Pioneer Square!

The walk to Pioneer Square is not a terrible one as long as it's not raining, which of course it did in unpleasant bursts that prompted my third outfit change of the day when we finally got home, wet and whiny.  The Square itself was interesting, although I wish we'd gone on our usual Friday and not on a Sunday evening, when most of the shops were closed.  Our first stop was the totem pole, which I somehow failed to notice at first even though it takes up a large part of the square we were standing in.

...What totem pole?

After that, we spent a good deal of time exploring the area, pointing out all of the shops that would be fun to visit if they were open.  I was struck mostly by how different the area seemed from the areas we'd walked through to get there, which is one of my favorite things about Seattle.  The Denny Triangle area where we live is completely different from Downtown, where all the giant malls and upscale department stores are, which in turn is completely different from Pioneer Square, which had a wind-y, old-timey, red-light district-ish feel about it that I dug.  

The other thing I enjoyed about Pioneer Square was that I found two separate things that I recognized from our course reader:  The cast-iron bus stop thing...

  ...which is on the front cover of our book, although from a different angle, and this sign...

...which was in one of the essays we read recently.  I was super excited that I was seeing things that were in a book until I remembered that this was a book made for this course and about Seattle, so it wasn't like I'd spotted the white whale from Moby Dick or anything.  It still made me happy though.

All in all, I enjoyed Pioneer Square, although I'd like to go back sometime soon on a better day and in friendlier weather because I don't think I really got the whole experience.