— छह हज़ार चौहत्तर —
Neither Shobhit nor I are fully recovered from our colds, but I think we're both mid-upswing now. I am only intermittently congested, although as of yesterday my voice is altered in a way it hadn't been before; Cathryn made fun of my "low sultry voice." She asked me later, "Is it a sore throat, or?" I told her I didn't have a sore throat at all; if I did, I would not have come in. She told me she wasn't worried about it.
Gabby did come sit by me at the beginning of the day yesterday to ask how I was feeling. I was in a slight fog for the first couple of hours yesterday, which I did not disclose to her, but I'm convinced that was just because of the Day-Quil I took before leaving home, which was maybe ill-advised. I told her I felt mostly better, "at about 75%," and that was true. (Also, side note, I actually had a solid night's sleep last night, for once, not waking up in the middle of the night until shortly before my alarm was to go off this morning. So that was quite nice.) She noted that she should have thought before I had brought all my stuff back from home, after working from home the previous two days, to suggest I still work from home if I wanted and then meet up with the team for our Summer Happy Hour at The Nest.
I had actually considered this, and it probably could have worked. I was too afriad that staying home would telegraph a fear that I was still contagious (which I would not be at this point), only to still meet up later. In retrospect, it probably would have still made sense to just continue taking it easy for another day even if I still met up for the Happy Hour, but whatever, I did come back to the office. I even rode my bike, which was fine, except that I had to walk back to the office to get the bike whe we were done; had I been thinking I might have ditched the bike for another day so I could head straight home either on foot or on a bus from there at 1st & Stewart. It was only six blocks from the office, anyway.
In any case, I was dead set on attending this Happy Hour, since it was at a location of my choosing, and partly to celebrate my 24th anniversary at PCC (which was actually on August 5, but I was in Brussels then).
The Nest is a rooftop bar I had still not been to, on what functionally would be the 13th floor of the
Thompson Seattle Hotel by Hyatt.
And this has already become something of a tradition: for our Summer Happy Hour, we go to a rootop bar of my choosing, and we've done this
three consecutive summers with this particular team (or all three versions of it now: "Pricing & Promotions" at the Smith Tower in 2024; "P3" at the now-closed Mbar in 2025; "Merchandising Enablement Team" (MET) at The Next in 2026). My
19-shot photo album for The Nest is also, of course, now added to my increasingly expansive "
Rooftop Bars and Restaurants" collection; that's gotten so big that I just also created a separate, more narrowed collection for just "
Seattle Rooftop Bars and Restaurants." That alone numbers 18 albums.
Anyway. I didn't bother posting a regular Daily Lunch Update (DLU) yesterday, at first because I figured I would post about going to The Nest later in the evening—and then I later decided that could still wait until
today's DLU, since I shared an extra post on Wednesday evening anyway:
Netherland: The Retrospection. That was intended to be the "final thoughts" post about our trip to The Netherlands and Brussels. Shobhit texted me later that he read the post, and was surprised I said nothing about how much more diverse was than the predominantly-White Amsterdam was.
Well, I actually already mentioned how White Amsterdam seemed to be in my
World Pride travelogue. But, I did not make mention of this in my
Brussels travelogue, to be fair. Still, given the geopolitical positions of these two nations, this difference just made logical sense to me. The Dutch have a colonial past just like most Western European nations, but this means the nation itself is historically White, as opposed to, say, the U.S. which was borne
of colonialism and then evolved as an epicenter of immigration. As I already noted in the Pride travelogue, Amsterdam is very proud of its "more than 180 nationalities," which suggests diversity of a sort, but many of those nationalities would of course be White. (You could perhaps counter by pointing to London, itself in a country arguably the worst offender of colonialism in history, as a boiling pot of diversity. But London is a global economic and cultural epicenter that no city in the Netherlands could ever hope to be. To me, this is comparing apples and oranges.) Brussels, by contrast, is the city considered
de facto the capital of the European Union, another element that lends itself to greater diversity of people passing through. I bet anything no other Belgian city is quite comparable on that front.
— छह हज़ार चौहत्तर —
— छह हज़ार चौहत्तर —
But, I digress! Another reason not to worry about posting a DLU yesterday is that I had nothing of note to report about Wednesday evening, which I just spent at home after working from home, watching TV with Shobhit. We got to just two episodes left of the Amazon Prime show
Ride or Die, which is objectively dumb but still fun with charismatic performers so I'm into it. I did that instead of going to the movie I would have gone to if not for this stupid cold. I'm going to a movie tonight, though. Between the trip and now this cold getting in the way, I'm being separated from my beloved cinema far too often, and I'm starting to go through withdrawals.
I did have a couple of notable phone calls last night. First, I got a call from Gabriel, which was the first time I had spoken to him since getting back from Europe. He marveled at how much we packed into our time on the trip. I was like, "Well, consider this: what little spare time we had outside of all that, I was working on those travelogues!" I was like, "I
know!" and brought up what he saw me working on when we were on our trip to Lummi Island in May. That was kind of funny because I only worked on photos during that trip; I didn't write up the travelogue until after I got home. But with the trip to Europe, I knew I was going to want to write up five separate ones, and it would just be far too overwhelming to wait until I was home to even start them—it was actually critical to
prevent getting exhausted by them, to work on them while on the trip. Besides, the travelogues become my only version of a blog when I travel, so there's all that. I need all this shit recorded!
But apparently the primary reason he was calling was to tell me he had watched the Spanish movie
Sirât while flying home from a trip to Chicago. He was mad that nobody told him
not to watch it. I later had to text him a link to my review, because ironically, I literally wrote in it that I "could not in good conscience recommend it to anybody." I said that in the first paragraph, and in the last reiterated that I would encourage people to avoid it. Not because it wasn't well-made—it was—but because its point overall was elusive, and things that happen in it are shockingly traumatizing to experience.
I truly can't imagine watching that on an airplane. That is
not an airplane movie. Unless you're Gabriel, apparently.
Anyway, he had to end that call before it had even reached 15 minutes. And then Shobhit said, "You should call your dad." I told Dad that later during the call we had that lasted a little more than an hour, and he clearly appreciated it. I wasn't even sure if Dad would be up for a phone call, after his back surgery in the morning (Gina texted
this amusing shot of him in the hospital bed to a family group text), but I thought: well, if he isn't, then he just won't answer.
He answered very quickly, though. He said he was just in bed scrolling on his phone. I got the sense that it was good that I called, taking his mind off the pain he was still in (not knowing yet if it was only due to the surgery or if it was still the back pain the surgery was meant to help), and it sounded like he was a bit bored as well. We talked a lot about travel stuff, which was fun. I did not remember that Grandma and Grandpa McQuilkin had themselves gone to the International Balloon Fiesta in Albuquerque, which Shobhit and I are going to with Jennifer and Matthew in October. He said that was how he learned about it. Dad and Sherri have drive through New Mexico, but they've never done the Balloon Fiesta. I'm really looking forward to it, of course. That's the final major trip I have planned until Provincetown in June, so there won't be any travel for an intervening six months, unless you count a possible overnight trip to Vancouver, B.C. in December, though I would not call that "major." Regional, maybe. I do still have to plan my Birth Week in April, though, which may involve some regional travel as well, particularly if I go with the Washington State lighthouses theme idea.
Anyway, I didn't even realize I'd be talking to Dad for so long, but it was nice. I threw out the idea of coming to visit them on the 29th, in lieu of the canceled Family Vacation trip. He quite understandably said we'll have to see how he's feeling when that day is closer, and I totally get that. We did buy quite a lot of chocolates in Belgium to bring to the Family Vacation though, and we need to bring them to someone! I think it should be them.
— छह हज़ार चौहत्तर —
Oh. Did I ever even finish telling you about The Nest? Talk about digressing! It was nice, if a bit warmer than we bargained for. We had outdoor seating, which Gabby had initially reserved for seven, but Amy wasn't able to make it. This was our first outing with the newly-expanded and renamed "Merchandising Enamblement Team" (MET), so Kevin and Mackenzie joined us for the first time. Between them, Cathryn, Brandy, Gabby, and me, there were six of us. There was a set of couch-like seating facing each other in which six of us fit comfortably, except half of us were sitting in direct sunlight that a tilted sort-of umbrella was meant to be shielding us from. There was also a standing table next to us that was part of the reservation for us to use when our bites came, and we all just moved over there once the food arrived.
Sometimes we have a second round of drinks at these things, but the bigger the team gets, the less inclined I think we are to do that, even without Gabby discouraging it. Also, the cocktails there were expensive, between $21 and $23 or so; we each had one cocktail, but also a "welcome bubble," the server called it, basically a small glass of champagne shortly after we all arrived. I ordered the hummus plate to eat, but also had one of the tofu and squash skewers from the second plate Gabby ordered, after sharing her first with Cathryn.
The Next was cool, but not my favorite. The views were great of course, but I think maybe this one is a little too close to Pike Place, which made it crowded and very touristy in feel. I need to find a new rooftop bar to go to next year—when not only will I be celebrating 25 years, but Brandy will be celebrating 20 (in the same month; I think they said her actual anniversary was today)—and perhaps somewhere a little more removed from Downtown. Except being in the area does make it a lot more convenient for everyone. So, we'll see. I'll have options, and I will consider them all!
— छह हज़ार चौहत्तर —
[posted 12:34pm]
