Fremont Oktoberfest

Went to the Fremont Oktoberfest on Saturday with Steve, Nan, Andrew, and Greg. Let's see, we started the festivities with food because none of us ate lunch. I think it was on purpose. At least for me anyway. I had bratwurst with grilled onions and sauerkraut. Then the five of us shared an order of curly fries. The guy was drilling the potatoes! And check out the size of one order of curly fries. Five of us and we couldn't finished it. Very sad. Then again the part we didn't get to had so much oil in it that it didn't taste so great anymore. Other food on sale that day: corn dog, burgers, crepes, grilled corn, samosa, shishkaberries, elephant ear. Didn't make it to the shishkaberries. Yumm, a row strawberries dipped in chocolate on a stick. How did I passed that up?

After getting our stomach ready for the alcohol, we got in line to retrieve our 3 oz(?)souvenir mug and tokens. Steve got our tickets ahead of time. Here is the set up, the beer garden is a separate section for those 21 and over. You still have to pay even if you're not going to drink. Less then the your alcohol counter part of course and you get two tickets for the root beer garden which is on the other side, and outside, of the beer garden. For those who are drinking, each token represents one tasting in your miniature mug. At first glance, the size of the mug didn't impress me much. After we began the tasting however, that little thing was just about the perfect size I needed for my four tokens! And yes you can buy more tokens as you go.

Here is the list of what I tried:
- Mothership Wit - loved it! Nice and light. My favorite.
- Arrogant Bastard Ale - oh the joy of being able to go up and order this heavier, more bitter brew with the nice, older gentleman who was serving us.
- Pumpkin Patch Ale - it's of the season so had to try it.
- Pear Cider - another light one with a little sweetness.

I like lighter beer so the first and the fourth were my favorite of the day. My friends like darker and more bitter brew so the others were their favorite. I took a sip of Kona Pipeline Porter from a friend's mug. I liked that one also. Nice coffee flavor. Yes I'm still talking about beer.

After the four tastings, we came back out to the food area since we were now ready for the elephant ear. It's suppose to be a local dish of fried dough. To our disappointment, the vendor was packing up! No elephant ear then. Will have to wait for the next festival. Across the street from the festival was Theo Chocolate. It's an organic chocolate factory...with lots of samples! Andrew, Steve, and I were in heaven! Little chunks of Chai tea, vanilla, Ghana, Venezuela, coffee, and nib brittle to sample. I think we each did double sampling on a couple of the flavors. Andrew dropped a not so subtle hint about the ones he wanted for his birthday, which is coming up apparently in a couple of days. Oh, Andrew and Nan also tasted the chocolate sugar body scrub. That's a little too adventurous for me even if all the ingredients were edible.

After lounging around on the couch at the chocolate factory, we headed over to Roxy's Diner for happy hour per Andrew's suggestion. Yes happy hour on a Saturday! All appetizers half off. The Reuben spring roll was the specialty. It made the list of Seattle's Best for 2006. Don't remember what category. Also on the order, fried vegetables and hummus plate. Alexis is now sitting in for Greg since he left earlier during the tasting. The spring rolls were really interesting, in a good way. Minus of course the oil dripping down our hands during each bite.

Back to the beer garden. But before we made out return, we took a side trip back to Theo. It was to let Alexis have a go at the samples since she met up with us at the cafe. Who am I kidding, we all wanted to go back for some more samples. Ok, now back to the beer garden. I didn't buy anymore tokens but did took a couple of sips from other people's mug just to taste. Can't remember which ones I tried. Too many names to remember. Apparently the Fremont Oktoberfest is one of the bigger ones in the country!

An entire day of beer and fried food and chocolate. I hope I'm still able to fit into my bridesmaid dress for Susan's wedding!

Hello Seattle!

After spending August apartment hunting on craigslist, I finally found a September sublease in downtown Seattle. My flight landed on a sunny Thursday. Nan picked me up from the airport and we went to a late lunch in Wallingford. Majority of the restaurants were closed but that might have been because it was after the usually lunch hours on a weekday. We ended up at a Japanese place because, well, it was open.

She dropped me off at my September home, a twelfth floor 2 bedroom apartment with a view of downtown. I met my new roommate who was sick and stayed home from work. Didn't do much the rest of the day except went to the store downstairs to buy food. Actually, didn't do much on Friday either. Went to the downtown library, an amazing structure with glass and steel exterior, to pick up bus map book. Walk around downtown a little bit and came back to the apartment.

On Saturday, went to Nan's and Steve's apartment to have lunch and went for a walk around Green Lake. We decided to rent a pedal boat. It was $12 for an hour. After putting on our life vests, we got to pedaling. We were aiming for duck island but wasn't sure if were going to make it because, after 10 minutes, we were already tired! We came pretty close to the island and then turned around to go back to the dock. The ride back was a lot easier because the current was going with us. Needless to say we did not last the full hour. We went and got green tea lemonade at Starbucks (insert Seattle joke here), and headed home. On the drive back to drop me off, we stopped at REI to pick up some pack towels for them and Trader Joe's to pick up grocery for both our places.

Sunday and today, I watched TV, listened to music, and cruised craigslist for shared housing and employment. I'll be doing that pretty much everyday until I find a place to live and land a new job. But I did went out for a drink tonight with my roommate's friends at Joey's in South Lake Union. Very nice place on the water. We sat outside. The weather is similar to Santa Barbara right now.

So that's my first couple of days in my new city. And my first holiday. Hope everyone had a great Labor Day weekend.