LSU in Seattle

Many moons ago, back when the world was young, I went to Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge to watch LSU play Texas A&M. I remember only two things: LSU won, and everybody booed the Aggie band when they walked onto the field. They put on such a good show that everybody cheered when they walked off. It was another eighteen years before I would see another LSU game in person. I went with my sister to see LSU get routed by Georgia in Athens in 2004. Last year I went with her again to see LSU lose in overtime to Alabama in Baton Rouge.

Saturday night in Seattle, when LSU was down 7-0 in the first quarter against a Washington team that went 0-12 last season, she said, "If we don't come back and win this game, you're banned." Happily for me, LSU did come back to win, so maybe I'm off the schneid. At one point the full moon was hanging low over the water and boats, which made a really nice scene.

I'd been to Vancouver, B.C. a few years ago, but never to the American Pacific Northwest. I was interested to see what Seattle was like, what the people were like, and how the food tasted. I was not disappointed. The city seems to be very quiet for a city its size, but I was there on a holiday weekend. The people seemed nice, especially--well, I guess this calls for a story:

In the beginning, there was the World's Greatest Waitress (Note: in this case "the beginning" would be October 19, 2000). Later on, there was the World's Greatest Bartender. On September 6, I met the World's Greatest Girl Who Works at a Chocolate Store in Seattle. An inch or two taller than me, silky brown hair, sparkling eyes, and a nice smile. I asked her if it was hard working there at the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory. She looked me in the eye--time stopped, angels sang, birds landed on my shoulder, and I got a little lightheaded--and said, "Oh yeah." On our way out she thanked us, and I said, "Oh no, thank you."

I should have proposed when I had the chance. She would have made me so happy. I don't know if I'd have made her happy, but I'd have given it a shot.

I was pleasantly surprised by the food. When I was in Vancouver I was a bit disappointed. In Seattle I had a couple of good burgers, good pizza, and a nice dish of blackened chicken linguini at McCormick and Schmick's. And of course, the chocolate...

Seattle's really clean. I mean it's really, really clean. Of course, I spent the summer in New Orleans, so maybe a lot of places would seem clean in comparison. It made me wonder what sort of draconian measures are in place to keep it that way. I looked for something that I would take for granted seeing someplace else but didn't see there, and hoped I could ask "Hey, why isn't anybody doing X?" and they'd say, "Oh no, we can't do that. It's against the law!" and I'd say, "What? You can't do X? That's terrible!"

I'd like to take a trip back there to see a few things we missed this time around. It's a nice place.

Note: I'm watching the U.S. Open, and Trump was there with a woman I assume is his wife Melania. He started talking to her, presumable about play on the court. She sat there and stared straight ahead. Does anyone know if she's allowed to talk?