Return To Seattle: Day 2

Those of you who are familiar with Seattle would know of Interstate 5 leading north from downtown, with State Route 520 making its own way to the west, across Portage Bay. Over a narrow water passage linking it to Union Bay known as the "Montlake Cut," there crosses overhead Montlake Boulevard, which links the University District to the north, to the Montlake neighborhood to the south. Getting off 520 and going south, the boulevard becomes 24th Avenue East.

Just to the right at the juncture of the name change is East Louisa Street, where halfway up the hill on the right is a Tudor-style house, the home of a distinguished professor of physiology, who still goes to work on his bicycle for twelve-hour days at the age of eighty-two. His wife is my Aunt Shirley, still very spry at seventy-two. For the next week, I have the couch.

When it comes to either public or private transportation, there is no better place to be.

In the morning, you can take the bus from the end of the street, as it ventures down 24th Avenue, then over to 23rd. As it turns down East Madison Street, the downtown area comes into sight, as one is surrounded by all manner of retail establishments, enough of which are to remind you that this is the West and not the East Coast. At the bottom of the hill, at the end of the line, there it is.

Pike Place Market was first opened in 1907, and is one of the oldest continually operated public farmers' markets in the USA. Many small farmers, craftsmen, and other purveyors of local goods make this their home. This writer wasn't there for very long today, but several of the photos shown here in the days to come were taken at the Market earlier today.

I also took a photograph of these guys, but none could do justice to this video. I listened to The Millionaires' Club for three minutes, which was all the convincing I needed to "give some of that energy back" and buy the CD. Their brand of classic jazz and early swing, with no small amount of that jug band jive, was the kind of music my Dad used to love.

I caught the bus to Capitol Hill (not to be confused with the one in the other Washington), and walked a mile or so to the house where Paul was staying. After lunch at the Vietnamese place, we engaged in a lively discussion of the gaming industry and his future prospects, which evolved into a debate over quantum physics, the theory of evolution, and the yeas and nays of the Uncreated Creator vis-a-vis the Big Bang Theory. (It was a draw, for the moment.)

Upon leaving, Paul showed me how to use the iPhone to get a bus home. I knew that Google Maps could give me directions, but I had no idea it could find the proper bus route and schedule for the user. I could get used to this century.

More about the Pike Place Market tomorrow (which is also my feast day, and it makes me wanna cry).