Fourth of July, Fabulous, with Pho

Excursion time!

Cien puntos to RantMom!


Never mind. RantMom will take 10 points in English and let someone else go overboard in Spanish.RantMom gets all these props for:

--chatting with her neighbor early in the day on the Fourth

--picking up suggestions for a promised RantWomen, RantMom + RantWoman excursion for our Fourth of July activity

--finding a free on First Thursdays stop at MOHAI on Lake Union
(also expressing interest in more free museum activities so RantWoman has something concrete to cheerlead RantMom about as RantMom learns some increments of skill about how to do internet searching. But don't tell RantMom; RantWoman wants RantMom to stay motivated and MAYBE have fun. So Shhhhh!)
--plotting the route to the museum (Rt 7 plus SLUT) because she already knew the way from picking up Irrepressible Nephew from sailing at the Center for Wooden Boats.

And all of this without even once expecting RantWoman to look things up for her!

Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Congratulations to RantMom for ALMOST going native.

Plus RantMom definitely enjoyed learning some WA / Seattle history she has not previously taken the opportunity to interact with.

RantWoman for her part was charmed by:

--signage with decent contrast and large enough font that RantWoman could read as much as she wanted (less than the total available, but still...)

--a dress worn by some kind of pioneer, someone who was tall.

--several exhibits with audio elements RantWoman could just listen to and not try to focus visually about.



Okay, so RantMom brought along her wheeled backpack for RantWoman to keep trying not to trip over. And the holiday crowds included LOTS of children zigzagging around without even thinking about Ambassador Thwack. RantWoman found this tiring enough to think about something grilled and smoky from all the food vendors, but a place to sit, air conditioning, and getting home away from the madding crowds before the fireworks started all seemed like REALLY good ideas.

Back onto the SLUT and the #7. The first Pho place was closed so on to Columbia City and Rainier Pho, a place RantWoman ALWAYS esteems for cheerful cleanliness, easy fast service, and piping hot broth. Both the RantWoman seemed to be afflicted with some kind of hacking respiratory crud so the soup was partly just to steam out our breathing passages. Check, with RantWoman's nose for several hours of Pho spices and jalapeno slices!



Is there photographic evidence?

Umm, not so much. RantMom has a brand new Smartphone. RantWoman has a slightly less new underused but not entirely satisfactory tablet with TWO cameras for RantWoman still not to know how to use. For the RantWomen to be able to use either one of these, there would have had to be some Read the (__) Manual. It was a bright sunny day and the RantWomen had better things to do. oops, well.


Just so the world knows, RantWoman did engage in her minimum daily requirement of geekspeak as follows:

--RantWoman's friend GrandMa FF who came to visit in the morning got a new om-puter, a new Mac. GrandMa FF is flummoxed by new vocabulary: to GrandMa FF, a conversation is that live thing that happens between two people. Wrapping her mind aroung the idea of a conversation showing a whole email exchange together was definitely a daring venture into new territory.

--RantWoman was in orbit Wednesday night. Her spiffy new DSL / somewhat higher speed internet modem arrived Wednesday afternoon. RantWoman opened the box Wednesday night and decided further interaction needed some sleep and more daylight. RantWoman got back to modem installation when she got home after her day's adventure on the Fourth. Installation was mercifully uneventful, if you don't count that genre of fascinating reading called the End User License Agreement. RantWoman is such a nerd. She STRONGLY prefers to read every word of such things.

This time RantWoman was also sort of desultorily listening for the part where the NSA gets permission to data mine all the transaction metadata. RantWoman did not find this, but she did find several places references to call centers that might be outside the US where privacy regulations are different. Oh sure! Once it's outside the US, the NSA standards for monitoring are even freer.

O come on! RantWoman has been near some pretty terrible tech support calls; even RantWoman's flair for hyperbole at least would not call them terrorism. RantWoman hopes any NSA types who happen upon such streams either die of boredom or move on quickly!



Happy Fourth!