Seattle

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So, as reported previously I’ve spent the last few days in Washington State, with one of my oldest friends, A, and his family, M and little E (and older F who I did not manage to catch on camera). It was lovely to see them.

Not quite my first time in the Pacific Northwest – I spent 24 hours in Portland, Oregon in 2016. But four days is a decent length of time, and little E was asking why I had to go home? Who will teach her to play Sudoku now?

My first tourism stop in Seattle was the Space Needle, suitably sfnal.

I was a bit taken aback by the $35 fee to get to the top, but in the end felt it was worth every cent. My selfie game, never strong, was worse than uual, so you will have to settle for landscapes without me in.

In partiular I loved the lower level of the observation deck, with the rotating glass floor. It was tremendously relaxing to sit and watch the city revolve around me. The couple next to me had a very tiny baby, just a week old (I asked, as one does), blissfully relaxed as we adults can never be.

At the foot of the Space Needle is MoPoP, the museum of popular culture, formerly the Museum of Science Fiction, with some fascinating displays – there wasn’t a lot new for me from the sf exhibits, but there was a very interesting room on the local indie gaming scene and others on the history of the electric guitar, the photography of hip-hop and Jimi Hendrix on tour.

I also investigated the Olympic Sculpture Park, but was a bit less impressed; the best is Jaume Plensa’s Echo.

And I was pleased with the framing of the Space Needle under the wing of Alexander Calder’s Eagle.

Off to the North, Lenin has been moved from Poprad, now in Slovakia, to a commercial intersection in the suburb of Fremont.

His hands are bloody.

Back in the centre, I was very charmed by the Pike Park Market, with lots of quirky book, comic and game shops. Two people dressed as cats were playing “Total Eclipse of the Heart” at the entrance.

Moving away from the urban, I found another distant cousin, W, a third cousin once removed like L who I had met in Los Angeles (and fourth cousin of L; we are descended from different children of my great-great-grandparents). W is the genealogist on his side of the family and showed me a lot more photographs from the early twentieth century. He has not done a DNA test but on average he and I should probably share 0.4% of our DNA. It may be stronger; I share 0.33% with his cousin’s daughter, which is on the high side of expectations for a generation further away. Facebook commentary suggests that the resemblance is detectable.

A took me on a very pleasant road trip yesterday, along the Chuckanut Drive on an unsuccessful hunt for fossils at the chamingly named Teddy Bear Cove (the tide was in) and up to lunch in Fairhaven.


We ventured over to Deception Point, and then down Whidbey Island; the bend of the road at the end of Penn Cove is the farthest west I have been in my life, marginally beating the Charlie Brown Museum in Santa Rosa.



Back at home, M got us grappling with Game of Thrones Risk.


Little E enjoyed the Georgian salmon dish I cooked one evening.

And R made sure we kept out of trouble, ready to help if necessary.

I’m coming back to a very different Europe than I left. I am writing on my flight which is only about a third full; I have a middle row to myself and am making full use of it. Possibly a number of people decided to defer their planned transatlantic trips this weekend for whatever reason.

This all has implications for this humble blog. LiveJournal has been a Russian owned service for some time; I think I need to find another solution. Suggestions welcome. But I think not Dreamwidth, which does not allow post-dating posts and does not have the flexibility with posting media that I like here.

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