~Monday~ Casey was up first this morning, and quietly out of the house and to the gym before work.
I got up at about 7:00, I think, trying to sleep longer, but after 10 hours of sleep, I was ready to get up. I thought I was being respectfully quiet, but Jen said I was actually making a racket that woke her up.
After searching through Casey’s cabinets and drawers for a knife and plate, and stopping long enough to photograph his impeccably organized spice shelves:
I fixed a bagel, which I took out to eat on his front stoop.
After I finished my bagel, I ventured out to get two cups of coffee to bring back to the house, and at the intersection of:
I approached an older lady and said to her, “Do you live around here?”
She seemed a little taken aback by the question, and hesitantly answered, “Well, I live near enough to here, yes.”
I suppose—instead—I should have phrased my question, “Are you from here?” or perhaps, “Do you live within the ‘local’ time?” might have been more palatable.
“Would you tell me where the nearest coffee shop is from here?” I asked.
She said, “Well, of course, that would be a Starbucks.”
Of course it would. Casey told us yesterday that this being Starbucks’ headquarters, there are 96 Starbucks in this city alone!
She pointed me to the Seattle Center, which was just on the other side of a building that was blocking it, and I remembered that Casey had said yesterday that they had a Starbucks in there.
Surprisingly, I was the only one in there when I entered, two plus-sized girls were working, and Natural Woman was playing over their intercom.
The girl that took my order said, “This is, like, the fourth time this song has played since I’ve been here—it was 8AM, mind you—and I wanted to say, “My god, what time did you start this morning?” but I was too busy singing Natural Woman along with the other girl who started getting one of the two Grande coffees I’d ordered.
She handed me one and thought she was done, so I said to the cashier, “You heard me say two, right?”
“Yes, I charged you for two,” she said looking at the other girl.
“Oh, I didn’t hear you say two. She did. But I didn’t. I’m sorry,” she said getting the second one.
I said to her, “Yeah, we were too busy singing Natural Woman to hear what she said,” about which we all had a laugh.
Back at the house, I enjoyed my coffee with a piece of banana bread. Yum. Yum. Yum!
After Jen checked with a camera store to see if they had a battery she needed, and found out they didn’t have one, we headed down to the ferry to Bainbridge Island.
We stopped at the entrance to Sculpture Park, where Jen snapped a picture of this sculpture and asked on Facebook for potential captions for the picture:
Here are some of them:
At the stop for the 99 bus a little ways from there, we waited about 10 minutes before a lady stopped to tell us that that bus doesn’t run between 10 and 2 due to a change that went into effect this past weekend, so we walked the about seven or so blocks to the ferry.
We had perfect timing in catching the next ferry across the Puget Sound, and after waiting just a few minutes to board we were on our way. I snapped a few pictures as we departed Seattle:
Upon arrival on the island, we stopped first at a bike rental place with the intention of renting two bikes right then. However, after the guy working there explained the price options and the potential routes to tour the island, we decided we should probably grab lunch first.
We ended up at the Harbour Public House, where we sat out on their deck tables, where we enjoyed this view:
Lunch of Fish & Chips and some beer and a couple of bourbons later, we jettisoned the bike-riding idea, and just walked around the island for a little while.
We dropped in on the Pegasus Coffee Shop, since Casey had recommended it, and although we didn’t get any coffee, I did snap this picture of a cool way to display your, presuming changing daily, menu:
We stopped at Bon Bon, a fudge store, where I bought a little square of maple walnut fudge, and where this exchange took place as described in a Facebook status update of mine: Fudge! “We don’t sell the dry edges,” the clerk said handing the shaving to me separately from what she’d weighed for me. “I’m not too proud to eat a dry edge,” I replied.
Next on the food and drink tour, was a stop at Mora Iced Creamry, where I had some Dulce de Leche ice cream that was like none other I’ve ever had elsewhere, which wasn’t necessarily a good thing.
But it didn’t keep me from eating it.
On our way back to the ferry, we followed a trail marked “Waterfront Trail,” but what it was more like was a “Waterfront Dead End.”
At the pier, we were annoyed that we couldn’t find an open both from which to purchase a return ticket, until we say a sign indicating it was free to ride back to Seattle.
Back in Seattle, we walked home via Target, where we made a stop. Jen bought a few items to supplement a failed suitcase packing, and I bought bourbon and diet coke.
Back at Casey’s, we sat out on his front entrance area and did Internet stuff until he got home from work.
A little while after he got home, we walked to Black Bottle for a dinner of tapas and Ginger Beer. I even had some Ginger Beer, with a shot of bourbon added to it. 🙂 We split four tapas orders and got one free due to an ordering error at another table.
Back at Casey’s we went up on his roof and viewed the (very) nearby Space Needle from up there.
All-in-all, a fun-packed day! Thanks, Casey, for being such a great, and gracious, host!