I am currently on the train to San Francisco as I am writing this, having already blown through Portland. The thing about Portland, it was nice, but it was no Seattle. No family gatherings, no friends, no friendly faces to go back home to at night. But let me focus on the things that I actually did.

It was Monday early evening by the time I actually arrived, so there wasn’t much I could do on Monday. But I ended up arriving at the same time two guests also staying in the house I was at. They were perhaps juniors or seniors in college. I forgot to ask. They invited me to join them finding dinner in the area, and walking down NE Alberta Street, we found a pub-like place that served burgers, which we settled on. The service was nice but slow, and that was the crunchiest medium-rare burger I think I have ever had. Probably would’ve been crunchy for well-done.

Tuesday was rainy and grey and not very pleasant, so I decided to stay indoors mostly, and I went to Powell’s Bookstore. It was HUGE!! It was undergoing a remodeling for half the building and it was STILL HUGE!! I spent probably an hour or so just walking around and browsing books randomly before settling into the fiction area and consequently finding four books that I would buy. So much money on books this trip. For lunch I ended up going to a restaurant an aunt and uncle recommended called “Mother’s” a restaurant that serves really good diner food.

Wednesday was my first outdoor adventure. I decided to go to the zoo! I spent about an hour there, just wandering through, trying not to get frustrated with the little kids who clearly don’t have much awareness of the world outside of their vision (though I admit I already knew this before Wednesday morning) and got to see many of the animals there. Lions and Tigers and Black Bears (oh my!) and monkeys (these guys were swinging around wildly when I arrived, it was amazing actually) and bats and polar bears and hippos and crocodiles and eagles and many other animals too. After my trip to the zoo, I made a quick lunch stop at Panda Express and then went to the fantasy world of dragons! I finally went to go see How to Train Your Dragon 2. I thought it was a fantastic movie, and highly recommend it to people who saw the first one and enjoyed it. Then I went back to the house for the evening.

Thursday was a *meh* day. Probably when I started thinking I just wanted to go to San Francisco. I spent the morning having to do a laundry run and that took a lot longer than I wanted it to. After that, I had to pack up my stuff by noon to move out of the house and into another one (owned by the same person) down the street about 10 blocks and then several houses down south of NE Alberta. This took until about 1, at which point I decided to go to lunch. I went for the Original Pancake House again, to grab another favorite dish, and this trip was so frustrating it was the last thing I did that day. First off, I had HIGH expectations for the headquarters of a national chain restaurant. Disappointment 1: NOT pedestrian friendly. There is no sidewalk leading to or from the restaurant, and in fact the parking lot exit leads right to a freeway entrance. Disappointment 2: No cards! I couldn’t believe it. This is the 21^st Century, I was in the headquarters to a national chain restaurant, and they only took cash! Fortunately the gas station a 10 second walk away had an ATM that even took American Express, not the most common accepted card company out here in the Northwest. Disappointment 3: The prices. Ok, maybe I just hadn’t looked at the last menu, but a stack of 3 small pancakes: $9.50. 9 dollars, and 50 fricken cents for three pancakes about the size of my hand. One scrambled egg: $4.50. ONE SCRAMBLED EGG! I could by eggs individually at the store just down the block from the original house I stayed at for 70¢. Disappointment 4: The grand finale. NO RESTROOM. I looked, and if there is one, it’s a totally separate building, or it’s very very cleverly hidden. Needless to say, by the time I left at about 3, I was in a very bad mood.

Friday was also a mixed day, but in general a better one. It started out not so great with a trip to the post office. I finally shipped back the last of my dorm room luggage home so that it would stop weighing down my suitcase more than 50 pounds. This took a couple hours, WAAY longer than I ever wanted it to last. After I was done sending the boxes out however, then I decided to head out. I first went for lunch to another Chicago favorite: Noodles & Co. It was delicious! After a quick (and very cheap) lunch there, I made my way over to the OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry). I had forgotten how kid-oriented those museums are, but it was still interesting to go through the exhibits and read about all the science. I even found some signs about watersheds. Heck, we could’ve just gone to the OSMI instead of the High Sierras for our May Term! To conclude the visit to the museum, I caught the last show playing in the Planetarium, which was called something like To Space and Back. It gave some information about the history of space adventuring, but then also talked about how our lives on Earth are effected by the technology we’ve thrown up in space. It was actually pretty interesting.

And today, my train left at 2:25, but that doesn’t mean my adventuring was done. I went back to Washington City Park (where the Zoo is) to go do some more outdoor stuff. I wanted to go see the Arboretum, but over shot it on the bus, and so instead went to the rose garden. And boy what a garden it is. I have never… EVER in my life seen so many colors in one place in nature (that wasn’t a really ornately decorated animation scene) it blew my mind. And then I ended up walking a little through the arboretum, but I only got to one trail of what I’m sure are dozens if not hundreds. I definitely need to get back there again someday. And who knows, maybe next time I’ll have a friend with me.

Until Next Time,

Joe