I love Seattle!
I never knew this about myself. I guess I've always consider Seattle to be a mocker of the parallel parking impaired, one way streets that are strategically placed so you are incapable of ever reaching your destination and a traffic nightmare.
I have been given the opportunity to work at my company's Seattle office for three weeks. I am covering for one of their admin woman who just had a baby and another admin woman who will be getting married and honeymooning for two weeks. With them out that leaves just one administrator here and to avoid her losing her mind and just beating her head on her desk for 8 hours they asked if I could fill in. At first I had mixed emotions about it. Traffic is always rough going into and coming out of the city. I knew that parking was going to be spendy and the girls would need to go to child care after school instead of me being able to pick them up from school, adding an expense that isn't normally there. I was literally going to be paying to work. But I was ready for a change and agreed to help them out.
My first day here I drove my car and was surprised to find that traffic wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be. My excitement soon was crushed by a little parking sign reading "Early Bird Special $18". $18!! Nothing about $18 makes me feel special for being early. Whatever. I shook it off and headed in. The Seattle office is located on the 11th floor of the Seattle Tower. A life insurance company called Northern Life Insurance began building the Seattle Tower in 1919 and completed it in 1929 orignally calling it the Northern Life Tower. Guys, this building is amazing. It is so full of character and history.
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| The building from the outside. They used five different colors of brinks starting with the dark ones at the bottom and they get lighter as they go up. |
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| The outside enterance, |
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| The beautiful lobby. |
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This is my favoritepart of ther building. This is above each elevator. |
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| The hall way to the office. |
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| All the of doors are made out of solid wood and are hea-vy! Some have glass in them, some don't. The panel above each door swings out for ventilation.. |
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| Every door knob has "NLF" on it for Northern Life Insurance, the people who orginally built the building. |
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| All the windows open by pushing them out in the center. |
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| Each room in the building has a heater that is run off of steam which is created in a boiler room under the building. |
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| My favorite room in the building, the bathroom! All real marble. Even that stall walls are marble. |
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| The locks inside the bathrom stalls. So much character everywhere! |
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| One of the many awesome views from around the building. Just high enough for a view but not too high that you miss out on some great people watching. |
After paying $18 and a piece of my soul to the parking lot attendant I knew that there is no way my limited budget could afford $18 a day for the next three weeks. When I got home I checkout the transit routes and times. I was excited to find that commuting by bus would actually result in a shorter commute time than driving! I was sold. Only down side, I’d have to get up a half hour earlier. Now, a half hour doesn’t sound like a lot but I already get up at 5:30 and I don’t care who you are, 5:00am is early! Anyway, I took the bus yesterday for the first time in years. Standing in line waiting for the bus felt like the first day of school all over again. I had my cash in my head ready to go so I didn’t have to fish through my pockets and be “that person” that holds up the line. Well, turns out that people don’t even use cash anymore. They have an Orca card that you load with money and swipe in front of a meter and it scans the card as you walk by. So being prepare with my cash in hand still made me the lady in the express checkout lane writing a check. Lesson learned and I am anxiosly awaiting my Orca card in the mail. Overall, riding the bus has turned out to be a pretty enjoyable experience. I have time to read my book or take a brief nap instead of being the lady in your rear view mirror pounding her fists on her stirring wheel and screaming at her windshield while stuck in traffic. Yeah, I'm that person. The bus drops me off two blocks away from the building and I love the brisk walk before starting my work day.
AND, everything is in walking distance! Places to eat, the bank, Pike Place Market, a Starbucks literally on every single block, Westlake Center and all the shopping a girl could ask for<---(this has proven to be dangerous).
So Seattle, I apologize for calling you the butthole of the suburbs. You are infact, electric, exciting and beautiful and I heart you big time!
