4th of July Weekend

The joke around town is that summer doesn't officially start until July 5th; I guess its usually cold and rainy for the 4th.  Thankfully, after a lot of rainy 60 degree days during May and June, we're finally starting to see some clear, sunny days here in the Emerald City!

The Olympic mountains from my rooftop

This weekend, in addition to being our nation's birthday, it was also the Seattle International Beer Festival.  I'm not the only person in Seattle who's been craving some sunshine, so when it comes out, so do the crowds.

This was only 1/2 the line to get into the beer festival

There were over 150 beers from 15 different countries, but don't worry, I didn't even attempt to try them all.  They were only giving out 4oz pours, but those four ounces add up fast, especially when some of the beers are 9.5% alcohol!  Even though it was super crowded, it was still wonderful to spend the afternoon with friends, drinking in the sun.  As seems to be a trend with me lately, the evening didn't end when the festival did.  We hit up a couple of local hot spots, met up with a fun bachelor party from rural Washington, and even found a place to do some dancing.  Seattle doesn't seem to be much of a dancing town so it was nice to finally let loose a bit.

After a late night Saturday, I did something I hadn't done in months... I slept until noon on Sunday!  I've been go, go, go lately that it felt amazing to finally have a totally lazy day.  On Monday, I let myself get talked into going to a meetup 4th of July party on the other side of town.  The meetup organizer had been sending out two emails a day for the last three weeks hyping up the awesomeness of the party. 

Leslie and I get all dressed up and arrived in the lobby of this huge skyscraper.  As we headed over to the elevators, there was a little card table set up and two 16 year old girls checking people in and giving out wristbands.  After we check in, we're ready to head up to the 28th floor, but... we can't.  The elevator requires key-card access to get up and the check-in girls are completely clueless.  We wait 5 minutes.  10 minutes.  More people start to accumulate and we're all hanging out next to the elevators before someone finally comes down to fetch us.  When we make our grand entrance into the party, we realize we're standing in the empty Microsoft cafeteria.  The meetup organizer guy explains that he's still setting up, but we can help ourselves to pretzels and some old smushed looking Subway sandwiches.  Not exactly what I would call the party of the year.

The big draw for the party was supposed to be the huge outdoor deck overlooking the city, but... the doors were locked and the organizer didn't have the key.  As Leslie and I paced up and down the cafeteria, we did our best to dodge the unwanted attention of some sketchy male party-goers and looked longingly out on to the deck.  Almost two hours later, as the sun was fading and the temperature was dipping, the little old man security guard finally came to unlock the deck.  My theory was that the old man was afraid of elevators and had to walk up all 28 floors, but Leslie didn't believe me.

That little blip across the water is the Downtown Seattle

Since it doesn't get dark until pretty late, the fireworks weren't scheduled to go off until after 10 o'clock.  Although we would've had a fantastic view from the party, I was worried about all the traffic getting home.  It easily could've taken until midnight or later to get home and I had a busy day of work scheduled for Tuesday.  I feel like such an old lady sometimes, but it's not like the party was rockin' or anything so we took off.  Luckily, we left with just enough time to make it back to my apartment and watch some fireworks from my rooftop.  There was a building partially blocking the main display, but off in the distance, all around the Puget Sound, you could see tons of people shooting off fireworks along the coastline.  It more than satisfied my 4th of July yearning for explosions.

Today was a stressful day at work since I had to prepare for another trip back to Atlanta.  I'm heading off tomorrow to conduct some more training at our manufacturing facility there.  I'm a little nervous, because this time I'm going all alone.  At least it's a slightly longer trip this time (two nights, instead of one) so maybe I'll actually be able to see a bit of the city or at least have a few good meals on the company dime.