A Few Random Hours in Seattle (and some in Alaska)

Be warned, there's no real reason for this post, except as an excuse to post older photos that I really like.

I've decided that I'm strangely enamored of the Pacific Northwest.  For the purposes of this post, I'll lump Alaska with the Pacific Northwest.  Hopefully that's not offensive.



I can't explain why.  It could have something to do with the fact that I've spend approximately 95% of my life on the east coast and thus heading West still holds some exoticism for me.  You know, exoticism in the form of tall pine trees and rainy weather and an over-dependence on coffee shops.

When I went to go visit my dad last summer, I had a 6.5 hour long layover in Seattle.  It was long enough that my Seattle friend kindly offered to pick me up from the airport and entertain me for a few hours.


These hours entailed going to see some earthworks...


Befriending some ducks...


Running up this hill...


And staring at this huge-ass navy ship.  Or at least I assume it was a navy ship.  There were men in uniform on a huge-ass ship at any rate.


After bopping around for a few hours and staring at the Puget Sound, I had to hop on another plane to Anchorage...


To Alaska...a land where even your local Wal-Mart looks like it could a part of some epic scenery for a Lord of the Rings movie...


... and where your typical trip to the market holds mystery and wonderment...


... and where former brothels become cherished family restaurants.


Maybe I do need to one day pack up and move out west.  At least for the option of having daily moose sightings.

Poles on Puget Sound

I recently purchased a Groupon to take a handful of pole dancing classes at a gym in DC.  Pole dancing is a lot harder than it looks and requires a considerable amount of balance, upper-body strength, and coordination.  And, like any other form of exercise, it requires practice in order to improve one's abilities.  What sucks about pole dancing is that....you really need a pole to practice.  If you're stubborn like me and have to comply with certain agreements in your lease, then you're not going to set one up in your home.  Which means one must take to the streets in order to find adequate poles for practice.

This is also harder than you would think.  Good poles are apparently hard to come by.  They're always too wide, too narrow, or too unwieldy.

On our recent trip to Seattle, after wandering through Pike Place Market a bit, I took Anna and Joh down to the waterfront.  It was there were we discovered, near the weird statue of Christopher Columbus and by the Seattle Aquarium, was a raised stage... with some poles.



Now, as you can see...these are not quite ideal poles.  They were not nearly sturdy enough to do a catch-spin or to try and lift yourself off the ground.  Also, at least one side is situated on a step, so that makes things a bit awkward.  But I thought that they were decent enough to play around on and try a few tricks.  I tried to demonstrate some of these to Anna.
This mainly consisted of a lot of spinning around, since I had forgotten how to do most of the tricks I had learned in the one class I took a few weeks ago.







And trying not to fall off of the step to a concrete death.



Joh opted not to participate in the pole festivities, opting instead to play photographer.  Because she is not a shameless woman.

It just goes to show you that if you know where to look, opportunities are everywhere for random, shameless, fun antics with friends.