Thursday, April 12, 2012

Pacific Northwest Trip 2008 Day 2 Tuesday July 22, 2008


UPDATED: January 7, 2021

This is the second of a series of posts recalling my third annual trip to Seattle. I’ve made minor corrections to these reports. Also, I’ve added additional thoughts with the hindsight of five years later or to add further clarification; I use “NOW” to denote such cases.


Bed this time is an upper bunk which is a good news bad news situation. Good news is I find the elevation really helps with sleeping. Bad news is there's no pillar to shake if the other person is snoring, which woke me up just after 5. Medication I take at night for anxiety also helps with sleep.

Also nice is there's curtains for privacy on each bunk so as long as no one snores, you have a nice illusion of being alone when sleeping.

Place is still warm but not as bad as last year.

My locker (below the bunks) unfortunately is right beside the door. In the past when people said excuse me this probably would have been okay but nowadays you're more likely to get poked accompanied by "need to get out".

A bit sleepy but mostly okay to face the day.

[NOW: The above was written in the morning.  Unfortunately I lost the evening report and haven’t found anyone who has a copy.  Also, as I’ll go into below, many of my photos were stolen, thus further making it able to recreate the day.  Here’s what I’ve been able to piece together:

I visited the University District (likely visited University Village, the University of Washington, and stores like Bulldog News, University Bookstore, Twice Sold Tales, Scarecrow Video, Cinema Books, Zanadu Comics, Neptune Comics, likely a few others that have moved or closed. I may have visited the Wall of Death structure.  I may have also visited Warren Magnuson Park which is not that far from the University. twice Sold Tales closed for a time and then reopened in Ballard.  Cinema Books and Zanadu Comics are now closed.

I’ve been able to confirm from photos that I took a bus from the University District to Capitol Hill, specifically on or near Broadway, where I visited a pop machine with mystery buttons (got cherry 7-Up). I might have visited Gruv, now closed but cannot confirm. I did visit Everyday Music which at the time was located where the Jimi Hendrix statue is.  I took a King County Metro Transit bus downtown and then walked to Silver Platters near Seattle Center. I took another bus back downtown where there was a crowd by Pike Place Market. I think I had tacos for dinner at the Green Tortoise and then visited Pike Place Market, the Harbor Steps, the former entrance to the hostel, the now closed Youth Hostel International location on Union St I stayed at during my first trip, then back to the Market, including a look at Post Alley. I went to the waterfront, then returned again to the Market before returning to the hostel.

All remaining trip reports to my knowledge are present and will be used as the basic for subsequent blog entries.  The next morning I had this to add about this missing day:]


There was a few guys singing outside of Pike Place Market last night.  Probably not professional but that quality.

Bought some beer last night.  You had to buy as a set but there's a fridge at the hostel.  It came to less than a $1 per half a litre.  Which may seem like a lot of beer but this was American beer so I was still pretty sober after drinking a can. 

A bit hard to get to sleep last night because one guy had his light on forever to work on his laptop.  His curtain was closed but it was still bright.  Then he got into a conversation on his cell.  I fell asleep but he was still on it when I woke up a little later.  The gist of the conversation seemed to be that he didn't care if he had sex with every women he meets but that he was okay with that if it happened.  He listed off a few names.

[NOW: I also unearthed this bit about Tuesday in a later trip report. Not sure when this visit happened. Likely before I went to the university:]

During first visit to Easy Street Records there was an odd song playing apparently called "I Think I Smell all Right" (at least that was the most frequent sentence in the song by a considerable margin).

[NOW: The Queen Anne branch of Easy Street Records has closed.]

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