Greetings from Seattle

Today was our third day in Seattle and we are having a blast. I was able to snag some access to the hotel computer, so I figured that I woule give you folks a look-see at what we have been up to so far. Note: these photos are off of my phone, and thus fairly poor quality. I will have plenty of high-res photos and video to upload upon my return next weekend. In the meantime, Check this out.

So we arrived at 10 am local time after 5hours in two different planes, a one hour layover in Milwaukee and forcing ourselves out of bed at 3am Boston time. Upon arrival, we checked into our hotel in Kent, just south of Seattle and then immediately loaded back into our rental car to check out the town. First stop - Pikes Place Market.

As we drove into Seattle, the weather was as expected, overcast yet mild. No rain, but no sun either.

We parked the car and started to walk toward Pikes Place. On the way we encountered this theater, which made me smile. This is my kind of town.

A few more blocks up and we came to the Public Market at Pikes Place.

First stop, the fish market of course.

Fish of every variety as far as the eye could see, several of which flew right in front of our noses as the fish mongers filled orders for the locals.

We came across this "Mother-in-law" fish, aka a monkfish. And you folks thought Dsmooth was ugly.

While in one of the shops, I came across this Cthulhu thermos and just had to send a text to XBL's "E".

After purusing the Market for a while, we explored the neighborhood and located a cool little bar that had a $1 oyster, $1 crab leg & $3 pint special. As you can see, Michelle enjoyed her crab.

After some lunch, we headed south to the Itnernational District to locate a vintage game store called the Pink Gorilla that a friend told me about. The place was cool, but we were told that the other location was better, so we put it on the docket for the next day and decided to head back to the hotel for some hot tub time and to hit the sack early.

Day 2 started off with a trip to find the Seattle Soundgarden from which the band of the same name garnered thier moniker. It took some searching and asking more than one person, but we found it. And let me tell you, it was worth the trouble.

The Soundgarden is located within the NOAA property in an area East of downtown Seattle known as Sandpoint. The installation is made up of several iron towers. Each tower is topped with a wind-vane of sorts and a hollow pipe. The wind-vane orients the pipe to the wind, which then blows over the open end to make sound. When the wind kicked up, the effect was nothing short of etherial. Very cool indeed. I took some audio and video of the Soundgarden and will upload it when I get back home.

After visiting the Soundgarden, we headed West toward Seattle and swung by the second Pink Gorilla location. This site was much larger and contained a good deal more cool gaming gear, including this 3' Starfox statue at the front door.

A mini-arcade was located in the back of the store and included several Japanese coin-ops, a few classics and the best pinball machine ever made, Medieval Madness.

Next stop was Seattle Center and the Space Needle. As you can see, the clouds went away and the sun was shining. So after looking around a bit, we opted to catch some space on one of the grass meadows under the needle and chill out. I passed out for a nice 2 hour nap. After I woke up we decided to head a little further North to check out Freemont and the imfamous troll there.

This sculpture, which includes a complete Volkswagon bug (under the troll's right hand), is located under the Aurora bridge on the Freemont side. Once again, this landmark was a bit tricky to find, but worth the search. I first heard about the troll when one of the Gears of War COG Tags was placed at this site as part of the "Last Day" viral campaign in support of the launch of Gear of War 3.

Freemont turned out to be a very cool, artsy area right on the water. We discovered that house boats are popular in this area. I would love to take up residence in one of these puppies.

A couple of blocks up the river, we stumbled on Google HQ. After walking a bit more, we headed back South toward Chinatown and the International District for some amazing sushi at a quaint little restaurant called Maneki. When you enter this traditional japanese establishment, the matron of the house, Jean, greets you and asks you if you "called". Apparently tables are hard to come by and reservations are a must. We said no and that we would happily wait for a table. We were informed that it would be at least 90 mintues, so we settles in. Jean picked up the phone, called someone who had made reservations and said "Are you coming tonight?" Apparently they said no, as we were promptly seated minutes later. The food was too good and we were so hungary that I completely forgot to take any pictures. All I can say is that if you head to Seattle and love Japanese cuisine, you have to check out Maneki. Be sure to try the seared Red Snapper Collar. It is simply amazing.

This morning greeted us with the typical misty, overcast skies and cool weather that Seattle if famous for. This seemed like a perfect day to head over to Greenwood and pay our respects to the single greatest guitarist to ever live, Jimi Hendrix.

Jimi's father, James Sr., replaced the original flat flagstone that marked the grave with this more appropriate memorial in 2001. Both James Sr. and Jimi's mother Nora are also burried on this site. As you can see, fans stop by fairly regularly to leave flowers and mementos at the gravesite, including this red guitar that was signed by 10 people and said "Jimi, you keep the fires burning".

Our next stop was the Pioneer Square area of Seattle, where we planned to take the Underground Seattle tour. We bought our tickets for the tour and decided to check out the area while we waited for our turn. Just up the block we ran into Utilikilt, a shop that deals solely in kilts for "function, freedom & fashion". The guys who run the shop, Tim & John, turned out to be expats from New England. As soon as I mentioned that we came West from Boston, Tim opened a small fridge underneath the cash register and promptly handed me a cold beer. Note that the kilt above can hold up to 18 beers. Remember, the "function" portion of thier motto.

After I downed my beer and chatted with the boys for a while, Tim convinced me to try one one of their kilts to see if I could rock the look. I have always thought kilts were best worn by huge men that could sufficiently defend their own honor, should push come to shove. Being 165 soaking wet, I never really considered trying one on. One thing that I can tell you, they are comfortable as hell. I may just have to invest in one prior to my departure.

So that is about all I have for now. We walked around under Seattle for a bit. The Underground tour was ok, but nothing special. We headed back to Maneki for another sushi dinner (we were able to eat there two nights in a row and still get away for less that $100 btw). Time to crash in preparation for day 4. More photos and stories to follow soon.