Seattle trip, part 2.

So on Friday my friend Rachel flew up to Seattle to hang out and come to the Seattle Hash Stuperbowl party. Being that she'd never been to Seattle, I offered to play tour guide and show her around the sights. Especially since the weather turned out so well.
Took her down to the market for a bit of lunch at Kells Irish Pub in Post Alley. Then tooled around taking photos and seeing the sites.


From the market, we drove up to Gas works Park
"This 20 acre point on Lake Union was cleared in 1906 to construct a plant to manufacture gas from coal - later converted to crude oil. Import of natural gas in the 1950's made the plant obsolete."

It does however, have an amazing view of the downtown skyline of Seattle. In the summers, we used to go out on my buddies boat and race in the Seattle Duck Dodge right here on Lake Union. Loads of fun, and with a couple of cases of good beer, it made for an amazing day of sailing, racing and drinking once the boats were tied up in the center of the lake. Lake Union does not allow for any ship to anchor up in it's waters, except for the officials boat. Which everyone tethers up to, when the racing is over.
After gas works park, we made our way up and under the Hwy 99 bridge and I had a little conversation with this fella. Seems he's quite lonely under the bridge, eating VW bugs. He did mention that some miscreant had painted his finger nails pink, but he was comfortable with it. ha! The Fremont Troll has some interesting history, (located in the Fremont neighborhood, self proclaimed center of the universe) and was sculpted here in 1990 by four Seattle area artists. One of which was also an architect, named Steve Badanes. What is even more coincidental and funny, is that I was lectured to by Steve Badanes, when I visited Vermont in 1993 and attended an extensive summer course on Sustainable Design and Build Course. Pretty cool. Quirky dude, and hilarious to boot. When he lectured us in Vermont, he was winding down a tour of all the cities where he had an office, and was celebrating his 50th birthday in each city. Genius. haha
After visiting the troll, we headed out to the Ballard neighborhood to check out the Ballard Locks.
A system of locks seperating the fresh water lakes, from the salt water of the Sound. Maintaining the level of the Lakes at about 22 feet above sea level at all times. It also includes a Salmon run keeping Salmon moving in and out of the area. We've run several hash runs through here, always a cool spot to run through.




Dicks burgers, a Seattle institution. They're quick, cheap, and small..I can usually down about 6 of them on a good night of boozing it up. :D They are open until 2am, and there is usually a police cruiser parked in the lot watching to make sure things go smoothly. And yes, they're always packed and have a line of people ordering food. Today's special was .10 cent cokes with your burgers.
Forgot to add these two photos to the Underground tour posting. Just some castings that were down in the tunnels that I saw while on the tour.

After a pretty long day we decided to go and visit my friends Jimbo and Karen, who live in West Seattle. Last time I was here was a little over a year ago, and there boy was still pretty small. He walks, talks and is a bruiser these days. Always laughing and smiling, cute kid. Got to playing with him, and while it may not appear like it, he's laughing his ass off in this photo.
This is him right after I put him down, asking for more.
Instead, we decided to down a beer and settle down. haha j/k. no beer for the little guy, but had to keep an eye on him, cause I don't think he would have hesitated to take a good swig. good man. Had a blast, and I'm always reminded of how cool it is to be in Seattle, when I visit. I didn't get any photos at the superbowl party, but it was a great game, and I got roped into cheering for the Steelers, cause I don't like the Arizona Cardinals, and of course, Assma had an extra steelers jersey.

I laid a hash trail run (5 miler) along the water way, up a large hill, and then down through a park. Pretty easy run, to me anyway, but got lots of bitching for making it so "long". wtf?! hahahaha too funny. either way, it was great hanging out with friends I hadn't see in years and catching up.
I'll be back. Working on a trip out of country, hopefully it comes through and I can make it. (crossing fingers)

Seattle trip, part 1.

So a few weeks ago I went up to Seattle to visit and see some friends.

I flew up on Wednesday to hang out with Jason (Assquatch ...don't ask), and spent the next few days catching up and seeing my old haunts in Seattle. The weather happened to cooperate marvelously, the sun was out, it was clear, and not as cold as it had been for weeks. :) Perfect.

Shit ton of photos from the trip. I'll try and get them in order.
Showed up to the no-balls H3 run (end of the run, actually) on Wednesday in Tacoma, and caught up with some friends/hashers I hadn't seen in a couple years. Traditionally this is an all womens H3, but being a "visitor" I was allowed. :D And boy toy was there, since his wife was also running that day.


The next day, Jason and I took Holly's bike to Aurora Suzuki for a service check. Goddam that's a bright jacket. Then we went about shopping for motorcycle stuff. Up in Queen Anne hill, there was this restaurant that had a "Keep Austin Weird" sign above the front door. Pretty cool to see how far that sentiment had reached. A bummer to know that the "Keep Austin Weird" movement has pretty much died off and isn't being kept up due to too many lame Austinites! lame! hahaha And wait, the hash happy hour is no longer at Lovejoys!??! WTF?!?!?! seriously?
The Triangle tavern and hotel. Favorite spot of the hash to go to before the Mariner games. This is also down in Pioneer square.
Late evening in the Pike Place Market. The weather was phenomenal, for those that know Seattle and it's weather, we were very lucky.

Elliot Bay. This used to be my view from my bay front apartment when I lived in Seattle. 2 blocks from the public market. Damn, I miss this city very much. Might have to take a job up here for the summer.
Looking down from the small park outside the public market, down the Alaskan Viaduct towards the ball park, and Mt. Rainier in the background.


The Smith Building in the background. (the pointy one below :) ) was hailed as the tallest skyscraper outside of New York city for many years. Located in the Pioneer Square district of Seattle along skid row (named that, for the logs that were sent skidding down it from the top of the hill to the mill that was located on the waterfront) Loads of history in Seattle, some more hilarious than you might expect. Like for instance, did you guys know that the Seattle Public School system was founded on the backs of whores?! No? Well, the most famous (and richest) madam of Seattle, donated all of her money when she died to the city of Seattle to establish a school system. While she gets little to no credit (for obvious reasons), it was via money made from the countless "seamstresses" in Seattle. Hear all about it on the Underground tour which starts down in Pioneer Square.
Yep, there were over 3,000 registered "seamstresses" residing in a 3 square block radius. Even a few cross-stitchers for the men who preferred to go the other way. hahaha


An old photo of the Smith Building, located inside the Underground Tour memorabilia museum.
This parking structure was built after the Seattle Hotel that used to be located here. The city said, after it demolished the hotel, that it would put up something that was beautiful and gave back to the city....instead, they put this crappy parking structure. It does look funky, and is nicknamed the "sinking ship"
A view of the hotel that used to be located where the parking structure above is now located along Skid Road.
A view along the sidewalk, on the underground tour. This used to be the 1st floor of downtown Seattle.
For many years, the existing buildings maintained their "1st floor" shops up and running, with the sidewalks covered over so that people would stop dying when they fell down these 8-10 ft drops. They added these skylights to help bring light down into the long tunnels. All these years later, the sky lights still exist, and the glass has turned to a light shade of purple due to the manganese in the glass. This area was active until about 1907 when it was condemned and no longer used. All the buildings and businesses just moved up one floor and that became the 1st floor. Tour groups now go into the underground areas, under specific permission only, and must pay each building owner "rights" to bring people through. I think it's somewhere along the lines of about 10k per month per building. sheesh!

The Seattle Public Library building is kind of a weird design, but very cool. I included a link about it.




The Seattle skyline from Queen Anne hill, one of my favorite spots to check out the city.
to be continued...

The Rev

At the Boom Boom room in SF.

The ladies...dirty.




Yeah, lots of booze, couple flasks of Jim Beam.

Night out! Us at the Boom Boom room, and The Fillmore
Had some Mexican food prior to the concert. Odd thing is that it was a Chinese guy running the joint, who couldn't understand what we were ordering. geez. I want a damn quesadilla, not a frippin' quesadirra!

Mtn Biking, Redwood Regional Park

Went with Bryan and Roxy out to Redwood Regional Park on Saturday, and got some mountain biking in, after replacing my bent front wheel (thanks to a fellow AFM'er for donating some wheels from his old mtn bikes). I have been adding more and more climbs to my workout, as they are much needed for the runs/races I plan on doing. Not much here where I live, but we do manage some fun altitude gain.

It was a fairly easy 8.5 mile loop, GPS showed about 1800 ft of altitude gain. So that was good. It was muddy as hell with all of the rains. Kicked ass. Here is some photos. I did spin out twice, and had to run the bike up the 15% grade. Not too bad. Great way to spend a Saturday...with a concert lined up for tonight.

Myself, Bryan and Roxy.
TXIH Texas Flag sticker...might need to clean the crank. :D
Bryan "I swear, I didn't shit myself!"

Killer day. On the way down on Skyline blvd (a very twisty road) I was drifting the truck through the curves, while Bryan was white knuckling the "oh shit" bars in the truck. hahahahaha

Reverend Horton Heat @ the Fillmore

So last night, a bunch of us went to the Fillmore in SF, to see "The Reverend Horton Heat". It rocked out. With two opening bands, the first was the "Shitkickers". Of course, with a name like that, how could you not look forward to their opening act... although, I could barely understand most of the lyrics, cause I think the guy was drinking a lot...but with an excerpt from a review on their band...I can see why. HAHA. "..they're kind of a cowpunk band that sings about important social topics, such as drinking, trailers, drinking, bacon, drinking, etc..." :D Nice.

2nd band up, was the "Throwrags" who had me cracking up, after the lead singer was all over the place (with signature Captains hat), a mixture of punk, alternative and psychobilly! They put on a kick ass show, including the stand up bass.




Main headliner, by this time, the beer was well in effect as well as as much 2nd hand smoke that you could shake a stick at. The Rev rocked it, hard. Watching the stand up bassist playing with the bass on the ground, and the Rev standing on top of the bass cranking out the tunes, awesome. :D 2 encores as well. No sell out tonight though, so no posters, but I think they came real close. Bummer. We had a great time, and I had to have Linda drive us home, cause I was in no shape! Making grub at 3am was interesting.


Today is just a lazy in house day, what with all the rain and cold outside. Bryan is making chili and now it's beer time. Posting up photos and getting ready for the week, although it's presidents day tomorrow, so that means another day off...oh, wait, what am I saying, I have a lot of days off. hahaha