Seattle Thanksgiving II--Pike Market and Thai Food

"What do you want to see in Seattle, besides Lisa and her family?" I asked Michael.  "Pike Market.  That's the one essential landmark whenever I come," he replied.  On Friday, November 22, 2013, the Spendloves and Flindts trooped downtown to enjoy the Macey's Thanksgiving Day Parade, and to visit Pike Market.

 

 

At the parade, I especially loved the clowns and marching bands.

 

 

 

 

Grant and Kirsten spotted the marchers from their high school, East Lake, looking very cold in their miniskirts.

 

The roads were lined with people and the trees were outlined in lights for Christmas.

 

 

 

 

 

The highlight was Santa Claus arriving in his sleigh.

 

 

Next stop: Pike Market.  We walked together to the gum wall, lined with disgusting pieces of

chewed bubble gum.  Of course, we all had to pose with our tongues hanging out, as if we would actually touch the gum!

 

 

 

 

 

We then split up to explore the wonders of the Market.  Kirsten, Lisa, Alyssa, and Bryce came with me.  We stopped for croissants and macaroons at the French bakery.

 

 

Alyssa and Bryce couldn't resist poking their heads through the Market signs.

 

My favorite store is the spice shop.  Lisa hinted that she'd buy me some spices for Christmas!

 

There are butcher shops, fishmongers, vegetable stores, and craft boutiques, and flower sellers throughout the Market.  This was the first time I had seen a pig's head sliced in half, with the ear still attached!

The Flindt kids posed on top of the brass pig that is the Market's mascot.

 

We ate lunch at a mom and pop Thai restaurant near the Market which is routinely chosen as one of the best Thai restaurants in Seattle.

When we finished lunch, we drove to the Pacific Science Center for our movie, "Catching Fire," the second installment in the Hunger Games series. We passed a cigar store which, Lisa informed me, is the place to get marijuana, which has now been legalized in Washington State.

 

The Flindts are mathematicians and scientists by nature, who love the Pacific Science

Center.  We paused to inspect the pulleys and the demonstration toilet before hurrying to the theater for our show.  "Catching Fire" was not for all tastes, and Lisa took Alyssa and Bryce to a 3-D documentary, "Jerusalem."

 

 

 

 

Seattle Thanksgiving I-Cooking the Bird

Our Thanksgiving chefs were diverse crowd.  Dave and I joined the Flindts for that turkey holiday in Seattle on November 20, 2013.  Lisa had been up late the night before, and so she napped for a few hours while a few Flindts joined the neighborhood athletes at the "Turkey Trot" and the rest, including Alyssa, were put to work. 

 

Alyssa modeled her new hat, handmade by her Aunt Laura. 

Once the turkey was in the oven and the other food was under control, Dave took a break.

Michael loves board games and is generous in teaching his nieces and nephews how to play with him.

The Thanksgiving table was beautiful, laden with Lisa's Lenox china and silver.  And the food was good enough to belong in that fine setting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

After dinner and washing the dishes, we drove to Carnation, a rural area where we hiked along a trail which had been a railroad track.  It was amazingly straight.  Grant, Bryce, and Kirsten played football in the golden, fading light. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We finished the day filling Christmas packages for Michael K and Spencer, our missionaries.

  

The Fight Goes On

It took several rounds to knock out the woodpeckers.  When we arrived back from our Adriatic cruise, Dave discovered that the plastic crocodiles and tarantulas he had stapled to the wall of our house before we left hadn't gotten rid of the woodpecker which was drilling holes in our house.  Dave hauled out his heavy battle equipment, including the huge ladder that could lift him to the woodpecker's dirty work.

The next round of ammunition, exploded the week of November 15, 2013, was life-size owls and wreaths of shiny cellophane.

 

 

When those didn't work, Dave brought in the experts.  He hired a woodpecker-removal company which installed a noise-automated device that sent huge, plastic tarantula spiders running up and down the side of the house wall each time there was a noise (whether pecking or not).  In addition, the company applied foul-smelling and foul-tasting sealer to the eaves and holes in the house walls.  Their fee?   Three dollars per minute that their workmen were on the job.  Dave spent more than $1000 on his experts, particularly after a wind storm raged.  The noise sent the tarantulas into perpetual motion, running up and down the house walls.  It ran down the battery which only the experts could recharge, at $3 per minute, plus travel time.  Dave eyed his BB gun longingly, but remembered the federal laws that prohibit killing that protected species, the woodpecker.

 

The good news?  We haven't heard the woodpecker for a while.  We assume he has flown south, is hibernating in some cozy hole, or has set his sights on other walls (the Kimballs?  the Hunters?).