1470 - The Freyed Ends of Seattle

What a week. I've discovered that putting four guys together for a week leads to some pretty self-destructive activity. I'm kind of glad I didn't ever live in residence - if this is a taste of living in residence, I'm sure I never would've survived it! The week saw us (AN, B-CC, B-AC and myself) go from mild amusement and hesitation, to elation and excitement, to a feeling of total chaos, and finally, to feelings of fatigue and boredom toward the end of the week.

The problem with business travel is that it's too easy to just go out and eat. Every meal is free, so why would you go to the grocery store to buy healthy things, then come back to the hotel and cook them (we have kitchens in our rooms)? It's difficult to find healthy food around, and when you do find it, the portions are huge. You eat until the food is gone, only afterward realizing that you probably didn't need that much. And, of course, you have a couple of beers, because you're out enjoying yourself after a hard day's work. There is also the peer pressure factor - if your buddy is having a big, tasty steak, you tend not to order the cheap salad. If your buddy orders another beer, you're not going to want to sit around and watch him drink it for a half-hour - you get one for yourself.

Monday, AN and I got up at seven and met for breakfast at half-past. Breakfast is the one semi-healthy meal that we have. We could go to Denny's for a huge, unhealthy meal (think Smitty's times two for the same price), but instead we have cold cereal or a bagel, some yogurt and maybe an orange (if they're there) - continental breakfast at the hotel. Breakfast being free also allows us to have nicer dinners in the evenings.

We worked Monday from eight until about six, so it wasn't too bad. We ate lunch at Arby's - I had a market frssh sandwich with curly fries. After work, AN and I went to Canyon's to wait for B-CC and B-AC to arrive from Vancouver - they'd flown in there and driven over the boarder because B-CC doesn't have a passport. It's actually a good story that I shouldn't tell here - the border crossing took two hours because they failed to lie about the purpose of their visit to the US - work. In the end, our CEO worked things out on B-CC's cell phone with the border agent. They basically let the two into the country not knowing who to believe!

They arrived around nine, and we had dinner and several drinks. I had a Thai wrap with rice, peanut sauce and various veggies - it also came with pineapple! The conversation was reserved, as we didn't know each other that well, but it wasn't long before we were taking turns badmouthing those coworkers deserving it. We also badmouthed the company travel policies (or lack thereof).

Tuesday morning, we all headed into work together. Again, we worked from eight until about six, this time taking lunch at D-Thai. I had the Panang Curry, which is coconutty and has various peppers in it (red, green and hotter ones). I went with "level four spicy", and I got through it okay.

After work, we hung out in B-AC's room and had a few beers before heading to Outback Steakhouse. I had the king crab leg dinner - one and a half pounds of crab - it was absolutely delicious - one of the better meals I've had in a long time. We asked the waitress about nearby pool halls, and were told the nearest one was a half hour away. She told us to go to the Silver Dollar Casino or Thrasher's Bar. The Silver Dollar Casino didn't have their tables open, and we wound up checking out a place across the street called Pounders - a name that we've laughed about many times since. The place was a total dive - peanuts on the floors, dirt-cheap tables that looked like they were made of plywood, slutty, aging waitresses and the typical bar flies that accompany such places.

They had one pool table - it was a pay table, and the felt wasn't in great shape. It didn't even return all of the balls every time. By this time, we'd grown accustomed to each other, and we (well, AN and I at least) were totally being ourselves - laughing a lot and saying a lot of "crazy" things. We played for a little over an hour, and I'm proud to say that I won every game I played. I played pretty well, but B-CC was clearly the best player. He later mentioned that he always chokes when he plays new people - and this case was no exception. Both times I played him, he got off to a good lead. Later, he'd miss a shot or two on the eight ball, and I'd capitalize and run a few balls off the table to finish.

We were all tired, and so we took our leave of the hospitality of Pounders around eleven.

Wednesday was to be our last day of relative calm. We worked a regular day again, eating lunch at Qdoba - a mexican fast food joint. I had a tasty burrito with black beans, veggies, spicy sauce and rice.

For dinner, we went to McMiniman's, a local micro-brewery. By now, we were all feeling the effects of bad eating (except B-CC - he claims that you just get used to it after a while). AN ordered a veggie tray, and I had a few hot wings. We were going to share our dinners, but in the end I wound up eating only the wings. I didn't have many, and they were completely unappetizing. B-AC had to finish them off for me. I did manage to have a couple of beers - after all, we were at a micro-brewery.

Thursday, all hell broke loose. Our supervisor in Seattle informed us that he'd "dropped the ball" and not told us about a need for a database drop by Friday morning. AN and I spent the day furiously attempting to whip something together, suffering many setbacks as we went. It was a frustrating day - we couldn't get answers to our questions, and we were angry that we had to work so hard for no good reason. We worked from eight in the morning until about midnight, taking a few hours in the middle to go to Jack-in-the-Box for lunch (I only had a chicken sandwich, as I had veggies waiting back at work), and Bonefish Grill for supper. The grill is a nice restaurant that AN and I went to on my birthday. By now the four of us were giddy all the time, laughing at anything and everything. We especially laughed about how terrible we all felt from the bad food and several days of beer. We felt like we were spending a bit too much on ourselves at our company's expense (well, actually at the company in Seattle's expense), but Thursday we justified overspending based on how we'd been jerked around at work.

We all had appetizers - I had a spicy shrimp platter. Then, we all had filet mignons, which came with mashed potatoes (that I could almost drink) and candied carrots (a bizarre flavour). We were all totally full, and we weren't going to have dessert, but then B-CC decided to have a brownie dessert, and so we all joined in the fun. I also had the brownie dessert - it had raspberry sauce, vanilla ice cream and cream, and the chocolate in the brownie was REALLY good. Of course, we all had a few beverages.

Friday was another hard day. The deadline for our data had moved to sometime Saturday, and we worked on a few changes handed to us by our boss. For lunch, we went to Arby's again. I had a sandwich, plus a banana and oranges back at work. We left work at six to go catch a SuperSonics basketball game, knowing we had to come back after the game to finish up some work.

The game was fun, only in that it's still a relatively new experience for us. I had a cardboard, unsalted pretzel (I swear it was cardboard) and a five-dollar hot dog that wasn't very big. The game was a blowout, with the home team winning by a large amount. We got our tickets from a scalper, and they were the worst seats in the building. Though they appeared to be together on paper, they were divided in pairs of two by a steel beam support - yes, our seats were in the very top row of the building. Fortunately, the game wasn't well attended, so we all sat on one side of the beam. Our bad seats also meant we had no chance of catching free tickets being dropped by a blimp, t-shirts thrown by the SuperSonics girls, or more shirts dropped from the rafters of the building. We were above the rafters.

After the game, B-CC and B-AC went up the Space Needle, while AN and I wondered aimlessly around the area. We came across a line of pot-smoking, pillow-carrying teenagers waiting to be let into a planetarium. We also crossed paths with a few of the many mentally-deranged bums in the city.

After the needle, we headed back to work. Fortunately, we didn't stay long, though, as I would later find out, AN worked through most of the night.

Saturday was supposed to be fun. It was the weekend after all. Instead, it was pretty sad. We were all tired of food - the thought of a burger, coffee, or a drink of beer made us sick to our stomachs. We were tired of each other's company, having been constantly together for nearly five days. Our car rides together were quiet, and our meals were even quieter. AN was in particularly rough shape having not slept much.

AN and I went into work in the morning. We fixed up a few problems, then met up with the other guys early afternoon. We decided to head out to the Boeing facility just outside of town - they had tours of their massive campus. B-CC really wanted to go, as he's interested in planes, cars and machines of all types. We found the place after a few wrong turns - we tried unsuccessfully to get into the corporate offce, we think. There was a small model of a plane inside the office, which we could see through the glass, so I pointed out that at least we'd seen something.

At the real tour, we found the next tour sold out, so we signed up for the three o'clock one. To pass the time, we went to a nearby Taco Bell, the only real restaurant we could find nearby. Our insanity deepend when B-CC bought some superballs, which we then bounced all over the restaurant. I had nachos supreme plus a supreme taco, and a raspberry iced tea. The iced tea story in Seattle is kind of interesting - it never has sugar added - you have to add it yourself. We've been unable to find a single restaurant offering sweetened iced tea.

Back at Boeing, we looked around a rather boring museum display before the tour. The best part was an old cockpit - we had to fight the kids off to get into it. I took the co-pilot seat, and then was continuously hit in the groin by the controls controlled by a five-year-old in the pilot's seat. The kid must've been an airplane whiz, because he took to telling what all the controls did - he knew a lot more than I did!

The tour itself was excellent - the tour guide was really funny and knowledgable. A bus took us past security and into the huge complex, complete with its own runway. We passed several new planes ready to be delivered to some client. Finally, we entered the hangar where they build some of their planes. It consisted of seven assembly lines, each a half-mile long, with doors the size of football fields. We went in via perhaps the longest corridor I'd ever seen. The view inside the building was even more grand - the wall furthest from us was so far away, I couldn't distinguish large objects from one another. Apparently, one time when the air conditioning broke down, clouds formed in the building. People walked around on the floor like dots, around the huge planes being built.

Many planes sat in various stages of assembly. Some were just hollow sections, others were complete other than the paint. We were astonished to hear that the planes are built in just six weeks. Imagine our amazement when we heard that a new moving assembly line being installed will allow them to build planes in FIVE DAYS! The tour was really interesting and fun for all four of us.

After the tour, we resisted the urge to head for the hills, instead opting to drive back to the office. AN and I did a bit of work, then we met up with the boys at the hotel. We decided to head out for sushi at Sushi Zen, a nicely-decorated sushi full of a wide mix of people. We over-ordered big time, thinking that sushi is small and not filling. We all had appetizers, then meals consisting of at least fifteen pieces of sushi. B-CC almost threw up when he tasted one piece of sushi. I also had it - we have no idea what it was, but it was like chewy wax - it was the first sushi I've ever had that I didn't like. B-CC didn't even come close to finishing his meal - he just couldn't get that waxy taste out of his mouth. I finished my meal, but just barely, while AN and B-AC didn't finish theirs. To top it off, we "enjoyed" (by which I mean got down) several pint-sized Japanese beers. We managed to turn an otherwise healthy experience into another food bonanza.

After sushi, we made our gallant return to Pounders. We fully expected the place to be overrun by a combination of drug dealers, ax murderers and country hicks, but we went in anyway. The pool table was occupied by two suspicious-looking characters - a young man dressed up like a rapper, and an older man who'd obviously had a rough life. He might as well have been wearing red leather pants to go with his NASCAR hat, dishonest moustache, and wrinkled skin.

B-CC went up to the pair to ask about their intentions, not noticing the large stack of quarters on the bar next to the table. The two were friendly enough, and they offered to play with us. The younger one took off for most of the night, so we wound up playing with the older one, while he bought us beer and told bad jokes. He also told us about his three ex-wives, and it soon became apparent why they were all "ex." B-AC asked him about peeler bars, and he started to give us directions to one all the way downtown, when we stopped him. He then pointed out that he gets whatever he wants when he cruises the streets downtown.

He played a few shots poorly to start, and we were all convinced that he was a hustler, giving us a few wins early to get us to bet on a game. He did mention betting later on, but we told him we weren't interested, and he claimed he was only joking. He actually still won all of his games, except for the two he played against me. I wasn't even playing well, but somehow I won. It became apparent that either he wasn't all that good, or that he was drunk... or both I suppose.

After a few more "interesting" stories, B-AC gave the guy his work number and suite number at the hotel in case he wanted to play pool again. The next day he pointed out that he probably shouldn't have done that. We keep expecting the guy to be in B-AC's room one day, sitting in the dark, tenting his fingers. He hasn't shown up yet.... :) *Jaws music*

Sunday morning, AN and I met up and went into work around ten. We came back at the hotel around twelve to collect the guys and head down to the underground tour downtown, but we couldn't find anyone. B-CC's car was gone, and B-AC didn't answer his door. We decided to go for a random cruise, during which we passed mansions, trailer parks, huge forests, huge fields, cows, chickens, wineries, Costcos, trucks, rocks and funny signs. After the cruise, we found B-CC, who'd stepped out for the morning to go to church. B-AC apparently was in his room, asleep I guess, but we got him up, and headed downtown.

We parked near the Space Needle, figuring we could find the underground tour. We did find it, but not before taking the monorail, then walking fifteen blocks along downtown streets filled with garbage and homeless people. Arriving at quarter to three, the three o'clock tour was sold out, so we bought tickets to the five o'clock one. We then set out in search of a restaurant that could kill two hours of our time. The only respectable place we could find was a Quizznos, so we went inside and had subs. It only took us a half hour to eat them, so we decided to go for a stroll.

We came across the home of the Seahawks (Football) - I forget the name of the stadium. Right behind it was Safeco Field, the home of the Mariners (baseball) - we internalized that information above the neck, as one of my old teachers would say. There was a comic book convention going on, and many people around the stadiums were wearing costumes. We tried to get into the convention for a peek, but it cost $12. Instead, we slowly walked back to the underground tour.

The tour itself was good and bad. The tour guide was an older, fast-talking, completely random lady who managed to make fun of nearly every segment of the population. She was particularly merciless when it came to Tacoma, a city located at the southern edge of Seattle. She was a bit inspiring to me, because her speaking was no better than mine, yet she's been a tour guide for 28 years. I don't think I'll ever be as bubbly in front of a dead crowd though - she hardly stopped laughing the entire time!

She told us the story of how the underground came to be - largely sanitary reasons. We explored the basements (well, now basements, but formerly first floors), and saw piles of rubble, wood, pipes, dust, dirt, cobwebs and flies. It really stunk too. A lot of the junk looked 'placed', and investigation on Wikipedia later verified this. We saw old businesses still largely intact (no furniture though). Otherwise, the tour was pretty uneventful, except for the guide's colourful storytelling, which saved the experience.

Okay, it's almost a week later, and I'm just getting back to this entry. I published it by accident last time, so I'm sure no one will ever read this part. Anyway, after the tour, we walked back to the monorail. On the way back, we heard this long scream across the street - it was some guy looking totally drugged out. Every block or so, he would stop, look around, grab the hair on the back of his head and yank, then scream loudly for as long as ten seconds. This happened probably fifteen times, until finally he turned up a street away from us. B-AC later chose this as his favourite moment of the trip.

The rest of the trip back was uneventful. We stopped into the office for a few minutes to check on our work, then went our separate ways for the remainder of the evening.

I don't think I mentioned the movie 1001 Maniacs - I forget exactly when we watched it, but it was a super-cheesy, super-gory and super-cheap slasher where a group of teens wonder into a southern hick town, populated by people that died during the American civil war. It was by far the worst movie I've ever seen, and we only watched it because it was so bad. In the end, all of the teens die - they are the dishes of honour at the town's annual feast.

I’m currently listening to: Choose Life by Humate.

Movies watched this week: Wallstreet, 1001 Maniacs