trickykitty | (no subject)

I finally made it back and have a moment to update about the trip to Seatlle-Vancouver-Whistler.

The flight up to Seattle was smooth. I ran into a friend from the YMCA (where I used to work) in the restroom at the airport. Turns out she was on the same flight as me, but a few seats back.

The night before involved going to Sanford's birthday dinner at Nagoya for sushi and hibachi. I took pictures and then sent them to him so they are posted on his site. I left there and came home to find the boys next door having a poker party night. With lots of beer. I only had half of my packing done, it was already 11pm and I had to be at my parent's house by 4am to make it to the airport on time. So I lent them my decks of cards, grabbed the poker chips and went off to pack. Yeah, right. So I spent the next few hours with a fraternity pledge assigned to make sure that if my beer gets to an inch short I'm to receive a new cold one. He did a great job. I finally left to finish packing and the guys offered to help take the luggage to the car. Got to my parents' house, had an hour or less nap and then ran to the airport. Unfortunately I had middle seats for both legs of the flight up and wasn't able to get any sleep.

AH - the sight of

smokedamage

Going down the escalator I see blue boots. Instantly I bend to see more and there is that smiling face.

**BIG HUGS** **BIG KISSES**

I'm exhausted and gloriously happy.
It seemed like a weird dream.

Onto the bus and then through the streets of Seattle we went until locating the Green Tortoise Hostel. Seattle has an underground subway system - for buses only - which shuts down after peak hours. It also has a whole system of underground tunnels as a result of how the city began in infancy. We were able to take a tour which explained it all and took us underground through some of the tunnels. Very interesting. It's called The Underground Tour and at first I had thoughts of the underground music scene or something as radical as that. Oh, no. But interesting none-the-less. I recommend it to anyone heading to Seattle.

smokedamage went on the tour twice.

Seattle was beautiful and true to form rainy, or at least it was when I arrived. Just as we were heading underground along the tour it started hailing, but we luckily missed it. And cold. What can I say, I'm a Texan. Oh, and

surreptitious will find the irony in the fact that I received a ring from

smokedamage. No, not engagement, but a Claddagh. I couldn't help but laugh when I saw it because of the ironic situation. But I am overly happy to wear it. Of course I managed to forget it at the apartment rather than wearing it to Birra's, so everyone will find out about it via this journal rather than seeing me wear it. I will happily show it off next time I see everyone. Currently right hand, 2nd stage. I think we both want to be absolutely sure of everything before we get to the next stage. A little time will help with that one. It was good to really talk it over and realize that we're both feeling the same things regarding the relationship. We'd both like for it to progress but that to skip to another level right now may be a bit more than what we're both comfortable with.

Uncle Arthur in Vancouver.

Holy shit.

The man is absolutely wonderful and absolutely nuts. I'll leave that one for

smokedamage to discuss.

Vancouver was beautiful. They have a park there that's about 5 times the size of Central Park in NYC. And a huge bridge that we had to cross after going through the park in order to head off to Whistler. It began snowing along the way and I was like, "OMG! I'm driving in snow!!" Again, I'm a Texan. Can't help it. Of course

smokedamage was just as much in awe as I. Apparently there is just as little snow in Sydney as there is in DFW. There are huge mountains and we had a spectacular view from the top of one of them overlooking the city. Further up were these lights from Grouse that were lit up to show off another ski location. It looked like the lights were just hovering in the ski. My comment was that the only thing I'd seen in the sky like that were stars and airplanes. It was wonderful. You could see it from just about anywhere in the downtown area of Vancouver.

Whistler was amazing, albeit expensive. The locals had packed up for the season because it hadn't snowed for 5-6 weeks. They were almost just as excited about the snow as we were. The only difference was that they were used to it and were busy shoveling on ski boots the next morning. They are prepared for snow there, so the snow plows were out early and the roads were clear enough for me to drive back. We had to slow things down a bit to account for a rock landslide that occurred on the highway that we needed to get back to Vancouver. Luckily it was all cleared by the time we got there.

Hehe. We spent an unexpected 40 minutes waiting in line at the border to get back to the USA. Then we got lost trying to drop off the rental car in Seattle. Almost missed our flight back to Texas. Oh, and Yes, Smokey is back in Texas with me. :)

And thus was a spectacular Spring Break. You know...the one that I was crying about because the only thing I would be doing for Spring Break was studying. You never know which way the winds will blow.

(no subject)

HE'S WHAT!?