Featuring multitude of resources including Labor History Encyclopedia, Communism in Washington State, and Civil Rights Movements in Seattle, there’s a ton of interesting material contained in these fascinating sites. Of particular interest is the photo archive.

http://depts.washington.edu/labpics/repository/v/uw_bsu/pitre/photo10.jpg.html

It only makes sense to take pictures of older relics as well.

And maybe some timeless subjects.

Such as a sentinel of light.

Over the weekend, while trying to relax a bit in our neighbor city of Portland, Oregon, I received an email from our landlord. It seems one of the owners of our apartment had died and they decided they needed to sell it. Now, we weren’t planning to be in here forever, but having to move out in July was a bit sooner than I had anticipated: we were going to go month-to-month until Autumn/Winter and then find a new shell to habituate.

But alas, my already stressed life had yet another stress added to it: the fun and excitement of not only finding a new place, but even scarier, packing and moving to it. Our current landlord cut us a deal: whereas our lease was up in the middle of July, we could change it and get a rather large financial bonus if we moved out beforehand. Combined with the idea that the sooner we moved the better, Tracey did a huge amount of work to find places to view. I truly can’t thank her enough for her doing this task, and just six days after our original notice, we found an awesome place!

Never fear, it’s still on Capitol Hill (in even a cooler location than where we are now), and we’ll have a huge housewarming party when we’re all settled in.

Yayyy.

Now I just need to pack in between my Rails Projects, tidying up my résumé, and trying to keep my head above water for just a few more months. Right? RIGHT.

Anyway, we’re arriving at Gare du Nord, which is the train station that the high-speed transport from Amsterdam arrives at. It’s already behind schedule due to a breakdown in front of us, and we’re quickly getting our stuff and leaving when we notice a couple of heavily armed French police at the terminal. They seem to be guarding some guy who is searching through his own bag for something, and we start walking past when one of them (with a rifle, of course) approached us and said something in French while gesturing what appeared to say “nothing to see here, move along.” So we start moving, and then he says something again.

We’re just staring at him, and I’m fairly sure none of us had anticipated this particular situation. It wasn’t even cached in our minds. After a few seconds of staring, he says “speak English?” Heads nod YES. “Passports and train tickets please.” Okay, we understand that. As we all start rummaging through our coats to find passports, I manage to snag my train ticket before anyone else and hand it to him. he seemed satisfied that at least one of us had a ticket, didn’t seem to care about seeing a passport, and let us go along. Strike one.

Getting through the Metro wasn’t an issue, and we soon step off into Montmarte, which is one of the more “lively” hubs of Paris, and home to the red light district. We soon find our apartment. Down a small side street that is quickly named “Shank Alley.” Finding our host and our room, she starts explaining everything in very rapid French. Oops. Strike two.

We get our room, get online, and we all immediately look for as many French apps as we could find. I’m not kidding in the slightest, all of our phones and tablets were downloading “learn French survival words” books and were quickly memorizing and horribly pronouncing basic phrases. We didn’t have a French speaker, and we knew it was going to be rough. The French are a lot like Italians, they may know English, but will pretend not to know anything because they like messing with tourists.

Nova had to use the restroom, and we all had to hide when she managed to mess it up and caused it to enter cleaning mode. Almost while she was inside.

The bike tour was pretty rad.

The night tour was even more fun.

A blurry picture of us on the river cruise. Note Oury photobombing us the hardest.

On the second day we checked out the Eiffel Tower again.

Notre Dame was pretty rad.

Outside Notre dame.

The Holocaust Memorial was at the tunnel where most of the Parisian Jews were shipped to the camps. It was quiet, simple, and fitting.

I think we all recognize this particular object. It’s also the home to an extremely bruising traffic circle.

BUT HOLY CRAP GUYS. IT’S TIME TO GO TO SAINTE-CHAPELLE. This is one of the few buildings that I absolutely had to see on this trip, and verily, one of the few structures that I had to visit in my life. Even though it was partially under reconstruction (the stained glass was distorting over time and they were in the process of fixing/replacing a lot of it), Sainte-Chapelle was an astounding structure. It was remarkable, and even more so for a building built in the mid 1250s. The walls appeared to be made entirely of stained glass, and the atmosphere, even in the evening, was even better than I imagined it.

I think I just stood around in awe.

I was too much in awe to smile.

After Sainte-Chapelle, we went to Sacré Cœur, which is much more impressive from the exterior than the interior.

We returned back, had some sleep, and went off to the Eurostar Terminal early on the third day to visit the Isles.

Full Flickr Album

View the full album here!

Believe me, it was plenty of time. I put off this entry for a while because I didn’t really have too much to say about Amsterdam. It was exactly what we thought it was.

Amsterdam is essentially the Seattle of Europe. It’s a pretty progressive place with plenty of commercial activities going on, and has a couple big claims to fame. People know generally what they’re all about, and they’re both pretty swell places to live and work. They aren’t a super top tier city, but still fun to visit for a day or two.

Oh look canals.

Amsterdam is very much a canal city that retains many reminders of the historical times when they were one of the most prosperous trading centers in the world. For most of the first day we simply wandered around getting oriented and seeing the locations of many of the sights and scenes from outside. It was decidedly a  recuperation day, and we ate a lot of kabobs, cheese, and perhaps some beer.

BUT GUYS DID I MENTION WHERE WE STAYED. FOR REALS.

Yes, that’s a converted bulk cargo carrier with sunroofs, and the entire part of the ship is now a houseboat.

There was plenty of room, “internet fun time,” and a real quiet place to relax.

We had some Mute Swan friends too.

Amsterdam is a city that has three main claims to fame: legalized prostitution, semi-legalized marijuana, and a bike culture. If you visit, you will encounter all three very quickly. The bicyclists will not hesitate to completely obliterate you if required, the prostitutes are easily seen in the old part of town, and grungy “coffee” houses dot the back alleys.

The highlight of this city was likely the Anne Frank House, which is both a required experience as well as an extremely harrowing museum to visit even when you’ve managed to go through American public school without reading her diaries. After getting good and depressed there, we eventually made it to the Dutch Resistance Museum, which chronicled their efforts in fighting the Nazi occupation in World War II.

You can find windmills too.

Amsterdam had these really weird advertisements, where it has a human citizen being molested by a large person in an animal suit. We think they have to do with paying tickets of some sort, but really. Just for reals avoid the giant furries. Just ‘cus.

Probably the most notable event we ran into was the beginning of the Dutch Christmas celebration. You probably know something about Santa and his Eight Moorish aides who help him distribute presents, and may have some idea of how this may be a little bit, um, racist. Our houseboat host tells us that there’s going to be a big parade and event at the town center with Santa and the whole gang, and while we don’t go out of our way to run into it, the center of the city is pretty small and we ran into it.

Oh, did we run into it. Did you know that Santa actually rides a white horse, and is armed with a longsword? Or perhaps that almost all of the parade consists of white people wearing blackface and elf outfits? The blackface individuals also pass out (and in some cases force) these really terrible looking crackers to frightened children. AND they’re riding around in parade contraptions that seem to reinforce this racist concept even further, if possible. As Brian noted, “If we had this in America, there’d be riots.”

After more than plenty time to visit the city, we left late on Monday via the Thalys train to Paris Nord.

I’m so unspired, here’s just some more random pictures.

They do have awesome fonts on their buildings.

Sometimes they move houseboats in the middle of the night.

The graffiti was decent.

View the full flickr album

Time Awake: 6h30m

As we begin our journey to the mystical land of Iceland, we ponder the adventure ahead of us. And by “ponder” I really mean “wonder what we’ll do for 24 hours in Iceland with a rental car, no internet connection, and just a few offline maps downloaded to our Android devices.” Attempts to sleep on plane are met with resistance. Watch Independence Day with increasingly blurry eyes. Ponder the reasons why I hate flying.

Brian unsuccessfully attempting to sleep.

Friday, November 16th, 2012. 0730 UTC

Time Awake: 14h30m

We have landed into a very dark and cold environment. Noticing that the roads are icy and that the land is covered with snow, we briefly reconsider our plans. At car rental agency, eagerly pay an extra ten Euros in order to acquire a local GPS device with directions. Pile into our Mazda 6 and journey forth.

Friday, November 16th, 2012. 0830 UTC

Time Awake: 15h30m

After passing through approximately 20 roundabouts while journeying through the outskirts of Reykjavik, we begin heading towards Geysir and the hydrothermal fields deep inside a national park. Traffic is extremely light, but the roads are extremely icy and snowy. Brian admits that he isn’t sure he entered in the correct destination into the GPS, but we seem to be going to the correct general area.

Uhhh. Can you see?

We’re pretty sure this is a road.

Friday, November 16th, 2012. 1000 UTC

Time Awake: 17h00m

Arrive at a random visitors center with about 10 parking spaces; we’re the only ones here. Steam is arising from just beyond a rather rickety-appearing rope fence. We guess that this is our first destination. We run out of the car and begin wandering around with joyful glee: we are free! We can walk and run and it’s cold but we don’t care!

The car was rather dirty.

It smells of sulfur. Steam is omnipresent. Nobody else is here but us. Snow and mountains surround the landscape.

We encounter a small bubbling pool that occasionally sends out a larger bubble. We are entertained by this pool, and stand by it a good 5 minutes getting progressively excited by every larger bubble. We decide to move on to find Strokkur, which is the most active Geyser in the park.

Check out this bubbling pool. It’s soooo cool.

Walking down a path. Nikky asks Nova if she locked the car. Nova replies that she doesn’t believe she did. A discussion arises as to if we should have locked the car, which is quickly followed by the conclusion that it would be a lousy place to ste… PFHOOMMMMMMM. WHOOSH.

We have found Strokkur, which was the big hole in the ground that we ignored during the car locking discussion. Impressed by this display of water, we eagerly run around the fence a few times while waiting for it to erupt again. It does so in a manner of minutes. General agreement is that this is quite awesome.

OH HEY EVERYONE WHAT’S UP

Geysir is also visited, but is is dormant. We head back to the car, which still held all of our possessions.

Oh hey guys. I’m kinda feelin’ down right now. (Geysir)

BYE SEE YOU SOON (Strokkur)

Friday, November 16th, 2012. 1100 UTC

Time Awake: 18h00m

Arrive at Gullfoss falls. We are the only car in the small parking lot, and are slightly concerned that we may not make it up the winding and icy road out of the lot. Ice is everywhere, but we spot an amazing sight ahead: Gullfoss falls.

Gullfoss

Shuffle-running down the path to the falls, we’re impressed by the amount of ice that has covered the landscape: the mist that arises from the falls is almost immediately frozen when it hits the ground, and the plants are covered with an inch or more of ice. Walking closer to the falls, we quickly figure out that it is literally raining ice. It covers us.

What a cool dude.

Icy Ice Ice

Friday, November 16th, 2012. 1130 UTC

Time Awake: 18h30m

Nova has read that there is excellent all-you-can-eat soup at the Gullfoss visitors center. We head into a very utilitarian structure and immediately find an amazing lamb-vegetable soup, which also includes unlimited rolls. We are cold, hungry, and consume approximately two day’s worth of calories each. Between the four of us, there were 35 rolls consumed and 8 bowls of soup.

I did eat lamb. It was delicious, and I didn’t care.

We head back to town.

Woah, is that another car?

WATCH OUT NOVA THERE’S A MOUNTAIN IN FRONT OF YOU

Friday, November 16th, 2012. 1400 UTC

Time Awake: 21h00m

Arrive in Reykavik and head to the tallest building: the main church–Hallgrímskirkja. It is an impressively-austere and beautiful building. Nova and I go to the top of the tower and are treated to lovely views of the city. We explore the government buildings downtown, and recharge with some coffee and hot chocolate.

Inside the church

A lego model!

View from the bell tower.

Friday, November 16th, 2012. 1600 UTC

Time Awake: 23h00m

We realize that our plan of “sleeping in the car or airport until we fly out in the morning” will not be pleasant. The airport is closed overnight, and we would likely freeze to death in the car. We head to Keflavík in search of a hotel.

Friday, November 16th, 2012. 1700 UTC

Time Awake: 24h00m

Stopping at a Taco Bell and KFC–sleep deprivation may have impacted our brains at this point. Nova encounters the situation that we all must learn: even familiar institutions are strange and different in foreign countries, especially when using the drive-through rather than going inside and face-to-face when ordering.

We also stop at a grocery store that has an odd Pig-like mascot which looks deranged. “Cool American” Doritos are acquired.

Friday, November 16th, 2012 1800 UTC

Time Awake: 25h00m

Nova is delusional. Brian and Justin find a hotel, but neglect to tell them that there are four of us and not just two. Nova and I sneak in the back of the building and meet them in the room. There are two single beds. We are not amused.

Friday, November 16th, 2012 1900 UTC

Time Awake: 26h00m

Beds are pushed together. Quarters are close. Luckily we have showered.

Saturday, November 17th, 2012 0600 UTC

Arrive at Keflavík international airport. Fly off to Amsterdam. We will return to Iceland one day.

Photos

As usual, you can view all the photos on flickr.

Flying in, we reviewed our options about what we know of this fair city. Turns out that the answer was “not much.” Other than something about Coors and Denver’s famous elevation, our knowledge hovered somewhat around zero. Then we were told by the pilot  to buckle up, as the landing would be a little rough. And rough it was.

This is because we were flying into an active snowstorm. Awesome.

We immediately went to the first Chipotle ever, and had a surprisingly good burrito. This is especially surprising for Chipotle, which tastes like warmed-up plastic most of the time. Still slightly unsettled by this tasty meal, the rest of the first evening was spent going to the downtown core and wandering around a bit in the foggy chill that would become quite familiar weather over the next few days. As the noise of a generally terrible Christian concert wafted through the Colorado Capitol grounds, we proceeded to freeze ourselves fairly thoroughly.

Fleeing for refuge, I naturally locate the Denver library and begin exploring this oddly designed building with half-complete floors, multiple architectural motifs, and some rather impressive reading rooms.

After catching the Husky game at a sports bar (finding the Pac-12 network was no easy feat!) we retreated to our hotel.

Here’s where I need to speak a little bit about Denver. Although it has an elevation to it and is quite literally in the mountains, the city itself is rather flat. And spread out. By now you should be thinking “oh god this sounds like suburbia hell.” You would be correct. Denver is very much the land of suburbs, strip malls, and generic everything. It was slightly terrifying in a sense that I haven’t seen such wastelands since LA.

So we immediately left all of that and went to Golden, Colorado, and the Coors Brewery.

The self-guided tour was essentially a giant advertising pitch for their products, but the facility was still impressive and we were rewarded with multiple *free* beers at the end of the 30 minutes or so we spent wandering around large brewing equipment. Although Coors Light still tastes like diluted battery acid, it’s true what they say: it’s just better in the Rockies.

We drove up a rather impressive road to a nearby peak…

And while the views were impressive…

The wind chill was not. After stumbling upon the Red Rocks Amphitheater on the way back to Denver, we prepared ourselves for the culmination of a lifetime. Where we were going to go next, well, it doesn’t get much better than this folks.

WOAH HOLY CRAP IS THAT CASA BONITA FROM SOUTH PARK HOLY HELL CRAP

SOPAPILLAS MORE SOPAPILLAS PLEASE

WOAH BLACK BARTS CAVE SO SCARY

Casa Bonita has absolutely the worst food we’ve ever eaten, and here’s how the whole thing works: you enter the converted department store and immediately order from a buffet-style counter. There are only 6 or so choices of meals, and they’re all fairly basic fare. After waiting an impressively short amount of time, your “dinners” slide out from the kitchen. And you’re good to go!

I got bean burritos, and they were, literally, without any exaggeration, beans that were taken out of a can, left under some warming lights for a good solid eight hours, and then plopped into a tortilla that was treated to similar circumstances. If tortillas came out of a can, that’s what these would have tasted like. The rice was, well, how can you even mess up Tex-Mex rice? And my meal was at least edible. Brian’s looked like someone had gone to a farm, scoped up some cow pies, and then put some odd greenish sauce on top. They even messed up the salsa for the salsa and chips.

Folks, this is impressive how bad they got this food.

But the Sopapillas were surprisingly good. Casa Bonita wasn’t really rocking when we went on a Sunday night, but the facility is nothing less than impressive. They have four or five completely different environs to eat, including places by the waterfall, in the two(!) mines, in an old-timey-style ballroom, and more that I’ve since forgotten. They claim that they can have 1000+ patrons, and I believe it.

Oh yeah there’s also an arcade in case you get bored.

For our last full day, we went to another part of Colorado to take a train to the top of Pikes Peak, a 14,110 foot “mountain” accessible after about an hour-long cog railway ride. But first, we needed to acquire food before going to our deaths in the thin air of Pikes Peak. This involved stumbling upon a BBQ place that was amazingly well-smelling, and the staff were similarly amazed that I didn’t want any meat.

Me: What’s in the beans?
Staff: Oh, you know, beans, bacon, and more beans.
Me: Hmm. Okay.
Me: I’ll have baked potato.
Staff: What kind of meat?
Me: Oh, no meat.
Staff: You, uh, sure about that?
Me: YES I’M SURE JUST GIVE ME THE POTATO

It was a great potato though.

Okay, so the railroad. Things got pretty serious soon enough.

They weren’t kidding about that thin air: running around was suddenly an arduous task, and did I mention how freaking cold it was at the summit? Because it was very. Cold. The views were spectacular though.

I don’t know who these people are.

There’s a road to the summit. Notice the lack of guardrails.

The most impressive part? There’s a race to the top every year on this road. It just randomly cuts off near the summit.

I may have been suddenly wishing for air. And heat.

Detail of the tracks:

After this adventure, we head off towards the town of Fairplay, Colorado. This is where the show of Southpark was more-or-less based off of, and is located in Park County. Specifically, in the Southern part of Park County. Or South Park. The trip there was ruggedly beautiful, and utterly devoid of civilization and other cars.

We make it to Fairplay at sunset.

And then when looking for food, notice that all of the places listed on Yelp are closed. So we stumble upon one restaurant, go through thick doors and into a room that smelled of wood smoke and decorated like a formal dining room found in the 1880s. Looking for some food? Sorry folks, the kitchen is closed on Monday. The Park Bar should be open though.

So to the bar we go. It’s decidedly rustic and had a welcoming atmosphere around it. But most importantly, it had a very powerful fireplace, veggie burgers (!), and lots of beer.

And then flew back to Seattle early the next morning.

Denver was an interesting place. It’s full of scenic beauty and friendly people, but has an odd sense of suburbia and sprawl surrounding the municipality. It builds out rather than up, mostly because it can, and while the city is nice enough, the surrounding countryside is decidedly *country*side in every sense of the word.

View the full photo album.

Frigate Lost

Whenever a frigate-class or larger ship is destroyed, a status message is overheard.

Kharak is Burning

Played after discovering their home planet was utterly destroyed by a previously unknown group of enemies.

Marshaling the Fleet

Mothership is Under Fire

The Mothership, while tough, is relatively defenseless other than a few point-defense cannons.

Combat Group Status Reports

As various combat groups ply the wastelands of space, reports filter in from the Mothership coordinating their missions.