Day Ten (Or: Dude, Relax)

Day ten started off at the leisurely hour of ten a.m., which was awesome. I had directions to the best breakfast place in Seattle courtesy Amelia, and so I headed over there for a big breakfast of egg nog french toast, eggs and veggies.

After Amelia came home from work, we drove to the Ballard neighborhood and walked around for awhile. She needed to buy cookie cutters, so we went to a place that sold only cookie cutters, we looked at records in another store, and then settled into a cupcake house for some tea and cupcakes, which was fun.

Ballard is a cute neighborhood that, according to the Lonely Planet guidebook sitting around the apartment, has a large Scandinavian population. I didn't see so much of them, but I did see some Scandinavian-themed stores and a Viking bar, no kidding.

We walked around one of our mutually favorite stores, Goodwill, where I found the vinyl of Alice's Restaurant (weird, given how much time on this blog has been dedicated to it, no?) but it was just the jacket--the record was missing, so I didn't spend the 99 cents. I did spend 99 cents on a little wooden painting of a snow-capped mountain.

After that, we drove down toward the Ballard Bridge in search of the Jolly Roger Taproom, a pirate themed hole-in-the-wall bar and restaurant where we had sliders and smoked onion rings the size of my head served with jalapeno tartar sauce, which was awesome. We also had Jolly Roger beer, which was also very good. And they call Portland "Brewtown." There was a pirate map on the floor although, regrettably, I don't have a photos because it didn't seem like the kind of crowd that would dig a photo-taking tourist.

I'm not going to be such a weenie on Day 11, that's for sure--we have a slew of very touristy things to do today. The Olympic Peninsula is out because the weather is rainy and cold, so we're spending time downtown (Space Needle!) which will be terrific.

Also, last night, I helped Amelia make blue Play-Doh from scratch for her class and it was totally fun. There are blue splotches of food coloring on my hands, and it is very satisfying.

I heard the Northeast got pounded by a storm, so I hope everybody's OK, especially those of you out on Long Island, because it seems like the suburbs got the worst of it!