hot for me but I felt like I needed to be outside. However, Sean and Urmy, my normal partners for playing outside were off doing a 7k run. So I was on my own.
I asked my friend Alida, who was in Atlanta at the time, for advice. She suggested I either go to this park, discovery park, which has a 3 mile loop trail around it, or pick up her dog Maizie Moo (the relation to the name Bunker Boo is entirely coincidental) and take her to the dog park. I decide to combine the best of both worlds, pick up Maizie, bus her to downtown where there is a dog park (though I found this by accident at the intersection where I needed to transfer busses) so she could run around and play in a little turtle pool and play fetch with me and sniff other dogs and get a treat from another dog owner and generally have a good time. Then we headed to Discovery Park.
Most of the 3 mile trail was shaded with lots of stuff to sniff around for so we had a good time. Then at the top there is this super duper view and since it was clear, it looked great. And there were water fountains and a dog bowl for maizie at the top. I drank a big bottle of water, and Maizie drank two. By the time we got back, Maizie barely wanted to move and didn't even want to stand up to get off the bus. She was so tired. I was a little proud of myself for outlasting the dog. But a little worried that the poor dog would go home, fall asleep and never wake up.
I hung out with Maizie and Alida tonight and it was quite clear that I had, in fact, killed her dog. Almost. She was walking kind of gingerly, and was quite clearly still feelin' the burn from yesterday's adventure. I figure that's a good kind of sore, so I didn't feel too bad.
But anyway, this whole experience made me want a dog even more. Sucks that he wouldn't fit into my lifestyle too well -- what, with me never being home ever. Observe.... here is my social calendar for the week:
Monday: Improv Playground (like a "jam session" for improv -- these things will give me some good practice for our showcase which happens at the end of the term. Performing for real people! yay!")
Tuesday: Indiana Jones practice (last week we watched Raiders of the Lost Ark, on here we are watching Temple of Doom)
Wednesday: Improv class, then midnight showing of the new Indiana Jones (others are watching The Last Crusade beforehand, but improv means I can't go to that)
Thursday: (in the morning) Office is doing a "morale event" where we all go to see a movie. I'm gonna see Narnia, which should be awesome. (in the afternoon) My team is doing a "morale event" with another team (who I get along with very well) and doing wine tasting! (if I were telling this to Sean, he would ask me for the fifty thousandth time, "does your team do any work? at all?")
Friday: Going to see a musical
Saturday: Sasquatch (headlining band for the day is REM, but i'm most excited for Throw Me the Statue)
Sunday: Sasquatch (headlining band for the day is The Cure, but i'm most excited for Death Cab for Cutie)
Monday (Memorial Day): Sasquatch (headlining band for the day is Flaming Lips, but I'm more excited for Flight of the Conchords)
So in conclusion, until I start living in a way that is fair for a pup, I will have to kidnap Maizie.