Well we just got back from an amazing trip back home to Seattle to visit friends and family and eat lots of yummy foods! We got up early and had a lovely sunrise in Berlin as we made our way to the airport. Alright so I keep trying to type this out, and during the day I just have a really hard time writing. I am not sure why...I have sat down every day this week, and a few last to try and write up our trip to Seattle and I have two sentences to show for it. It is odd as in the evening I am more likely to write, but also Raymond is home so I am more likely to do something else. Then when I go to sleep I am up forever going over what I will write in my head, until the next day when I go to write it and nothing. So strange. Anyways it is evening now, we are watching some X Files and it is now time to write! I only write once the sun goes down apparently.
Alright back to our trip. We flew Lufthansa this trip and I must say I was impressed. That was the most comfortable flight I have ever been on. There was a lot of space between seats - I never once bumped my knees on the seat in front of me even when it was reclined which is amazing. I am always moving around and sitting different ways with my legs folded up and I usually think the person sitting in front of me probably hates me since I move around a lot and knock into their seat. Not this time though! Also I think the seats were wider than normal as when I sit with my legs crossed on the seat I usually encroach on Raymond's space, but I didn't really this time. I know it is probably not good to sit next to or in front of me on a normal plane - I move around a lot and take up all the space! I don't know how Raymond deals with me usually! This was great though. Also they have a billion different options for special meals - pretty much anything you could want. They have diabetic meals, low calorie meals, a bunch of different vegetarian meals, even a raw fruit meal options. Usually there are maybe 2 choices so it was a little crazy. This was also the first time that I could eat everything that was on the tray they gave us. Usually I can eat the hot portion, but then on the tray is a muffin or cookies I can't eat, butter I cannot put on the bread, etc. This time everything was vegan including the butter for the bread and they gave us this gross pate like stuff that reminded me of the vegan pate we tried in France(which I suppose if you like pate is good). Still the fact that they actually made everything according to the dietary choices chosen was great. On the way to Seattle they did have issues with the video and it wasn't working for most of the trip, but that was fine by me I was reading anyways. On the way back about halfway through the flight the tv's in the back of our seats stopped working, but again I was fine with it. They were super nice about it and tried to fix it however they could but I didn't really care. They also came around with a tray of water, juice and cookies all the time. Pretty much every time I went to take a drink they were there with a cup of water. Something simple, but so very nice. Oh and the outside seats are only 2 across instead of 3 which is awesome. I don't have to try and get over a stranger to get out, just Raymond. It was just the nicest flights we have been on, and at 10.5 hours that is really nice. I highly recommend flying with them.
While on the flight over it was sunny over the south eastern part of Greenland and it was absolutely beautiful. Probably the prettiest landscape I have ever seen. The photo above does not do it justice. It was just these large mountains and valleys covered in snow and ice. The tops of the mountain ridges looked like they were covered in ice or something and it was kind of fuzzy in the way that photos of waterfalls and stuff are. They had this soft fuzzy quality that made them seem like they were not real. Like they were paintings. It was absolutely gorgeous. Now I really want to go to Greenland some day, though Raymond was just like what would you do there? I said play in the snow! Enjoy the beautiful scenery! See the northern lights and narwhal! Really I had never thought about Greenland as...well I didn't really know anything about it. Now it is toward the top of my list of places to go, though it will probably be some time since it seems expensive to get to.
My friend Gillian picked us up from the airport as we were staying with her our first few days. We were hungry so we went out for some lunch then back to her place to chill for a little bit. They couldn't find the pump for the air mattress so we had an adventure to Big 5 Sports or some such store and then stopped at Starbucks for a refreshing beverage. Earlier at her place we were reading these blurbs for books that her brother got her - books that sounded horrible! For example What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank. What kind of a title is that? Who would buy that book? How did they find it in the first place? Well one of the book blurbs was all the first black woman to write some kind of story and blah blah blah and felt the need to point out if the characters were black or white. The one girl moves to France with her white boyfriend (and the one lady cannot even fathom the idea of France which is just like what? What does that even mean? You cannot comprehend the idea of France??). So we thought it was pretty awful sounding and were joking around about my white boyfriend this and well my white boyfriend that. Well cut to Starbucks with Gillian and Jesse and we are talking and Gillian says kind of loud well my white boyfriend...and she said there was this big black guy right there who just turned and gave her quite the dirty look. I unfortunately missed it, but still think it is hilarious! Oh my white boyfriend.
After that we just got some dinner then back to her place. Now I had expected to try and sleep on the flight over since I only got a few hours of sleep the night prior to leaving, but I was way too excited to sleep. So then I figured I might crash early but oh well. Somehow I stayed up until 11pm - some 26 hours after we got up from a few hours sleep and still would have been able to stay up longer, I just figured I should probably go to sleep since I had been up so long. It was odd - it was like I could have stayed up all night which is not like me. On the way back I was way more tired and lethargic than that first day in Seattle. Odd. Raymond on the other hand passed out on the air mattress immediately after we got home from dinner. We had talked about watching some TV at dinner and Gillian was like do you want to watch some X Files, but I decided on my favorite It's Always Sunny episode as it would be shorter. The air mattress was set up between the couch and the tv and Gillian was just like are you sure we won't disturb Raymond? I was just like nope - he won't even wake up. Which he didn't, he didn't know we had watched anything. Oh to be able to just sleep whenever.
Gillian's place has floor to ceiling windows and an pretty nice view. We woke up on Sunday and it was just blinding how bright it was. I always bring a sleep mask with me as I can't sleep with light and had just gotten a new one which blocked out all the light. I pulled it off and was just like whoa! It is so bright!
The thing Raymond missed the most is breakfast as you just can't get an American style breakfast here so we went to Wayward which we always used to do on Saturdays (and proceeded to eat WAY too much food).
Gillian and Jesse picked us up from breakfast and we headed out to the locks for fun times in the sun. She went a weird round about way that had us come out at Golden Gardens so I asked to stop there and we did for a bit even though she hates it there because she is nice like that. Here are some photos of our time at Golden Gardens:
Jesse is a loner. As you can see it was a gorgeous day, though there were a few clouds in the sky. It was perfect! After Golden Gardens we did make it down to the locks for some more fun adventures.
You can't tell us what to do!
And here are more pictures taken at the locks:
After the locks we went back to West Seattle and had dinner in Alki which was kind of odd. We never hung out much over there except at night to look at the view. It was kind of like Jersey Shore Seattle style which was just....very strange. I don't remember every being with so many frat boys and such in Seattle. It was an odd mix of people, but fun for people watching!
After our dinner we headed back to Gillian's and Alison, Bobby and Avery came over for a visit! Avery was so cute and so sweet. It was close to her bedtime and they kept apologizing that she was getting cranky, but man if they wouldn't have said anything I never would have thought she was cranky. She was so sweet and it was really nice visiting with them.
I suppose that is enough for now since I will be heading off to bed soon. Hopefully I will get the rest posted before the end of the week since we have been having lots of fun adventures here!
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