Landed in Seattle
Posted by Skrud at Monday, June 11th 2007 at 1:49pm
Getting from Montreal to NYC wasn’t the problem — even though our plane was put into a holding pattern around JFK airport for an extra 40 minutes or so, and once we landed at 4:25pm I noticed my boarding pass for my connecting flight to Seattle was at 4:55pm. In a different terminal. The map they had in the American Airlines magazine did not do the distance justice. I must’ve ran for about 5km, going through security again, reaching the departure gate, before realizing that 4:55pm was the boarding time, not the departure time. I managed to eat half a crappy airport-depanneur sandwich before boarding the plane.
It’s a good thing I ate that crappy airport-depanneur sandwich, because the seven-hour flight from NYC to Seattle had no food except for crappy airline snacks and crappy airline sandwiches, of which I believe they had four of. Obviously, not enough to feed a 757 of hungry passengers. It didn’t help that the plane was grounded for about an hour after the intended departure time, either. I more or less finished the book I was reading (the Ghost in the Shell manga by Masamune Shirow) before we took off. Having finished that, I watched the movie on my laptop. Yes, it makes much more sense now. (And there’s a lot that was left out of the movie, though the movie certainly does the manga justice).
Then I played some Moeru Nekketsu Rhythm Damashii Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan 2, the sequel to the greatest video game ever, which was happily waiting for me at home when I got there. I beat it on Normal during the flight, and it was one of the most satisfying video game experiences of my life.
Early on in the flight, I befriended the woman sitting next to me. (Seriously, when you’re sitting next to the same person for 7 hours, and when you’re spending an entire 10 hours communicating with no one but security personnel telling you to take your shoes off, you need to talk to a real person). She’s a Seattleite that was returning from a vacation in NYC with her friend (in the next seat). They were nice enough to chat a bit and point out some interesting things out the window: Mount Saint-Helen poking up through the clouds, Bill Gates’ house, etc. I asked for some restaurants that might be open this late and she told me some places I could walk to.
When we finally landed, at 9:00pm Seattle time (midnight), I caught my shuttle to the hotel and finally met my teammates.
I was hungry. Famished. The Starbucks in the hotel was closed. (Although the hotel bar has some beer taps that I’d never seen before and I will try them all before I leave. Especially the Pyramid Hefe-Weizen.)
We started wandering around outside. Then I remembered that the lady on the airplane told me about a place next door to Barnes & Noble. As one teammate was plugging it into Google Maps on his wi-fi phone, we saw Barnes & Noble. Kept walking, and came across the Rock Bottom Restaurant and Brewery. I love how the first place I end up as soon as I get into the city is a brewpub!!!
I order a Thai Chicken Pizza (their late-night menu wasn’t so extensive), and an American Wheat Beer. The beer was decent, but not particularly tangy or tasty. It tasted pretty bland for a wheat beer, actually. I know American Wheats aren’t supposed to have much fruity flavouring, but they usually have a decent hoppiness. This one didn’t. Then I tried the Pale Ale, which was exquisite. Fantastic hoppiness and extra-bitter, just howI like it. As we were leaving I noticed they had another beer called the \”Hop Bomb IPA\”, made with 5 different kinds of choice hops and won all kinds of awards. I announced to my team that we’re going back there. They agreed. :)
Things to do today: * Plan our attack so that we can rock the competition to its core. * Get my welcome package (includes Zune). * Meet all the Microsofties involved with ImagineCup
This is shaping up to be an awesome-fun trip!
