My Trip Out West

A couple of months ago, I was thinking about the people we know living out west.  Lisa and Elana had just moved to Vancouver.  My friend Tony had been in Seattle for a few years, as had Phil and Morgan.  I thought it'd be nice to have a vacation out there and visit both cities and all those friends.  Then, a few days later, my boss told me about the American Meteorological Society conference in Seattle and that we ought to go, and that was that.

One thing for sure, I didn't want to fly directly to Seattle because I didn't want to expose myself to the TSA's abusive practices.  My plan was to fly to Vancouver on Friday, hang out with Lisa and Elana over the weekend, and then take the train down to Seattle.  Unfortunately on Thursday afternoon I got a call that Lisa's mother was about to pass away, and that they had to hurry back to Toronto.

I was able to reschedule my flight to Sunday morning--early Sunday morning.

The view from my first flight on the trip.

But that also meant I would do all the traveling--from St. John's to Vancouver then down to Seattle--in one day, 22 hours of straight travel.  Several things made the trip easier, though.  I made the trip across the continent in only two flights.  I had exit-row or bulkhead seats for all of my flights.  And on the plane, I was able to watch most of the NFC championship game.  It was a long day, but it could have been worse.

In Seattle, I only had one chance to get together with Phil.  Unfortunately on that day, he injured his eye pruning some grape vines.  (What a wino!)  So we weren't able to get together.

I wasn't able to get together with Morgan either; she was sick that week.  When I told her where I was staying, she said my hotel was right in her neighborhood.  I thought it might have been a few blocks to a few miles from her place.  No, when I stepped out of the hotel and looked to my right, hers was the first building I saw.  I walked by it several times a day, yet strangely we didn't get together.  Ah well.

I was able to get together with Tony, though.

Tony, after I said, "Smile."

On Tuesday, he took me to a bar with 100+ beers on tap.  Then Thursday night, we went to the Science Fiction Museum, where they had a Battlestar Galactica exhibit.  You can see my slide show of the exhibit here.

The Sci Fi Museum's exhibit of the Tree of Life from Darren Aronofsky's The Fountain, a film I highly recommend.

After the museum, we did some old-school bar hopping in a cool Seattle neighborhood whose name escapes me due to the old-school bar hopping.  We had a great visit.

In Seattle, a single of Bailey's in a regular tumbler.

(Let me now point out how impressed I was by the generosity of the Seattle bartenders.  Having grown accustomed to Canadian pours, I ordered a double whiskey; I got a full tumbler of booze.  Canucks, I love ya, but this is one area the Americans have over you.)

The view from the train.

As I've documented, the next morning did not go well, yet that had little to do with the night before.  Fortunately, Elana was able to pick me up at the train station.  Sadly, Lisa's mother did pass away that week, and she'd stayed in Toronto to attend to family business.  Elana and I had a great visit, though, and it did involve alcohol.  It also involved an early flight the next morning as well.

BLOG FLASHBACK:  Previously on UITGWN, I described how the circumstances precipitating my marrying Nicole had involved a trip to Vancouver and Seattle.  While in Vancouver, Nicole and I had brunched in Havana, a cool restaurant.  So when Elana and I were bar-hopping in her cool neighborhood, I was shocked to see and recognize the place, which I'd all but forgotten.  "I've eaten there," I said, which surprised her because she'd just learned about the place.  At the end of the evening, I dragged her there for dessert, which means she watched me eat creme brulee' as we each had one last white Russian.

Havana.

After the border incident on my trip with Nicole, I had returned to Seattle without her and went to a neighborhood bar to drink my sorrows away.  The next morning, I woke up late, still a little drunk, and had to speed through the Seattle rain to return my rental car and make my flight.  Last week as I walked to the Sci Fi Museum, I walked past the place, the 5 Point Bar.

5 Point, a friendly bar worth photographing but not worth crossing the street for.

It was odd to have this trip out west echoing that momentous trip from several years ago.  END FLASHBACK


So on this trip, I saw 40% of the friends I'd planned on.  That's less than I'd hoped, but I enjoyed all my time with them.  I noticed, too, how booze figured prominently in this blog entry.  That's telling me something . . . my friends like to drink too much.


Now I will leave you with a slideshow of the winter wonderland that's befallen St. John's.  Click here.