Thursday 9th March

So, it's my last day (sigh). The blossom is out now, although it's really cold. Yesterday was so windy that they had to close some of the bridges which go over the lakes.















I take some flowers and a card in to Uni for Babs. I also meet up with Joe and Shannon, my two solitary mates. We go for a coffee, which is smart enough. Then I went for a haircut (one of my least favourite activities, although every time I go, it seems to take a little less time...) at Rudy's a cool chain of hairdresser's owned by the same people as the Ace Hotel. The women doing the cutting are all sporting tattoos. The Smiths are playing on the stereo. Ah, Seattle!



As I wait for the bus home, I see a Mexican guy getting a hard time off the cops. He stands absolutely stock still for 5 minutes with his hands out in front of him while they sit in the car checking up on him. I don't think he is taking the mickey. More likely, he is not well.

Anyway it's back home to pack. Ugh. My board bag is ridiculously heavy. Maybe I'll get clobbered for excess baggage....

So here I am with a beer, finishing off my blog. Well done for getting to the end. Or have you cheated and just read the first and last entry? I wouldn't blame you.

It's been a great couple of months. It seems like much longer to me, although other some people have said "Oh, is it over so soon?" So I guess time has slowed down for me over here, which is nice. It remains to be seen how much my work has moved on while I have been here. I will hopefully produce some papers over the next few weeks (my job kinda depends on that), so I have got a lot of work to do when I get home. I've been hampered by a few things, not least Babs being in the middle of applying for another job, going for interviews, etc. And I have been duty bound to spend long hours blogging, of course. And having fun. And tutoring. In fact... it's a wonder I got any work done at all in the circumstances!

I feel like I have got a handle on America a bit now. I have seen for myself the legions of people struggling to stay afloat, and I have tasted the good life for those who have got the cash to enjoy all that the States have to offer. But a few things I am looking forward to...

catching up with y'all, I mean, you all
a decent cup of tea
another decent cup of tea
biscuits being biscuits and not cookies (which are like savoury scones here!)
people not being overly polite to me in shops
not being ordered to have a nice day
being able to cross the street when I choose
not being surrounded by armoured personnel vehicles
a decent cup of tea
not seeing flags everywhere
a curry
irony
sarcasm
football

I will miss:

Ann
the colourful characters on the buses and on the streets
Pike place market
the Space Needle
the mountains
the lakes
the great service everywhere (I know, I am contradicting myself now)
mega cheap prices
not having to go to work every day
ridiculous adverts
Frasier in the mornings
bus drivers who will acknowledge your existence
pancakes
clam chowder
the cool old cars
blogging (yes, this is the end).

Wednesday March 9th

Went for coffee with the Crisp-meister, and had a nice chat about the state of the world, academia, blah, blah and blah. Then I mosied into town for the Underground Tour. This is a well-known tour which looks at the birth of Seattle as a city back in 1850. Amazingly, most of downtown was originally mudflats and cliffs. Hard to imagine now, although there are still one or two hilly areas. Then there was a big fire (the houses were wooden). Then they rebuilt. Then they decided to raise the sidewalk above the water table, so lots of ground floors were buried. And some of them have been preserved, so you can walk round them. The tour guides were very slick- ours was kinda funny, now and again, apart from when she picked on me. Suggesting I could lock my knees and hold up the ceiling at one point! The barefaced cheek of it! Anyhook, the tour was well worth it- an hour and a half well spent. I wondered whether Sheffield could be interesting for that long. Probably could- I bet there's a lot of history underground.






















On the way back, I went past "Leroy", my favourite shop- this is where the pimps, playaz and hustlaz come to get kitted out. I was sorely tempted to get measured up for a little turquoise number, or perhaps something furry- after all, I have got two weddings to attend when I get back. Whassup, Ronnie M? Whassup, Hinkie D?















I caught the bus home. The buses are bendy (did I mention that?) Here is one going round a corner.















Got back to find out that Liverpool had been beaten at home 2-0. Rubbish! We need a goalscorer sharpish. Someone who knows where the onion bag is.

Sunday March 5th
Work work work. Yes, I do do some sometimes. Oh, and a bit of speech writing... ; )

Monday March 6th
More work. Punctuated by pancakes. And a long run through the park. Who knows, I might be needed for the football team back in Sheffield (I am the only one tall enough to tie the nets onto the crossbar without going up the ladder, after all).

Tuesday March 7th
Work. And watching the BBC Sport website as Chelsea are slowly but surely knocked out of the Champions' League. Get in there- I mean, jolly hard luck chaps.

In the evening, I catch a bus downtown to go and see a gig. But a few words about the bus journey. The driver looked like the fella from "The Green Mile" and was about the same size.















He turned out to be a TOTAL legend. First, he let a dwarf guy on without his pass- "You can have a courtesy ride, my friend, because you came onto the bus and asked in a respectful manner". They talked like old friends all the way until the guy reached his stop. Then on the Ave, a guy got on who looked like my man Flavour Flav-

This dude was riproaring drunk, but he was one of those livewire characters. He started off ranting. Drive reminded him,

"Sir? No pro-fanity on the bus please!"

"Wah?"

"Please do not curse on the bus".

Flav was chatting to Drive about Afrika Bamabaataa (a Hip-hopper) and then he got up and started doing some crazy (and frankly rubbish) breakdancin' on the bus, in front of everyone! "Plan-et... RRRRRROCK!" Drive was just chuckling away. A crazy lady came on and sat next to me, with her tambourine rattling in her bag and her church song sheet in her hand. She came from the Bwackie Stallone school of make-up.

And she started laughing away at Flavour Flav and blathering on to me about him. Flav was on a roll about something to do with misdemeanours. "We awl done it... climbing off yo Daddy's porch in the evenin..." I was loving all of this. And the Drive just kept on chatting to Flavour in such a good-natured way. Whenever anyone pulled the cord for a stop, Drive would say over the microphone "STARP REE-QUESTED... Please stay seated for your own pro-tection until the bus has come to a com-plete standstill!... Thankyou Sir, you have a nice day... Thankyou Madam... All clear brother, on you get! Yes sister, on you get!"

As I was getting off, I said I wanted to shake his hand for being such a gentleman. He whipped his glove off and gripped my hand...

"Why thankyou Sir. Just doin my jarb..."

"What's your name?"

"Tony."

"Tony. Well, I've been here for 2 months and you're definitely the best bus driver I've seen!"

"Why thankyou. Where you from, brother?"

"England".

"Oh, the Queen's State?"

"Yeah, I guess so".

"Well nice to meet you. You have a good day."

I realise this sounds a bit ridiculous but there you go. You would have done the same thing! He was such a star. I know it is part of the culture to be chatty and all "have a nice day" but this guy was so good to all the weird and wonderful creatures who crawled onto his bus. I thought he was the man.

I scuttled round to the Crocodile Cafe for a gig. Three bands- Whalebones, The Can't See and The Pink Mountaintops. The venue is the most famous place in Seattle. Nice and small. Good feel to it. Not packed, but then the bands weren't too well known. The Can't See were the best- a three piece (usually a good sign) whereas the others had a right old stagefull. I think there is a less is more approach to numbers in bands. Any more than 5 members and you gotta start asking questions! Here's The Can't See. And appropriately enough, you can't see them.




They were a bit like The Shins meets Sparks. I liked them. Between bands, I sat on a table on me tod like Billy no-mates, nursing a beer and writing postcards. A few people asked me to mind their beer when they went out for a fag. Some guys started apologizing to me for George Bush.

So it was a good gig, not great. But another thing ticked off my list of "what to do in Seattle".

I got the 12:20 bus back and who should be driving but Tony. He had a bus half-full of drifters, smackheads and crazies and sure enough, he called them all Sir and Madam and did his best to see them right. Driving down the Ave, I saw about 20 blokes (they look like Frat boys) laying into each other. Looked like they were too drunk to do much damage, and it was more of a hugfest than anything else.

When I got off at 29th Ave, I said to Tony (cringe):

"Hi, it's me, the English dude."
"Oh, the English dude!" like old friends. Another handshake.

"You should come and be a bus driver in England!"

(laughing) "You blow buses up in England, don't you?"

"Oh that was a one-off, a one-off..."

"Well, you have a good night, brother" etc etc

I think that was my equivalent to "You're my besht mate, you are!" I had had THREE whole bottles of beer, all to myself. Maybe I am already feeling a bit sad to be leaving Seattle behind.

Saturday 4th March

Snowboarding for the (sniff) final time (sniff). Usual routine- on the bus for 9 am and on the slopes for about 11. The weather is good today- sunshine and broken cloud- and it's quite warm. There is a kind of competition in the snowboard park with the young dudes flinging themselves into orbit, and mainly landing, amid much "wooing". There's a jock commentating and some phat beats playing on the speakers. Like totally gnarly, dude!

When no-one is looking, I dodge onto the course and do a 1080 (that's a jump with three full revolutions). I land it perfectly, then go onto the rail and nail that one too. AWESOME! The crowd was buzzing. "Who IS that guy...?" Sadly I don't think it was captured on camera. Here are the rad dudes waiting their turn, mere moments before my incredible leap.




















My new Burton mitts are super warm. Which is good.

In the afternoon, I have my final lesson with David Dude and Benedict Geek. We do carving (just going fast in a curve really) and POWER CARVING (going a bit faster in a curve). I am totally boss. At the end, we do some mini jumps in a mini park (for losers). Ben canes it over a jump and from where me and David are standing, we just know that he is going to land on his head. Which he does. He seems to land mainly on his eye socket, and will no doubt have a nice shiner to show his Microsoft buddies on Monday morning. At the bottom of the slope, there is a really bad band playing ("No Doubt" covers a-go-go and a hot tub full of pi**ed-up Americans- grrrreat!)





















Nevertheless, I am sad to leave Snoquers for the last time and pack up my board for going home. BOO!!!

Photos of the now legendary "straight line" walk

Here they are. Click "slideshow" to see them in order.

Friday 3rd March

I didn't achieve much today. I spent most of the morning faffing round trying to decide what to send home in the post and what to try and squeeze into my cases. In the end, I lugged two big boxes down to the post office, one of books, the other of T-shirts and stuff I bought from Crate and Barrel. Cue Homer Simpson voice- "Ahh-hhhh-hhh... Craaaaate and Baaaarrellll..." It's a seriously nice shop. And so cheap, dudes. It's a bit frightening how far yer shekels go over here. You end up buying things just because they are cheap. So if you have the honour of being invited to Thrush Street in the next year, bring some sunglasses, cos everything in the kitchen is now brightly coloured rubber or plastic. Don't say I didn't warn you!

Anyhoo, at the post office I spent a cool 100 bucks sending stuff to me back in Sheffield. Imagine my surprise when I pick them up from the post office down in Hillsborough... " a parcel?... for me?... what could it be?... gosh, what a surprise... let's see... oh right... loads of books and some T-shirts... great. Which loser sent me this load of tat? Ah..."

After that, I went to the Henry Art gallery at the Uni. I had been earlier in the week (forgot to blog it) to see the Lichtenstein retrospective, which I enjoyed, although not quite as much as I had hoped. I think I am used to seeing his stuff alongside other artists' paintings, and it tends to blow away whatever it is exhibited next to- BLAM! A bit like this one, called...



















"Blam"!

But it was still great to see his stuff brought together. I think he's spot on (geddit) and anyone who thinks that Pop Art is rubbish knows next to nothing about art, in this writer's humble opinion.

Today, I saw the James Turrell Skyspace. Now bear with me folks. This is basically a small room, built outisde the gallery, with a large oval hole in the roof where you look up at the sky. Sounds naff. But is brilliant. The sky looks very different when it is brought into a small frame. Birds fly over, Coulds drift past. It starts to do strange things to your mind (had you noticed...?) I wasn't meant to take photos so don't tell anyone about these...




It's definitely one of those things you have to see yourself. I think he has got something at the Yorshire Sculpture Park. Meet you there for a picnic this summer.






















After that, more shopping over at the Mall. Oh yes. Back to Crate and Barrel for a kick off. Now that I have sent som stuff home, I need to buy loads more things I don't really need to overfill my cases with! Then I went to Sephora, which is a girly shop really, but me being such a metrosexual, it was no sweat to go in and ask about my skincare regime. Good grief. I've changed, haven't I? Well, deperate times call for desperate measures- I have two weddings approaching and need to be looking my radiant best. On to QFC where I bought a mango, just because I could. And some pancake mix and maple syrup- that's how breakfast should be over here. None of this Cornflakes and cup of tea nonsense! No, pancakes hot off the giddle and cawffee fresh off the stove. Outside QFC, some little girls were gathered in a rather intimidating group (it won't be long before my nieces reach the age where they can look at me, whisper furtively to one another and start laughing and it will scare the living daylights out of me!) The girls in question piped up as I walked past "Girl Guide cookies? Girl Guide cookies?" One of them, seemingly the saleswoman, belted out the line,
"They're yumm-ee in your tumm-ee..." while her partner in crime, without missing a beat, yelled "What she said!" I thought it was funny, but not funny enough to risk stopping and engaging them in dialogue.

Rich and Becky have finished their four week course. Perhaps that will coincide with them a) cheering up a bit and b) realising that playing their radio at 2 am or 5 am or even 7 am is not big or clever. Of course, standing outside my door and shouting down the stairs at any time of the night or morning is perfectly fine. You go for it.

I watched a film tonight called "The Station Agent" I had seen it before in Sheffield with Keri and Shaun, although I fell asleep right at the start and missed the first 10 minutes. So it was good to see them properly! But it's a great little film, about a guy who inherits an old run-down train station house in the sticks of New Jersey. Not a whole lot happens, but it is still brilliant. Not unlike this blog, if I may be so bold.... Oh suit yourself.

Sunday 26th Feb

I moped around today, trying to think of things to use the car for. In the end, I went downtown and did a whole bunch o' shoppin'. Then I came home and felt guilty about not doing much work.

I did knuckle down a bit in the week. On the Tuesday, I met up with Riki, the talkative postgrad, and we blathered away for about 3 hours about work. On Wednesday, I went for a run in the Spring sunshine. I took a new route and went down a road that was being resurfaced. As I ran past a large Afro-American lady construction worker who was standing in the middle of the road holding the STOP-GO sign, I went past a big stretch of perfectly smooth, grey, wet cement. Mmmm. I happened to catch the lady's eye, and she bellowed, "DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT!" followed by a big smile. I hadn't been thinking about it, or had I...? Perhaps in every male's brain there lurks a little chunk that would love to leave its mark on a big wet slab of concrete. Running across it would be good for starters, eh? Or signing your name in 4 foot high letters. Or doing an angel like you're on your back in the snow. I was a bit taken aback by the lady's comment, and reacted by smiling and saying "I wasn't going to" and throwing my hand at her (a bit like Norman Wisdom does when he says "stop messin' about!") The result was, I suspect, supersonically camp. It may even have been the most ridiculous moment of my life. Not that that's a problem! Oh no. But the effect was probably like combining the following:






























































































Thursday I had a meeting with Babs. She has been rather distracted by being offered a new job in Pittsburgh (a bit like working in Hampstead and being offered a position in Rotherham). So she hasn't put much energy into my stuff, which is kind of disappointing and kind of to be expected, as she is basically supervising me on a voluntary basis, and we have met about the right number of times. Looking back, I think it took me longer to get started, due to feeling dog rough and not having easy access to a pc for the first few weeks. Hey ho. I will keep plugging away at it and hopefully produce some papers back in Sheffield.

Yet more holiday blog

Tuesday morning, and a veritable feast awaited us outside our room for breakfast. A tray with a banana chopped in half, a bagel and a little plastic pot of jam! So we headed out for a potter round Port Townsend, a funny old place really. We had a coffee in a great little cafe, and we also felt compelled to sample the cakes, what with breakfast being a bit meagre, you understand.

Fortified, we did some shopping for presents although I was more successful in buying things for me. I bought a lightweight red gillet which, for the uninitiated, is what we used to call a "body warmer" in the 80s. I might go for an 80s look- anyone know where I can get frost-washed denim these days? I'm sure there are still someplace in Sheffield selling it. The wedge haircut might be more of a challenge... praps I will stick to the mullet!

Back in Seattle, and we go to the movies. It's a really tiny cinema- strangely, a lot of the cinemas are small over here, but there are a lot more of 'em. I like it that way. We go and see "Brokeback Mountain". I read in a freebie newspaper that it is OK for a guy to go with his date, but you won't catch gangs of Frat boys going to see it, no sirree. After about 10 minutes of the film, I leaned over to Rosy and said "I want to be a cowboy". But I wasn't saying that by the end. It's a proper film- the gay thing and the cowboy thing are diversions really- but it sure is sad. I had tears in my eyes as we left the theatre (although that was partly to do with our car being given a parking ticket). We went over to the Mall for a few consolatory beers at the Ram while we put the world to rights.

So we only had a few days of mooching left. Maybe it was the beers, but on Thursday morning, I was feeling a bit ruff. A bit Husky to be precise.















Thursday night, we decided to get some culture by driving over to Green Lake to go to the theatre to see "The Inspector Calls" by J.B. Priestley. We got well and truly lost on the way over, partly because there is a 20th Avenue North and a 20th Avenue North East, and they ain't the same thing. I got a bit distracted and nearly drove the wrong way down a few roads! In the end we found it, but we kinda wished we hadn't. It was pretty Amateur Dramatics stylee, and the Inspector would bound onstage, screw up one eye and say "To be sure... what Oi waaaaant to know is dis..." before flipping back into some kind of American accent. Come back Dick van Dyck, all is forgiven!!! So the play rumbled to its rather strange conclusion. It's a clever turn, when it comes (I won't spoil it for those who don't know the play), although maybe a bit contrived. I guess Priestley was aiming for some kind of plea from the heart in response to the horrors of WWII. "None of us lives alone..." intones the Inspector towards the end.

Anyway, from there, we tried to find a restaurant (cue more amateurish navigation from yours truly) and ended up back on the Ave in perhaps the grottiest Chinese restaurant this side of the pond. Rosy's meal was covered in what really did look like the product of someone with a bad cold. We drove to the Mall and bought some donuts, but when even these were a bit rubbish, we called it a day. You gotta laugh, eh?

On the Friday, we did the harbour tour, which was great. We were lucky with the weather and I got carried away with taking pictures of big old ships and big old cranes (the biggest in t'world, allegedly).


















On the last night, Friday, we finished the holiday in style with a meal at a cracking restaurant called St Cloud's (a recommendation of Ann's). The food was great, and we didn't get lost.

Saturday morning, we went over to SEA-TAC airport and Rosy caught her flight. Boo! Back to Blighty and back to work. Boo! And she didn't manage to get upgraded to club class like she did on the way over (courtesy of her bro's Father-in-law who's an air traffic controller at Heathrow!) I went back to drop off the car, only to find that the rental place had closed at noon, and was closed Sunday too. So I had the car for a bit longer (and it would cost a fair bit more). D'Oh!

Still, the motor had done us proud, and helped us to see loads of Seattle and Washington State. So a big round of applause for the electric blue Nissan Sentra... Here endeth the holiday blog.

Holiday blog

Back in Seattle, and we found ourselves missing the islands a lot, and hoping to see Orcas or at least a seal or too whenever we went past any water! To soften the blow, we went down to the Mall, and had a burger at "Jonny Rocket's". They are a chain of 50s style diners, and are definitely a cut above yer average burger joint. The burgers were perfectomundo, and the staff wore little white hats. We were served by the new kid, which is happening a lot. In fact, wherever we go, we seem to get served by someone who smiles sheepishly and says, "I've just started here..." I think it might be conspiracy, but I don't know who could be behind it!

The next day, we head over to Fremont. On the way I reacquainted myself with the troll (yes, he does have his hand on a real VW Beetle!) and we said a quick "howdy" to Comrade Lenin.

Then it was on to a brilliant vintage junk store...

followed by a pavement, I mean sidewalk, coffee. Over to Ballard next, another cool part of town which felt a bit like London in a way, with a Sunday market on a backstreet and loads more shops, ending up at "Cupcake Royale" for, you guessed it, a cupcake. Although we did make the schoolboy/schoolgirl error of having a tea as well, which invariably means hot water with milk and very little tea flavour to speak of. Thank goodness Rosy brought some Yorkshire teabags with her for home consumption! Ahhhh!

Monday, we drive downtown to catch a ferry to Bainbridge Island (not far from Seattle, in fact lots of people live there and commute by ferry).















From there we drove on westwards along the Olympic peninsula to a place called "Hurricane Ridge" in the Olympic National Park. We had to pay a real life Park Ranger to enter the Park, and then followed a winding hairpinned road (past the occasional deer) up to the summit at about 5,000 feet. The top was crowded with nippers skidding around on snowboards, although sledging was not allowed. One man was reminded of this by a Ranger and replied, "It's not for sledging, it's for pulling my inn-fant". We tramped around a bit, took some chilly photos and headed back down. But the views from the top were stunning, even though the weather wasn't the clearest.















Having long arms is useful sometimes- for taking photos!















Onwards from there to Lake Crescent and a quick walk through a forest before arriving back at the water's edge.
I hope you are keeping up with all of this! I will be testing you when I return to England.




Accomodation that night was back on the coast at Port Townsend, a little town full of old Victorian houses and not much else. Our hotel was suitable random, although probably not as chintzy as most in the town. There was however a barking dog, a squeaky bed, and a hotel which had many varied incarnations over the years, most notably as a bordello- each room was named after the young lady who frequented it!

Holiday blog

We stayed at the Ace Hotel which was, as the name sugests, ace. It was a bit like a hip hostel in a cool part of town (Belltown, where the Grunge scene sprang, or rather slithered, up). Here's a reject shot from their catalogue of a post-grunger helping himself to breakfast.
















Fortified by breaksfast, we scooted up the Space Needle. Rosy's new North Face coat came in handy, as it was absolutely freezing at the top.






















After a day back at 29th Avenue, we pick up our hire car and set off for the San Juan Islands, a collection of islands in the Puget Sound. It was a bit mad trying to drive an automatic car on the wrong side of the road- me and Rosy had a practice in the mercifully deserted blocks near the house in our blue Nissan Sentra.

We took the car ferry from Anacortes to Lopez Island.
















Lopez is a small sleepy place with pretty much one road. Everyone who drives past you waves, as they probably know everyone else on the island in February. So it's a real change in the pace of life for us. We drive towards the coast and see bald eagles circling overhead. We go for a walk through a forest...















and spot some seals lying on some rocks. They are very curious about us and keep coming over to take a look. At one point, six of them drift over to say hello. I suppose they don't often see anything as exotic as English people.














Our accomodation is a log cabin...















with an outdoor hot tub. I am not smiling- my face has frozen solid.














We also visited Lime Kiln Point, which in the summer is a great place to see the resident and transiet orca pods (that's groups of killer whales to you and me). A killer whale eats up to 1,500 pounds of salmon a day. That would cost you a fair bit down at Tesco's.














None of them came out to play for us, but we did see another seal (or was it one of the same ones from yesterday?!)

From Lopez, we took the ferry to San Juan, a bigger island. This was our view from a hotel in Friday Harbour. The following day, we took a ferry like this one (or was it the same one?) and headed back to Seattle.