Forgot to take pics yesterday but..

Many of the vistas we visited yesterday are actually already included in these blog-o-sphere of pages. We took the Duck tour. My first time in the 9.5 years I have been here. It was pretty awesome. Im sunburnt and cranky.Will have to say that being in that old vintage ww2 vehicle was quite impressive. Sturdy comes to mind. Going out on the water in it was the best part too. Seeing all the boat houses and barges and finding out that Boeing started on Eastlake and used to have his own airline which is still around today under another name.

Found out that the Fremont bridge is the most used draw bridged in North America. Not surprised there. It opens an average of every 23 minutes.

The price was pretty darn spiffy too for what you got. 25$ a head. It was certainly worth the 1.5 hours trip. Normally they go thru a lot of Pioneer Square but the race on sat that had aurora shut down and most of Pioneer congested made us spend most of our time in Fremont. I liked that but I was actually looking forward to the history of Pioneer Square. Oh well another time :)

A last note is that what ride or tour can you go on and quack the whole time and no one gets mad or tells you to shut up. That was worth the price to me right there. I quacked myself up the whole time :)

On a side not that has nothing to do with this blog I found that putting heavy whipping cream into tea tastes like I am drinking mashed potatoes. Perhaps I put too much but it seemed like a sparring amount. Well I shan't be doing that again.

Cascade Farmers Market

A new little farmers market down in Cascade area. This part of town is finally getting a lot of traffic and great restaurants. Lots of office buildings down here now and even some new fancy schmancy parks :)

Its a jungle out there

At the before mentioned coffee shop I saw all of this foliage at the front door. I sat next to it and felt all cozy. Mmm jungle.

Summer Bash at this cute coffee shop on friday

I just thought I would pimp for them today :)

Zatz one hell of a Badtz platz

If you like shitty service, with a fresh bagel that tastes like cardboard and watching mid-morning chaos of whose on first, then this is the place for you.

We had such high hopes for greatness as so many tout this place as a beacon of east coast style bagel nommery. To those people, you can expect a wild weasel in your next mail delivery.
The place was staffed with teens or young adults who didnt quite know why they were up at 9 in the morning and they all bumbled into each other while trying to fill orders or just plain starred at the walls. Probably they needed to drink some more of the only thing that I liked about the place - the coffee. At least they had Cafe Vita AND it was hot.
We couldnt figure out where the line to order started. Neither could others it seemed. One girl in front of us got fed up and left so we moved up in line.. hooray. Then I got to watch the dude just starring at the counter while we watched him but no one helped us. Finally the only adult there asked us what we wanted and we thougth we had reached our goal... we were wrong. Meghan asked for a bagel with egg and ham and cheese. The lady asked her if she wanted green onions and Meghan said no. So that was it and she went make the sammiches. I asked for just a garlic bagel toasted with cream cheese for the record.

Then we just stood there. The kid was still starring at the counter. No one else was being helped. A few minutes passed. A girl asks who is next and we were not sure what the story was because we still hadnt ordered any drinks. Meghan piped up that we didnt know if we were done as we hadnt finished our order. Apparently this is a no-no to say here as all three employees piped up that THE PERSON who helped you will finish that. From what I could tell NO one ever got their orders finished. Hell each person before us still hadnt been fully taken care of yet.

So we stood in our rebuffed silence watching the kid, yes STILL starring at the counter, the other girl helping someone new so they could have yet ANOTHER order to not finish, and then finally our gem of an adult making our food. She was microwaving the eggs for Meghans sammich. The look on Meghan's face of dissastisfaction as she was getting ill from just watching the affront to breakfast cookery was making me dislike the place even more.

Our food arrived and then she says "Ok so what else do you want?"  Seriously?? I dont know how they still can operate but Coffee comes first to any person who steps into a breakfast place and taking care of it last was just ridiculous. She then states that my bagel came with a med coffee... that should have tipped me off about the place, but I digress. Meghan ordered a latte. She then said our bill was 13.45$. At the time I was so relieved to actually be done with the line I didnt think about how insanely expensive that was for a bagel breakfast that included a free coffee? Holy shit is all I have to say.

We sat down and this is when I found out it was Cafe Vita and I was partially mollified. The same person who made our food then went to make her latte. Seriously the MOST INEFFICIENT place I have ever seen in my life. Hence the bumbling of them bouncing off of each other all doing the same things.

We looked at our food. I had barely enough cream cheese to cover my bagel. It might have been warm but sure didnt look toasted and low and behold it tasted like cardboard. Mmmm yummy cardboard. More please! Even Oliver Twist might have throw this back at them. Alas my bagel was a work of art compared to Meghan's - nothing was right. They had added green oninons and some how included bell peppers in her microwaved eggs, which they had forgotten to ask if she wanted but somehow remembered to ask about green onions.
Though I should note her latte was excellent but then that was cafe vita of course :)

In conclusion this place is a big KERPLATZ.

Leek me tell you how nice ..

Fresh leeks are. Meghan made this fantastic nommery of fresh leeks that we get from the farm fresh deliveries along with fresh carrots, which she didnt like ( hehe), and garlic simmered in chicken broth with black lentils, crimini mushrooms and fresh romas. I didnt take a final result picture - bad me.

Another pic for a better view of Da Guds

Leeky

Thats one pretty leek.

Organic groceries delivered to you.

This is our second delivery. We have them sent to Freshy's and then we pick them up. Its quite handy. So much good stuff. Meghan is going to make salmon and leeks this weekend :) Ill probably juice up a bunch of the stuff.

Paint a picture

I am reading Walden by Thoreau and it is fascinating how much can be taken from it and applied today.

He writes this book from a state not unlike our own. The area around him is more or less like our own state of commercialism and high consumerism with little regard for self worth and what we need to survive. He decides to go out into the woods and is mocked by his contemporaries for doing this. His choice to not live in the city and use all the conveniences both upset and disturbed his neighbors.

I found one part very reachable in todays terms - " if one would live simply and eat only the crop which he raised, and raise no more than he ate, and not exchange it for an insufficient quantity of luxurious and more expensive things,then he would only need to cultivate only a few rods of ground, and that it would be cheaper to spade it then to use oxen to plow it, and to select a fresh spot from time to time than to manure the old,..." " and thus he would not be tied to an ox, or horse, or cow or pig"

Seems to be saying. Live within your means and dont allow yourself to be tied down to "The Man" as it were. Sadly, the basis of our culture has become that you are " supposed" to be tied down with all of these trappings. This is normal. Living within your means is now "bad". Mostly its all the credit companies that I would call the " cows and pigs and horses". They are the means by which we increase our our material trappings outside of our natural abilities to get them. Tend to our needs ourselves and stay within them.

If that pillow was a vampire he WOULD not be happy

I shall call him the NOT a Vampire pillow.

Nom Nom Nollies

I havent had bagel and gravalx since I lived in Atlanta. This was A M A Z I N G. A dill sauce on the whole wheat bagel with homemade gravlax. Wow. I met the chef and he told me how he made them as this was his first time doing it and he loved it as well. The girl who rang me up also suggested scrambled eggs next time which I do believe I will do. The only complaint I had was that I ordered a drip coffee and she gave it to me and it was very luke warm and really made me sad. I was so looking forward to my hot coffee to go wth my breakfast that I had for second lunch. Yes I ate this at 2 in the afternoon and it was just as wonderful as if I had had it for 6am.

Nollies by the S.L.U.T storage bay

I have walked by this place quite a few times lately and wanted to go in. Looked to be quaint and have bakery goods that were nummery. On that account they did not dissapoint. There was actual seating in the place and it had metal counters to stand at for lunch as well. The one sitting room was painted yellow, which i found cheerful and relaxing and I bet in the morning would find even more wonderful.