UPDATED: February 4, 2022
This
is the ninth of a series of posts recalling my third annual trip to Seattle,
though with this report I head south of Seattle for most of the rest of the
trip. 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.
Miracle
happened. Nothing significant to
report. Everyone well behaved. I did all my packing last night so no real
problems this morning. Minor
difficulties finding my glasses when I woke up but easily solved by turning on
bunk light. Set both watches' alarms at
5 minute intervals but beat them both up by about 5-10 minutes from watch #1.
[NOW:
The above was written in the morning. The below is the first of two reports I
wrote upon arriving in my next stop, Portland.]
In a
piece of crap city the Internet correction is a piece of crap. It couldn't handle typing these reports and wiped out everything
I just typed.
[NOW:
It was at the hostel I stayed at, Hostel International - Hawthorne that my report got wiped out after going
slow. I've since warmed to Portland a bit, particularly after revisiting it a number of times since.]
I'll
try to find an Internet cafe. Otherwise
I can't justify spending money on this sluggish Internet connection, which
really should be free given it can't handle simple e-mails.
Short
answer: Portland sucks. Even Powell's
Books is overrated. I might return home
a day early. Don't bother with this
dunghole of a city. I hate it here. Hate it, hate it, hate it.
[NOW:
Time has been kinder to my recollections of Portland. I considered editing the above but wanted to be true to how I felt back then.]
Pardon
typos above. It's not just my mood. Words actually take forever to appear on the
screen.
[NOW:
I edited out the typos]
Can't
wait for this suddenly lousy vacation to be over with. I should never have added this dunghole of a
city to my itinerary. Barely worth a
daytrip if that.
[NOW:
See above. Also, the below was written after I found a place to retype my report. I wrote the report early the next day. Again, I no longer dislike Portland that much.]
I'm
paying a bit more and typing this from Powell's Technical Books. Let's see if I make it through this without
anything crashing. Feeling better today.
[Now: Powell's Technical Books has closed, though other branches of Powell's remain.]
So...
on my way to the train station I thought I had lost the memory cards for my
last Seattle day. Luckily they turned up
later. I asked for a window seat on the
train. They gave me the left; right
which would have have been better because of the sea and the lack of trains
going the other way but still got lots of good shots.
The
trip to Portland took longer than expected, due in part to some delay in
Tacoma. Still at first it was nice to
see Tacoma again however briefly.
It
was pretty overcast yesterday and Portland looks incredibly dull yesterday,
hence part of why I was in such a sour mood.
First impression of the city was everything looked dull. I walked to the #14 transit stop to get to
my hostel. There was an incorrect number
14 stop a little before; luckily I figured this out.
They
gave me the wrong room initially at the hostel, which seems to be a refurbished
cottage. I'm in one of the basement
rooms. The lockers are in a shed, which
doesn't really thrill me; I'd rather the lockers be close to the room. Walked along Hawthorne and basically
confirmed that in Portland music stores are just that (i.e. no movies like most
Seattle music stores have). On a bus a
woman claimed that it was against the law to take pics with people in them
without permission. The bus was about to
reach the hostel and there was a nearby comic shop to check out, so I got off,
confirmed my hypothesis that the woman was incorrect, and bought some comics at
the comic shops before returning downtown (my hostel is a ways to the east of
downtown).
I
lost my list of places to check out in my final day in Seattle so I mostly just
wandered around. I visited a place that
had DVDs for sale, but they were unpriced so I didn't bother looking too
closely.
[NOW:
I think I visited the now defunct Borders around then as well.]
Just
before Powell's Technical there's a cute state of a baby elephant on top of an
adult elephant. A short walk further
took me to Powell's (main store). Huge
selection and does take up a full story block.
My problem with it is that it lacks atmosphere, either of a local type or even of a chain like Chapters. But the selection is quite good and I did buy
two, one being a collection of 1970s stories featuring the sons of Superman and
Batman. The stories make no sense even
to veteran comic readers (they supposedly take place in the then future, but
1970s hair styles, use of bikers, etc clearly date them to the time they were
written).
[NOW: The above statue is Da Tung & Xi'an Bao Bao]
The
old town has some nice architecture. The
world's smallest park , Mill's End is actually in the middle of a
crosswalk. I would have stepped over it
Godzilla style but there was a plant in it that I didn't want to hurt.
The
old town has what appears to be a poor man's International Fountain.
I ate
at Pioneer Place, not really a pioneer place but a modern shopping centre. The sad thing is after the drab, dull look
outside the mall actually energized me, which malls rarely do even to me. I ate at McDonald's and then left the mall
and comic comics at another comic shop.
[NOW: That McDonald's has closed.]
I
decided to walk back to the hostel for exercise. I used the computer there which was $1 per 20
minutes, buying 40 minutes. The words
couldn't keep up with me, so I was making tons of typos, and when I tried to
correct the worst of these typos it crashed and erased everything, which is why
I seemed so POed yesterday.
I
worked off the stress by going for a walk, then buying DVDs at a Hawthorne
branch of Hollywood Video.
[NOW:
All Hollywood Video branches are now
defucnt]
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