mcrt

It is 2 am and I just staggered home from the pub run after dinner in Seattle. For quite some time I had had been looking forward to meeting all of these people I had seen on-line. I had a great time visiting with people like Punkie, Newself, Essxjay, EPS, Shadow and Kokonutz. This was my first flyertalk event. In the last few months I have learned a lot from these boards and look forward to learning more and meeting more of the people from these boards.

ozstamps

Don't forget the next biggie in Dusseldorf in November!

Think of the points you'd rack up flying from Seattle.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum.../000474-9.html



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~ Glen ~

Rudi

Even when it is raining in Seattle (it does - that's what my internet-weather-frog says right now) I am sooooooooooo�� jealous

I would like sharing your experience of getting all wet - in- and outside!

Enjoy the day and company (and forget about the rest of the world right now)!

shadow

I started a thread in Trip Reports about the beginning of the SEA get together.
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum81/HTML/001241.html

I'll post photos there once I'm back in LA.

High Life

Hey mcrt, that sounds like alot of fun. Wish I could have joined you .)

svpii

Me too One of these days, I'll make one.. in the meantime, I struggle w/ envy!

kokonutz

Oh good LORD! Shadow was there with his digital????

How does one spell "disavow?"

wingless

Punki

Boeing in the Rain:

The weekend began for me when I dashed out of my office (10 minutes) late to pick up Tropical, Smooth, and Neal, who had all cleverly planned to stay at the Westin, to simplify this task. We were joined by one of my employees who works on the Boeing account and was extremely curious. He used a reservation that had been made by MileCrazy who had been called away at the last minute for a family emergency. Thank you Milecrazy for letting us use the reservation, and please know our best wishes are with you in this hard time.

After a 30 minute drive in the rain, we arrived at the world's largest (by volume) building and started the tour. Awesome!. They took away our purses because they are afraid that someone might drop something on a plane and cause $$$$$$$$$$$ damage, and we went into the theatre where we watched a film of a 747 being assembled in 7 minutes. We then all climbed onto a bus and drove over to the world's largest building to see the real thing (which actually takes somewhere between 6 and 11 months). One of the most interesting things to me was a 4' section cut from the center of the 1st 747 which was sold to Japan and had been bought backby Boeing after 25,638 (about) take offs and landings for stress testing. It clearly showed the anatomy of the plane and was most interesting. We then drove out to the flight line and viewed the new 747, 767 and 777 planes ready for delivery.

The scariest thing I heard of was a 747-D which is an all-economy, domestic plane sold to Asian countries. It is designed for trips under 1 hour and has, smaller seats, less leg room, fewer restrooms and narrow aisles that regular economy on a 747. Let's just pray it never get's reassigned to a Trans-Pacific flight.

Do not miss this tour if you have a chance to take it.

Wild ginger and Wild Carousing:

After returning the crew to the Westin, I ran (read "crawled in heavy traffic") back to my office to deliver my employee to his car and then back home again to dress for dinner, arriving at the Wild Ginger to find the bar packed with FlyerTalkers. In short the place was packed, the food was wonderful, and Kokonutz and auh2o were as silly and entertaining as ever. A grand time was had by all and the Wild Ginger was followed by wild carousing through the streets and bars of Seattle. Again Kokonutz and auh20 provided the entertainment in the bars, until they somehow mysteriously disappeared along the way. We then grabbed essxjay and newself's gear from the Hilton and took them down to the boat for the night, before heading home ourselves for a very few hours sleep. (I think I am getting too old for this intensity of partying.)

Saturday Sail:

Sturday morning we did the car switch thing for moving the boat and took off in the rain from Elliott Bay to Bell Harbor with essxjay (who turned out to be the best crew), newself, LarryU, Watergirl, who we believe is responsible for bringing all this water to Seattle, and EPS. It was rainy and a little cold, but quick and fun despite the weather.

Lunch @ Anthony's:

After arriving at Bell Harbor, and securing the boat we wandered up to Anthony's to join Shadow and the gang for lunch. Highlights of lunch for me were seeing my old friends TravelWeary, Michael, kyklin and the beautiful Danielle again. It wasn't too very long before Catman showed up with Wanderlust and the mystery guest nathan detroit. Meeting nathan was a great treat for me. While I tremendously enjoy the enthusiams and optimism of all the FlyerTalkers who are young enough to be my children, meeting another FlyerTalker who can actually remember Orchard Place has its own special charm.

After lunch, Joe and I did more car shuffling, and headed home to make sure everyone was covered for and informed of their respective rides to Chinooks.

Chow at Chinooks:

Chinooks is a particularly northwest kind of place with no reservations so we were required to be slightly aggressive in acquiring space in the bar to await our table assignments. It wasn't long before all 28 FlyerTalkers had arrived and found a space in the bar to get a brew. We drank, laughed and swapped stories until dinner time, when we were assigned to three tables of 7 and 2 tables of 4. Crab Cakes seemed to be the number one choice of meals and the table that held kyklin, Danielle, Jailer, Joanne listened to the most choice tale of intrigue provided by smooth and dgolds. I would love to spill the beans, but since I have only hear it second hand, I will await the telling of this story by someone who was actually present.

After dinner, Joe and I headed straight home to bed, leaving the additional drinking and partying to the younger crowd.

Flashbacks:

During the night I had a very crazy dream where I learned that all of my favorite Canadians, including, Jackie, Rick, and Blonde Bomber had conspired to boycott the Seattle weekend because they though Chinooks was a Canadian slur. Must have been something I encountered in the '60s.

Roy's at the Westin:

We decided to sleep in a little and show up late for breakfast. We actually arrived just as they were breaking up and had a wonderful opportunity to say our goodbyes to all who were heading home in the morning.

Sunday Sail:

After breakfast, Danielle, kyklin, mweiss, Joe and I went for a sail in Elliott Bay. Great company, sun breaks, nice wind and NO rain. What more could one want? We told wild tales of dgolds, smooth and the KGB and laughed so hard our sides hurt. After lunch on the boat, I drove Danielle and kyklin to the airport, and was feeling very old and tired, until I noticed, and was redeemed by, the fact that the incomparably young and healthy Danielle had fallen asleep in the back seat. I guess it was just the very, very busy and wonderful party weekend that was getting to me, not old age.



[This message has been edited by Punki (edited 10-02-2000).]

Ling

Bravo! Congratulations on a wonderful weekend, and I want to thank you, Punki, for taking the time and energy to organize this get-together. I'm sorry I wasn't able to attend (just a mere 360 miles), and missed you all. I can picture your lovely smile and hear laughter in the air.

I love happy endings.

Linda

nathan detroit

Punki, not only can I remember Orchard Place but also when Midway was the only commercial airport in Chicago and all the planes had silly looking things on the front; I think they were called propellers and they had something to do with moving the plane through the air. And nice steps up to the plane, ladies in nice dresses who took care of the passengers, windows that opened (really!), full size warm blankets, meals cooked in the onboard kitchen. And EVERYBODY was addressed as Mister, Missus, or Miss - except for the boys who were often called sonny. And no TV, radio, much less telephone.

SEA dinner was a grand experience with simply grand people. God love(s) you all.

TravelWeary

I want to also thank Punki for energetically and enthusiastically organizing things in Seattle this weekend. Also, a special thanks to MileageAddict for instigating the whole process. Michael and I had a wonderful time at a time we badly needed the distraction of old and new friends. After 15 1/2 years with our cat who was truly a member of our family, he died on Thursday after a few very heartbreaking days, and it is still very painful to be at home where he still haunts us. So, thanks everyone for the great conversations, many laughs, and the promise of many future such events.

smooth

What can I possibly add to a great description of the weekend by Punki? Oh well, I'll try anyway.
Looking back and "decompressing" from all the fun, that's what I remember most:
Friday afternoon.
I am waiting for the ride to the Boeing plant at the Westin lobby. I am supposed to meet TropicalFlyer and have an idea how she looks like, but Neal is a mystery. After waiting for about 5 minutes, I decide to take a risk and to approach the first man in the lobby: " Are you Neal?" The response: "No. But I wish I was ". After asking two or three other men, the whole lobby was looking at me with great interest. One man asked if I would settle for Steve rather than Neal for just that night . Fortunately, TropicalFlyer showed up and rescued me from embarrasment. The tour was great, just like Punki described it. But even greater was Punki's driving. She could talk on the phone, maintain a coherent conversation with the passengers in the van, take messages, maintain some sort of radio contact with her Portland office, change lanes from right to left and back in the pouring down rain, keep her fingers on the status of air traffic flow out of SFO, AND inspite of all of this craziness SHE STILL LOOKED GREAT ! Whoa !
After spiffing myself up for dinner at the Wild Ginger, I was back at the lobby, this time looking for Shadow. Learning from my earlier experience, I positioned myself by the escalator and decided "to be found" rather than openly approaching the male guests of the hotel with question: are you shadow? Earlier in the week, I e-mailed Shadow and asked him to wear a short red dress, so I could spot him easier. Alas, Pete never got my message. So, here I was, standing about 10 feet from a well dressed man, eyeing him for about 5 minutes and wondering: could this be Shadow? I can just imagine what Pete was thinking about looking at me. And once again, TropicalFlyer comes to the rescue and introduces us. Off we go to have a wonderful dinner at the Wild Ginger. When it came to desserts, Newself made quite a sincere announcement that " as a rule, he does not eat desserts". However, when I offered to buy him a piece of some wonderful chocolate creation, it became obvious that he had a disclamer to his earlier statement: "... unless somebody else pays for it". TropicalFlier and I skipped bar hopping since both of us have not slept much the night before: she was flying on the red-eye from HNL, and I got up at 4 am to catch my flight from MSP.
Saturday night.
After some confusing instructions ( all three of us, Neal, Sylvia and I, had different ideas on who is going to drive us to Chinooks ), we got picked up by a very level-headed and calm driver ( Punki's opposite, but just as good ), dgolds. Driving around Seattle in the dark, without a clear idea of where are we going, with 6 (!) of us in the car, was fun! Got a chance to see the 15-th street bridge ( Ballard bridge? ) 3 times: from South to North, then back from North to South, and almost one more time, had Sylvia not spotted the right exit. Dgolds maitained his cool through the whole experience. I was smitten ( more later ).
The lady luck was smiling at me that night because at dinner I was seatted with the greatest group of people: Kyklin and his gorgeous and smart Danielle, Jailer with classy Joanne, and Mr. Cool himself, dgolds. After a couple of drinks the conversation came to " How we met " stories. Oh, before I give you the details of that, I wanted to mention that I was dying to meet Kyklin. Why? Simply because I have never met a member of the Mile High Club in person. I've heard of people like him, but have never met them live! I thought that there will be some kind of sign on his forehead, or something very special about him that would indicate the "hights" that he has experienced in his past. True, he is a very special guy: handsome, funny, intellegent, etc. And so INNOCENT looking! You just never know...
Back to the "How we met" conversation. Danielle kicked it off with a 7-year courtship story between Ken and her. And the violins started to play, and the birds were singing. It was so romantic and sensuous ! When it came to Ken's turn to add to the story, his summary consisted of about 7 words:" Well, we met on campus, dated for a while, and then decided to get married". Right to the point. The end of story.
Thankfully, Jailer's Joanne turned the discussion to some more romance. And Jailer himself was quite good in making the violins to start playing again. Their story of courtship and love was just as charming as Danielle's.
And then... It was "our" turn. Without blinking an eye, dgolds started making up a fascinating tale of intrigue and mystery, with some Russian thrown into the story. The audience loved it! What was I supposed to do? To spoil the fun? So, quite reluctantly I HAD TO play along. By the time we were done, there were spies, KGB, state secrets, deception, etc. all firmly implanted in our "romance". By that time the audience was sitting at the edge of their chairs, and were looking behind their backs, just in case. The grand finale came when we (dgolds and I) announced that if we tell them more, we would have to kill them. There were no questions after that.
So, all in all, the dinner was delightful, and Catman put an icing on the cake when he stopped by our table at the end of the evening.
Later, after a couple of drinks at the Westin lobby, I've learned about a tricky plot by TropicalFlier to "sell" my second heavenly bed to a complete stranger for that night. Apparently, the first bidder (Newself) could not afford the TropicalFlyer's asking price, so that's how I ended up with Essxjay as my roommate for Saturday night. Newself got himself a half-priced couch in TropicalFlyer's room.
Ess was a delightful roommie. She slept as quiet as a kitten, not a pip through the whole night. I even checked on her in the middle of the night, if she was still in the room. When I woke her up in the morning, we had a cup of coffee and a nice conversation to go with it. I am happy to report that she looks just as gorgeous in the morning, without any makeup, as she does look when she goes out for dinner or dancing. Some people have to work on it, and for some it comes naturally. Lucky duck that she is!
Sunday Morning.
After a quick breakfast with all my dear FT friends and tearful good byes, I got invited to share the ride to the airport with Catman, Wonderlust and Newself. They sure know how to travel first class! My original plan was to take a city bus to the airport. Cost: $1.00. Instead, I ended up in a limo, which was great! The only thing that concerned me greatly is that the driver was RUSSIAN !!! Dgolds, is it your doing? Is KGB still on our tale?
At the airport Catman was kind enough to invite me to be his guest at the RCC. Too bad, his plane was leaving shortly. Still, I feel honored to be "introduced" to his kids ( via pictures). Over the next hour, Wonderlust kept me occupied with the stories of his travels to Australia and Peru. I could listen to him for much longer, but the reality hit me hard when the time came to catch my plane to Boise.
I am home now, basking in the memories of a great get-together. When will I get a chance to see you all again, guys?

scaredofKGB

Hmm, your "it wasn't my idea" story almost convinced me, but I am now 48 hrs older and a lot wiser!! -- so be warned

For my handle, I was trying to decide between this and CallMeGullible, but I figured why give others an unfair advantage? Besides, this is a better conversation-starter.

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=D

kyklin

Smooth - the fun part is as soon as essxjay and you retired to your room after the after-dinner drinks, scaredofKGB quickly grabbed TropicalFlyer and said "I am confused! What is the deal between smooth and dgolds?"