Portland

Well, I think I'm finally recovered enough from the Portland trip to write about it. That, or I've just been lazy in writing it. :P Either way, it was a long day, but a fun trip. It began with me dragging my ass out of bed at 6AM, to eat breakfast, brush my teeth, and leave to be at the train station by 7AM. My dad drove me and my sister downtown, and we picked up Kitty (my girlfriend) on the way. Thankfully, the train wasn't late, because it's a 3 and a half hour ride down. We got to Portland around 11AM. From the train station ,we took a bus across the river to the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, or OMSI. I'd been to OMSI before, but not since I was 8 or 9. Needless to say, it had changed quite a bit. It was still fun, though. Lots of hands on and interactive exhibits. OMSI also has a real live submarine in the river next to the OMSI building, and we went on a tour of that. This sub was one of three used in the movie The Hunt for Red October, a movie about a Soviet submarine during the cold war whose captain and crew want to defect to the U.S. The inside of the sub was cramped; I'm 6' 3", and I had trouble squeezing through some of the doors in the interior. The inside could get even more cramped when the sub was at sea; frequently, cans full of food were stacked wherever they would fit, which was most often on the floor. Stack two layers of those cans on the floor of the sub, and I'd be walking around bent double!

After we left OMSI, Kitty wanted to ride MAX (Portland's light-rail system), so we walked back across the river and did that. We got off farther up the hill, above downtown Portland. From there, we walked back down to Powell's City of Books, where we spent about an hour browsing and sitting in the Powell's cafe. Kitty is partially blind and unable to read books that well, so she bought an audio book instead. My sister and I were supposed to pay for it, sort of as a "thank you" for her waiting for us, but neither of us had any money. Well, I'll take her out to dinner sometime instead. Or maybe, I'll just hand her $40 and say, "here you go."

When we finished at Powell's we went to a small bakery a couple blocks from the bookstore and bought food for the train trip back. Then we walked down towards the train station, crossing a bridge near the station and doing a little more exploring because we had some time to kill. About this time, it started raining steadily - it had been raining off and on all day - and Kitty was starting to get a little depressed. Her mood is interesting; it seems to change with the weather sometimes. So, I just held her hand, and that seemed to give her enough strength to keep going. I know she can, but I don't know if she knows that she can. But, that's a story for another post.

Finally, it was time to go back to the train station. This was just a one day trip, unfortunately. On the train ride back up, Kitty and I fell asleep on each other's shoulders. Well, not quite - my head was on her shoulder and her head was on my head. I think my sister thought we were a little weird, but she thinks that about me anyway. My dad picked us up, and we did the reverse of what we'd done that morning, dropping Kitty off and then going home. We were tired, but it was a good kind of tired. We all had fun, and next time I want to go overnight. Now I just have to find a cheap hotel.