Pacific NW Trip

We flew out of Pittsburgh on Saturday afternoon, the 11th. We'd stayed up too late the night before finishing up last-minute stuff, and it was a long, exhausting trip! But when we arrived in the baggage claim, we met up with our friends Holly and Brian (Holly's a MUDder - Nimue). We picked up our rental car, then met up with Terra (MUDname: Sansivera) and her boyfriend Ryan for dinner. We had a great dinner, and it was fun to catch up! We last saw Holly in 1998 at the wedding of our friends Aaron and Elizabeth (Bargalad and Abby), but we didn't have a lot of opportunity to talk then. And we hadn't seen Terra since 1995!

After dinner, we followed Holly and Brian a couple hours south to their home in Vancouver, WA, which is on the WA/OR border about 20 minutes north of Portland. We stayed overnight in their very comfortable townhouse, then had a leisurely (probably too leisurely!) morning there. For lunch, we headed down to Portland, where I enjoyed some oyster hash (hey, I figured that's something I wouldn't eat in Pittsburgh!).

Afterwards, we headed to Mecca, otherwise known as Powells. If, for some reason, you have been deprived of the Powells experience, I feel for you. Powells is the largest independent bookseller in the country -- it's HUGE, with multiple locations in Portland. The main branch takes up an entire city block! It's chock-full of new and used items -- they literally have some of the largest selections of books I've seen outside of Amazon.com. Unfortunately, we were already running late, so we only really spent about a half-hour there. We resolved to return later on in the week!

From there, we headed another couple hours south to Albany, OR, the home of Charlie and Miranda. (Charlie is my best friend! I've known him since we were 13.) We had a great couple days with them. On Sunday evening, we were treated to a homemade turkey dinner, which, as everyone knows, is one of my favorite all-time meals. On Monday we headed into Salem, OR and did some shopping. It was our first exposure to Happy Bunny, who appealed to us a lot. (We bought and send a postcard to our friend Barry that said, "You suck, and that's sad" with a cute little sad bunny on it.) We also saw "The Rundown" with The Rock and Stifler -- a thoroughly enjoyable popcorn action flick. That Rock has tons of charisma!

Unfortunately, that evening Miranda started to not feel very well at all, and she spent the next few days feeling miserable. We took it easy on Tuesday, mostly just hung around, talked, watched some TV. I made chicken soup for everyone, which was tasty (but was more "stew" than "soup"). We also rented and watched "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of Miranda while I was in Albany -- I didn't take any before she got sick, then didn't want to take any while she was feeling so ill! So I still don't have a good Charlie/Miranda picture to hang up in my cube at work!

Wednesday was leave-taking day, which was sad. I'm always sorry to say goodbye to Charlie and Miranda, because we always have such a great time there. We seem very compatible! Hopefully they'll be able to visit us soon. We headed back to Portland in the afternoon, and got to spend a bit more time at Powells. Then we met Holly and Brian again for dinner. We ate at a really great restaurant, and were entertained by a punny magician.

Eventually, we headed back north towards Seattle, finally arriving in Federal Way at my aunt and uncle's later than we probably should have. That evening was simply about settling in and heading to bed.

But Thursday we went to Tacoma, had lunch, then visited the Museum of Glass. Wow! I've been into glass art recently, ever since my family went to see a Chihuly exhibit at the Garfield Park Conservancy in Chicago a couple years ago.

At the Art Museum, we spent just as much time outside the museum as we did inside, enjoying some of the exterior art and the view of the water. Inside, we saw an exhibition of early 20th century European glass, as well as some other exhibits. We spent a lovely afternoon!

That evening we went to dinner with Chris Laurel (picture of us), a friend of mine from college. I hadn't seen him since we were both still living out in the Bay area back in '96. He's got a GREAT place on a hill overlooking Lake Washington, and we got to see some great space software (Celestia) he'd developed on his projection TV. Wow! We had a really great time, but eventually had to leave when it was getting late and the power went out (high winds).

Friday my aunt Karen took us all around the Federal Way area. We went to a local garden and park called Dumas Bay that was right on Puget Sound. We also went to the Dash Point State Park, also on the Sound, and visited the Browns Point Lighthouse. It was a pretty small lighthouse compared to the ones we'd seen on the east coast, but a lighthouse nonetheless! And we got to see some maniacs trying to wind-surf in really really high winds.

We also got to spot that elusive natural wonder, Mt. Rainier! (See, Holly, it DOES exist!) Now if only there weren't those power lines in that one really nice photo with the fall color in the foreground. :(

Saturday, after an ill-fated attempt to find the "troll under the bridge," we visited the Nordic Heritage Museum. That was really cool. We saw a lot of information about Scandinavian immigration to the U.S. and about why a large population ended up in the Seattle area (guess they found the weather in North Dakota not to their likings -- gee, wonder why?). Pretty cool, except I wasn't supposed to take flash photos, which is why these aren't all that great.

After that, we headed back home to change for the theater. Milo and Karen are very culturally active, with season tickets to numerous theaters and musical events. That evening, we saw Omnium-Gatherum at the Centre for Contemporary Theatre in Seattle. It was a pretty hilarious satire about an upper-crust dinner party after 9/11. My favorite line? "I drink to make other people more interesting!"

Sunday, unfortunately, we had to take our leave of Milo and Karen and head back to the Real World. It was a long day of travel, culminating in a long wait for both luggage and parking lot shuttle. We didn't get home until after midnight, and didn't get settled until about 3 a.m. The transition from Pacific time to Eastern is a tough one for a natural night owl like me!