~Monday~ I slept in until about 9:00. Kevin took Ricardo to a doctor’s appointment this morning, and when he returned, we headed downtown to see the Central Branch of the Seattle Public Library.
We stopped at “Dick’s Drive-In,” which is a lot like the Char-Grills in Raleigh. We each ordered a “Dick’s Deluxe,” fries, and a drink. Delish!
The library was a very cool building, which has won architectural awards. Here are a few shots I took there:
(Notice the 4th Floor: “red hall, meeting rooms”
as its significance will become apparent a little later.)
Proof That I Was There
(Out the 10th floor window.)
Ground View
(From the 10th Floor)
Surrounding Buildings
(From the 10th Floor)
My friend Tom (bearzendurham) alerted me to this cool data-driven artwork in this library up above the circulation desk: “An electronic installation that visually maps the circulation of The Seattle Public Library’s Central Library gives viewers a glimpse of what patrons are reading.” This article, New data-driven artwork installed at Central Library; Screens display titles checked out in past hour, has more details about it.
Close-up of Data-Driven Art Work
And as promised, the 4th floor “red hall, meeting rooms”:
Back at Kevin’s place we spent a little time downstairs in the coffee shop using their wireless network and enjoying some java—he a latte, and me, an Americano.
Kevin participated in a couple of work calls in the afternoon, and I took an hour nap.
I met Kathleen and James—two fun people from the People-to-People Technical Communication Delegation to the People’s Republic of China trip I took in October of 2008—for dinner at Jai Thai here on Capitol Hill. It was nice to catch up.
They were thoughtful in bringing a copy of their China pictures on CD for me, and generous in picking up the tab for dinner. Thanks, you two! So good to see you both!
Back at Kevin’s, I met him and Ricardo and we headed over to Cineoke, which basically is like karaoke on steroids. It was held in a little movie theater, and the singers went up on stage to stand on either side of the “big screen,” while it played scenes from movies and people sang along.
Everybody who sang was pretty darn good singing-wise, and they were all very animated and fun up on stage. I really enjoyed it! They also serve food there, so Kevin and Ricardo were able to have dinner.
Some of the songs/scenes I remember:
- The “I Feel Pretty” song and scene from West Side Story.
- Three different Pavarotti songs/scenes:
- La Dona e mobile (very interesting, since I just saw Rigoletto, and very funny, because they had English subtitles that were totally and clearly not what the words really meant)
- Sinatra’s My Way with the other of the Three Tenors while Frank was in the audience
- With his dad (that is not the one they showed and he sung to, but it is one in which he sings with his father)
- Julie Andrews doing Send in the Clowns
- Barbra in the Don’t Rain on My Parade scene of Funny Girl
- Prince Ali from Aladdin
- Julie Andrews in Marry Poppins in the Spoonful of Sugar scene
- The Hakuna Matata scene from The Lion King
- Josh Groban singing some song I didn’t recognize with some woman I didn’t recognize
- Liza Minneli in the Mein Herr scene from Cabaret
- The Big Spender sequence from Sweet Charity (I love this scene!)
- The Miss Piggy and Kermit wedding scene from The Muppets Take Manhattan
- Could We Start Again Please from Jesus Christ Superstar
- A scene from some movie with Donny Osmond singing in a diaper in a cage.
I thought the emcee said something about it being from Phantom of the Opera II, which none of us had ever heard of, and I don’t see anything about it on youtube or google (so it can’t be real).Turns out it was from the Close Every Door scene from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, another one of Andrew Loyd-Webber’s pieces. Thanks, Will!!!
There were others, but that’s all I’m capturing. (I know, “Thank god,” right?) I very much enjoyed the two hours worth of entertainment.
In the final hours of being 51, I tweeted this at 10:00 Pacific time:
| Right this minute, I’m a year older on the east coast. Lucky for me, I’m on the west coast right now. 🙂 Happy Cusp Hours to Me. 🙂 |