[Later sent as email photo digest, at 5:27 pm]

I had an unusual start to my day on Independence Day this year. I was in bed and asleep when my husband said, at regular volume from near the foot of the bed, "Darling?" and I was so startled I shit myself.

Just kidding! I mean, he did scare the shit out of me. But then he handed me an omelet. So I had breakfast in bed, so I was like, okay fine I forgive him.

Shobhit had a morning shift until 1:00, and I made plans to see a movie at the AMC 10 in the U District with Tracy and Laney—who had not yet met each other—at 11:45 a.m., choosing the earliest showtime because the movie we were seeing had a run time of 2 hours and 44 minutes.

We never saw it, though. I took this photo and posted it to my socials, and IT WAS A LIE! We actually waited for a solid half hour before I finally went to ask if something was wrong. The guy out front said they were having server issues and it should be up and running in less than ten minutes. Given the chatter we had already overheard in the projection booth, I did not trust that this left hand knew what the right was doing.

Moments later, another guy came into the screening room and told us they were unable to get the movie to play and would be issuing both refunds and a free movie pass for each of us. In retrospect, I'm guessing this was why the showtime was listed on the app as "sold out" shortly after we got to the theater: they probably just blocked off the room because they couldn't get the movie to play. They could have informed us a little earlier than half an hour into our time sitting in the theater facing a blank screen, though.

So, we all pivoted: we'd just hang out for a bit at a nearby coffee shop. We decided we would just walk over to The Ave (for out of towners: that's what Seattle locals call University Way, the primary business corridor in the University District) and see what place with outdoor seating we could find. We didn't even quite have to reach the Ave before we found a place called Leon Coffee House, which is right next door to the Neptune Theater and which I have passed many times but never given any more than a cursory glance. And, it was great: Tracy got a mango iced tea; Laney and I both ordered a mango mimosa, and shockingly for a coffee house, it was truly one of the tastiest mimosas I've ever had. (Laney noted that she saw them do at least an 8-oz pour of champagne in both our glasses so that may have been part of it. Except! I actually don't like mimosas with too much of the champagne element and this was delicious.)

Anyway! The space inside is delightfully quirky, with a ceiling covered in umbrellas, and bread roll pillows on a couch just inside the entrance, as well as the uncanny dog-shaped throw pillow that looks remarkably like a real dog, especially in photos. Except that if the dog were real, the way Laney was holding it would be defying the laws of physics.

Laney and I took Light Rail back to Capitol Hill Station. I walked home from there. Shobhit and I watched the last two episodes of Ripley on Netflix. Fast-forward to about 7:45, and Shobhit and I were walking down to Lake Union Park for Seattle's Fourth of July fireworks over Lake Union.

Here is Shobhit walking north on Boren Avenue, in between the Seattle Convention Center and Olive Tower.

This was where we were just reaching the south side of Lake Union Park, which is on the south end of Lake Union and gets plenty crowded in its own right on the 4th of July, but doesn't get anywhere near as nuts as going to GasWorks Park at the north end of the lake, something I swore off doing after experiencing those throngs 24 years ago. (We live a lot closer to the south end of the lake anyway so that also makes it much easier, for instance to walk the 2 miles from home and back as opposed to the nearly four and a half miles it would be to GasWorks.)

The sun was nearing the horizon by this time, and I just thought it made a lovely picture through the trees in the park, as we crossed the streetcar tracks.

Last year we pivoted to watching from a spot overlooking the freeway but still on Capitol Hill, and I'm thinking now that we will go back there again next year. But, because Shobhit is currently on Weight Watchers and truly obsessed with getting in steps every day, we decided to walk back down to Lake Union Park again this year as it was a longer walk both ways. (At a distance of 2 miles from home, that made a 4-mile walk round trip; the spot last year was 1.6 miles from home and thus a 3.2-mile walk round trip. I guessed we were also actually closer to the fireworks last year, but I just checked, and although I was technically right, it was not by much: 0.94 miles away versus 1.12 from the spot I estimated on the map the barge launching the fireworks was.)

We even found the exact same spot we sat at for the fireworks in 2022: on a short concrete ledge to the side of "Goose Beach," over on the west section of Lake Union Park across the small inlet there. It was on the other side of the footbridge but the police closed that to keep crowds from clogging it up as a fireworks viewpoint, so we had to walk around.

I never get over how the U District has developed its own mini skyline of high-rises in recent years. Compare the above view to this one from all of two years ago; or especially this one from 2018.

I took this shot when the sun was just about to finish setting. I love how well my phone takes nighttime shots anymore; I thought this turned out beautifully, and literally looks better than it did to the naked eye in person. We are all slave to the machine! Moving on . . .

Goose Beach and the park area behind it got super crowded itself, and all the way to about 10 minutes before the fireworks began, people kept carrying huge canoes or paddle boards of one sort of another (we saw a couple versions that were folded up and carried on a couple's backs, then they unfolded and strapped them together on the beach) out onto the water. More than once there were near misses so close to a paddle board bonking an unsuspecting crowd person in the head that I nearly had a heart attack.

It's a rainbow! Nice to see a mashup of Pride and Independence Day. Okay, sure, Pride doesn't have sole ownership of the rainbow. Let me have this! It was super cool, anyway, especially how it reflected in the water. This was easily my favorite photo I took yesterday.

Walking home after the fireworks ended: the city enveloped in smoke.

Okay, so this part is just a brief addition that is not part of the email photo digest I sent out: I just have to mention that I had my virtual lunch with Karen over Zoom from work this afternoon, as if I don't put it here I might forget to mention it in any future post.

She's been back a week after a weeklong cruise to Alaska with her family, so we spent a little over the first half of the hour with her telling me all about that. She also told me just a little about her insanely busy travel itinerary, as it involved a two-day trip to Portland for work that ended only the day before they left on the cruise; and the trip the previous weekend to Cape Cod for her brother-in-law's memorial service. This was all why she had to cancel our virtual lunch two weeks ago, and thus this is our first one since Monday, June 10.

It was the evening of the very next day, June 11, that Shobhit and I flew out for our anniversary trip to Toronto. So, we also talked a bit about that trip, and that apparently she has a conference opportunity to visit that city for the first time next year. She's very excited about it, and the fact that I can serve as "a fantastic tour guide" with recommendations for her. Of course I always have to keep in mind accessibility issues in anything I might recommend, as she's a wheelchair user.

Oh, and actually the very first thin we brought up was the cats, as it was the first time I spoke to her since we put Guru down on Monday. She offered very heartfelt condolences which I very much appreciated.

I guess I'll post this now, though, and spend some time getting work done. Gabby kept telling me to leave early on Wednesday—it was a lot like what Jennifer G used to do before holidays back in the old days—and I finally did at 3:30, leaving an hour earlier than usual. But of course, especially as I'm covering for both Cathryn and Amanda today, I've got a lot to do today. [posted 1:45 pm]

Thu, 10:46: "The Seattle Public Library would like you, please, to not return your books." The Memorial Day Weekend ransomeware attack that knocked out SPL's electronic systems has still not been corrected after five weeks, which really sucks. But! It's sure working out for me, because my copy of DUNE was due back on June 2 and I still haven't finished it. I'm really close to the end now though, so it would be a very convenient time for me to be able to return it and check out a new book. This whole thing *is* about me, isn't it?? https://t.co/BFEoHRgQONZ/
Thu, 11:40: A triptych of weirdo observers of a triptych of weirdo film shorts! https://t.co/AWSXlc8EAK
Thu, 19:08: Is Warren G related to Kenny
Thu, 20:11: Seems odd to me https://t.co/TclBc964uv
Thu, 23:51: Independence Day 2024 https://t.co/yrgOVesTMB