I love big cities. And I love exploring big cities. And I find it rather adventurous, when in a new big city, to hop in a rental car with just a map and throw caution to the wind. But the past two days here in Seattle, the wind also included rain. Lots of it. And, well, that's a wee bit much on the adventure side for me.
I got into town around noon on Thursday. Drove up to downtown and went shopping for bachelorette and birthday and going-away presents. I was about to head south to Nancy and Marty's house at 4pm when Marty called to warn me about the traffic I'd hit if I did so. He suggested waiting it out until 6:30 pm, which I did and u-turned my way to Capitol Hill. Bought a couple of novels at a used book store, grabbed a cinnamon latte from Seattles Best Coffee (how could I resist...when in rome) then rolled up my already soaked red sweatpant cuffs one last time before getting back in the rental car to drive down to Sumner. When I got to the house, I got the grand tour. They live right on a lake, and even though it was dark by the time I arrived, I could tell it was beautiful. And peaceful. And calm.
So I decided to sit in their house and look at the lake all day on Friday. I drew in my sketchbook and read a bit. I took some photos in the all-day magic hour light due to the clouds and on-again, off-again rain. And then I headed up to Seattle to see JRJP's show. I arrived a little bit early and went to find them backstage. Hugging everyone gave me goosebumps, and I was somewhat at a loss for words. Luckily, I had an excuse to leave: the show was about to start. I made my way to the auditorium and found a seat near one of the aisles. What can I say about the show? This was the third time in three years that I've seen them perform (without me, that is) and I think this may have been the hardest of those three. I can't pinpoint why, but it was hard. And I felt a little out of place being there.
Those feelings passed when I went to see them after the show. There was a cast party afterward and I got to catch up with a lot of them. I stayed much later than I'd anticipated. When everyone was leaving, and I hugged Billy good-bye, I joked about being their groupie now. And he looked at me and said, no, you're not a groupie. You're a part of us.
And they are, and always will be, a part of me.
Lisa and I left O.C. at 5 am to drive to San Diego. We picked up Jillian in the S.D. parking lot at 6:15 am then ate breakfast at IHOP. The three of us drove to Imperial County where we were to spend the rest of the day collecting data. Our first stop was Calexico, a border town that smelled really really bad. Next, we drove to El Centro, which literally was a time capsule. We felt as if we'd entered 1985 with the strip malls that had Mervyns and Millers Outpost. We did multiple U-turns before finding our next stop in the miniscule Imperial City. Our final stop was in Brawley. When we were done with the data collection, we drove to the Gaslamp Quarter for a too-late lunch at an italian restaurant called Al Acqua 2. I was not impressed nor satiated. My fusilli with funghi porcini and gorgonzola was bland. After our "linner," the three of us went back to our S.D. branch to drop off Jillian. Not wanting to get stuck in traffic, Lisa and I ventured to La Jolla to find a movie theater. We got lost and stuck in traffic but eventually found the Ultra-Star Cinemas in Solano Beach, where we watched Viggo in Hidalgo. We finally made it back to our office in Costa Mesa at 11:30 pm, thoroughly exhausted.
Lisa and I flew out from Orange County Sunday afternoon. Before checking into the hotel, we stopped at Mimi's Cafe for a snack. Checked in and killed time at Park Meadows Mall. Freshened up at the hotel then had dinner with Andy, one of the land guys in our Denver office. I didn't catch the name of the restaurant, but I tried buffalo for the first time. He dropped us off back at our hotel and I caught up on the phone with Fletch for an hour. Turned in for the night after working out in the gym for a bit. Monday morning, we enjoyed the Original Pancake House, which I'd thought was only in Chicago. Yum! We got into the Denver office at 8:30 am and set up for the sales presentation. We left the office at 10:30 and drove out on the 70 West to catch a bit of Denver's scenery. Flew back to Orange County at 2:40 pm.