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So, a month ago today, my wife and I ventured up north to Seattle, Washington for my sister-in-law’s graduation. It was a wondrous affair, full of joy, merriment, and celebration. We arrived on a Friday and joined my in-laws for a ride to our rental car company and hotel, which was excellent as we got to see much of the cityscape at an extended dusk, which lasted about 45 minutes. EXCELLENT.

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Seattle is a fantastic city. It has loads of skyscrapers, many of which bear unique architecture, as well as several other large locations with a style and design all their own, making for a rather beautiful cityscape. I commented that it looked like Gotham City, to which my wife responded. “That’s not even real.” Luckily, I had my answer in the queue, “Well then where does Batman live.” ZINGER.

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We made our way to our hotel (pictured in daylight above); and then, due to my Father-in-law’s hunger as well as my own, ventured to a local pub. I had wings, chowder, and beer, a meal fit for a king, and we enjoyed catching up. FANTASTIC.

The following morning was spent exploring my sister-in-law’s college campus (clocktower pictured above) prior to her graduation. Seattle and Oklahoma should not even be in the same country, because while the latter is flat as paper, the former is only hills. In fact, I think every step in the City of Seattle is taken at a 45 degree angle, and it only seems flat because your body’s natural equilibrium balances you out. Yeah, it’s THAT hillous (hilly? Hillfull? Not sure what word to use there…writing major indeed). NICE.

The graduation was excellent (seating pictured above), and I enjoyed myself just fine. Of course, by “enjoy myself”, I mean I read a book 2 hours while everyone but my sister-in-law was announced. Ha ha ha. I win. Of course, when she was announced I videotaped it and made a big fuss, but other than that it was reading time like George Bush on 9/11 (ohhh, I should not have written that!). The ceremony was excellent (as if I remember what was said), and afterward a group of us including my wife, myself, my in-laws, my sister-in-law, and my aunt-and-uncle-in-law, ventured to a Red-Robin-on-the-water-front, at which I tried their new French dip with Garlic fries, a fine meal that was good but not great (it’s something I’d wanted to try for some time, and I am glad I got it out of my system and can return to my standard five-alarm burger with confidence). SHAZAAM.

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That night, we all hit up some hot sites (further pics coming in photo-montage form in the next few days). There was one site that looked like a refinery for a mad sceintist’s airborne toxins–which in my book is the kind of scenery to show visiting tourists like myself. Seriously this place was awesome (pictured above) , and all I could think was, “I gotta play paintball there. FOR REAL. That site was the highlight of the Seatlle sightseeing that night, but the others were fine as well. Never a dull moment, that’s for sure. We ended the eve with some baby pictures of my cousin-in-laws first born…which means that he is my second-cousin-twice-removed-on-my-wife’s-aunt’s-son’s-side, right? Well, something like that–regardless he was a cute baby, and I don’t say that fleetingly, alot of babies look stupid. (ha ha ha ha, sorry I had to laugh at that). INAPPROPRIATE.

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Sunday we awoke and hit up some breakfast and a used media store across the street from our hotel (an adventure which I will post about in the coming days). My in-laws, wife, her sister, her sister’s fiance, and his parents then went down to the fabled fish market at Pike’s Place (or something like that…”Pike’s Market?”, maybe? I don’t know, the pic just says, “Public market”, but that’s not really catchy, is it?). Anyway, we saw some local longshoreman selling fish, which was excellent considering I went through a period in life when all I wanted to be was a longshoreman. There were also some shops including a terribly overpriced comic store and an awesome-looking-but-light-on-selection used DVD/CD store (there was a second used media store store that was heavy on selection but pretty hard on pricing, so the two canceled each other out in terms of shopping–good for my wallet I guess). Anyway, we enjoyed some Starbucks from the original store, which was pretty cool, [store pictured below] and some grub from another place that was alright–I forget what the food was called, but it was essentially hand-made hot pockets that had real food in them instead of the common dog-food-pockets found in your local frozen food section. DELICIOUS.

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After the market, we headed home. Seattle ruled like nobody’s business–except those who rule. And that was the weekend…at light speed…or at least as fast a wordy, unedited blabberer like me can write.