August 5, 2010 –
So, when you think of touring Seattle, what comes to mind? The Space Needle? A ferry ride? Clam chowder on the waterfront or at Pike Place Market? Well, we did none of those things during our brief tour of Seattle. Granted, we had intended to visit the market, and we did wave at the Space Needle from a distance, but that really doesn’t count.
So what did we do in Seattle? We explored under a bridge, walked through a life-sized catalog and “shopped” in a free Costco-sized warehouse of books.
When we have been in Seattle in the past to visit family, one of the things that we had done on each trip was a visit to the Freemont Troll who lives under the Aurora Bridge. We had been there about three years ago, and on this visit, Alex kept asking when we were going to see the troll. Seth and Kara, being the neglectful parents they are, had never taken their children to see the troll. Seth had to work, but the rest of us headed into downtown Seattle with the intention of seeing the troll and then Pike Place Market.
We figured that if we headed into the city in the late morning, we’d miss some of the commute traffic. However, there is some kind of celebration going on this week in Seattle, and the Blue Angels were flying over the city. Because of that one of the two bridges we needed to cross was closed so the other one was way backed up. It took us longer than we had expected, but eventually we made it to the troll. The kids (the big one with the goatee included) had a great time climbing all over the giant monster.
By that time, we realized that we didn’t have time to go to the market so that will have to wait for our next trip. Kara had to take her kids to gymnastics, and we were supposed to meet Seth at his work. Since we didn’t have time to go to the market, we had seen the Archie McPhee store on our way to the troll. Now, you need a little background here (as opposed to my normally streamlined version of events). Becky’s mom Kit loves catalog shopping, and she is always ordering gag gifts for birthdays and Christmas. Archie McPhee is one of her favorite catalogs and since she had given each of the kids some money for the trip, we figured that we should stop by and spend some it for Grandma’s sake. The kids ended up with some really cool and desperately needed treasures as you can see in the picture. Even I was able to augment my Edgar Allan Poe collection with a mini figure of the master poet.
After the McPhee-a-thon, we caught another important Seattle tradition when we ate at Dick’s Drive-In Instant Service Hamburgers. The troll, a giant gag store and Dick’s burgers – a truly sophisticated connoisseur’s tour of Seattle. But wait, we’re not done yet. Our free second hand bookfest is next up on our Seattle stops.
Seth is the president and part owner of Thrift Books. If you’ve ever ordered a used book from Amazon, there’s a decent chance that you bought it from one of his warehouses. He works out of a warehouse just south of Seattle, but he has six warehouses across the US and is looking to start a 7th. It’s basically a huge warehouse of used books with people organizing new shipments and sending out orders. Becky and I had just discussed book recommendations with Seth and Kara the night before, and Seth found every book they had suggested (and then some) in his warehouse and gave them to us. Then he asked the kids what books they wanted, and he found those as well. It was pretty cool.
After that we stopped by for a couple of hours to visit my brother James and his family – wife Nicole, kids Jessie, Drake and Derek in the same town as Seth’s warehouse. I know what you’re thinking – wait, your brother lives there, but you went to Seattle primarily to see your friends? You see, my sister-in-law Nicole’s mom lives in Santa Cruz, CA so we see them somewhat regularly. In fact, they just got back from California last night, and we had spent a weekend with them less than two weeks ago when they were down there. On this current road trip the stop was to see Seth and Kara since we hadn’t seen them in years, but we dropped in on James and Nicole since we were in town. It was a good to see them, but maybe I’ll include pictures with them from Santa Cruz because that was the more exciting visit.
Afterward, we went back to Seth and Kara’s, packed the car, said our goodbyes and hit the road again. Since this entry is entirely too long already (as I’m sure you’ve noticed), I’ll describe the fancy motel where we stayed in tomorrow’s entry.
Hasta la vista, baby.
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