Thoughts on Seattle so far:

* Discovery Park. We spent a large portion of Monday there. It was very pretty, we walked many miles and enjoyed the beach along Puget Sound. It reminded me of Northern Michigan, to be honest. Without the mountains in the background, of course, but the terrain and vegetation were largely indistinguishable from upstate. (More ferns, different pines.)

* The locks and salmon ladder. Goofy, but amusing. We saw some great big boats go through the locks, which thrills my inner 3 year old.

* Seattle drivers. Already seen one hit a cyclist. No stop lines at intersections so people apparently just pull out into traffic randomly. Unimpressed.

* Seattle pedestrians. They outdo U-M students in terms of strolling out into traffic without looking. Effing annoying.

* Seattle denizens. So, is it a requirement to get full arm tattoos if you live here? The people seem pretty nice, though. We’ve had good staff at restaurants, and the clerk at Safeway helped us save $40, and a kind soul at the bus stop saved us a ton of trouble (we were at the wrong stop).

* Pike Market. Um, so it’s a really big farmers market with some fish mongers and book-sellers? Not uninteresting, but certainly not ‘all that’ either. Boys were unimpressed, although we did have some nice nectarines and bought a metric ton of king crab legs. Ate half tonight, the rest later.

* Seattle buses. Seem clean and efficient. In fact, there seems to be a lot of good public transportation here. I don’t really get the ‘pay as you get off’ thing, but it seems to work for them.

* Seattle Aquarium. A bit of a surprise - we were expecting it to be super lame, but it was actually interesting. Quite a large number of touch pools, and we loved the baby salmon and salmon ladder. The otters were particularly cute, too.

* City Pass. FTW. We’ve used it for the Aquarium and an Argosy boat ride so far, and will use it for the Gehry monstrosity and the Pacific Science Center before we’re done. Seems like a total bargain if you’re going to be here a few days and have kids in tow.

* Garmin. Now that we’ve ditched Jill and hooked up with Daniel the British guy, things are much better. I’m sort of liking the turn by turn narration, but what I really like is the locator thing - ‘where is a grocery store near here?’ That rocks.

* Kerry Park. If you want to see a steady parade of people with very large cameras, this is the place. Also, nice view of the city featuring the space needle thingie.

* No air-conditioning. It’s getting a bit old. It was ever-so-slightly cooler today than it was yesterday, and we’re trying to tough it out.

* Lake Union. It’s pretty but much smaller than I thought it would be. Fun to watch the sailboats go around in little bathtub circles tonight - they were pretty with the sun coming through the sails, but seemed too big for the lake.

All in all, I like Seattle so far, but I don’t love it. We’ve seen some pretty neighborhoods (Queen Anne, Magnolia, etc.) and downtown seems alright (enjoyed the buskers), but something about it just isn’t clicking with me. I mean, if I had to live here, I’m sure I’d be happy, but I don’t think I’d put it at the top of my list. If for no other reason than the tattoo requirement.