So, in an effort to relive my trip as long as possible, I'm posting some fun highlights from the Emerald City. For you, yes, but also for me.
First, the most amazing thing happened on the flight from Dallas to Seattle: my hotel roomie Rosemary Clement-Moore was on the same exact flight! And we hadn't even planned it. We had both upgraded to first class (so luxe!) and it was a truly delightful trip. As soon as we had check in at the conference hotel, we headed into Seattle for some sightseeing. We made the rounds through the Pike Place market (and I had the most amazing vegan chowder) before taking a harbor cruise.
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| My obligatory self-portrait with Rosemary. |
I have a serious things for boats and water (see: Fins, Forgive My) and we had a wonderful time. The weather was perfect, just a little cool and gorgeously sunny.
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| Leaving Seattle behind, for a little while. |
That night I joined Rosemary for dinner with two of her friends (Kelli and Lance) and their friend (A'mee) for my first foray into Indian food. It was amazing, even if I had to ignore the massive amounts of butter involved. And, in a strange, small world kind of coincidence, Kelli works at Microsoft, right across the hall from my Buzz girl sister, Dona Sarkar-Mishra. Crazy!
Since a lot of my travels revolved around food (or the finding thereof) I'll tell you about another dinner I had on Saturday night. (I'll skip the details on the conference meals and you can thank me later.) I ventured out of the hotel to Purple to have dinner with the aforementioned Dona, writer pals Kelli (different one) Estes, Christina Arbini, and Pat White. I got a ride to the restaurant with the ever enviable Jane Porter, and her buds Megan Crane and Liza Palmer joined the party, too. (Let's just ignore the part where our food took forever--which apparently very unusual at Purple, because they comped our entire meal and if that happened all the time they'd totally be out of business.)
After the writers' conference, I headed into Seattle proper to stay with fellow Buzz girl, Heather Davis. Her apartment is perfectly located for sightseeing, branch office locating, and apartment hunting. I got to spend some serious quality time with Heather's cat, Harper, who immediately remembered the tuna I snuck her last time and kept buttering me up for more.
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| Roar, said the kitty cat. |
Heather's apartment has a great view of the Space Needle, and (like many Seattle apartment buildings) has a nice rooftop patio complete with lounge chairs, barbecues, and spectacular views of the city, the sound, and the islands beyond. (Sadly, no sparkly vampires showed up because of the glorious sun that shone my entire trip.)
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| That's a mighty tall thing! |
On the way to dinner my last night in town, Heather and I passed this very cool bottle cap mural of (we assume) Kurt Cobain. This reminds me of my first love affair with Seattle, during college when the grunge movement was at it's peak. I guess it was only a matter of time before I fell in love with that city again.
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| The king of grunge immortalized. |
For my last dinner (for now) Heather and I met up with the adorable (your face is adorable) Liz Gallagher and the always together, recently promoted Buzz girl Dona at Plum Bistro, an all vegan restaurant. It was so nice not to have to think about anything other than what to order. (Btw, the Mac 'n' Yease, definitely!)
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| Heather, Liz, Dona and me in atmospheric lighting. |
Hugs,
TLC
* Daisy wanted me to add that she's a little nervous about the rain (she's not a fan of water) and the clouds (she kind of worships the sun) but I've promised her long walks on sunny days, so she's going to give it a shot.
