Odds and Ends

Dear Diary,

It's so good to be back!  Have you missed me?  As much as I've missed you?

The Thursday and Friday before my backpack's theft, the 14th and 15th of May, I visited something like 27 parks in something like 29 hours.  I want to be fair to a lot of them about their plumbing, so, since it's been so long, I'll have to re-visit them before I can tell you about them.

But the ones in this page shouldn't need re-visiting, because none of them have plumbing to be fair about.  Heck, the first goes all the way back to May 12, when you may have noticed I took a long time to get from Cowen Park to University Playground; that's because I visited en route

University Heights Plaza

It turns out much of the city block on which the former school, University Heights Center, sits is the property not of the non-profit that runs the Center, but of the Seattle Department of Parks and Recreation.  It's astonishing how many parkish amenities they jam into the space, regardless of which entity owns the land under each:

A playground, of course.

A P-Patch.

A basketball court.  But there's one amenity not there; I'll let the Center explain:

(Well, at least one.  I haven't found any water fountains either.)  As if to make up for this, there's currently this:

I saw several not obviously homeless people use these while I was there.

This is the last of the little, plumbing-free parks I listed as local some while ago, at least as far as I know.

Leftovers

Skipping ahead to Thursday the 14th, I decided to start my trip to Lake City with visits to the three remaining little parks in the area I'd already covered, up to 110th St.  I took 35th Ave north, partly because I thought (correctly, thankfully) it might have sidewalks the whole way, and partly because all three parks are pretty near it.

Wedgwood Square

Seattle has a lot of streets that share their names and general latitudes or longitudes with other streets.  I like to use the computerish term "instance" for these.  For example, one instance of 82nd Street, a very small one, runs from 34th Ave to 31st Ave.  There it's divided by a triangle.  And this triangle is Wedgwood, um, Square.  It's full of trees, and on that afternoon also of kids.  There definitely isn't room there for a restroom, and I saw no sign of a water fountain.

Mock Creek Ravine

This park's official address is actually on 35th, but all you'll find there is a fence.  However, if you go down 97th St, just north, pretty much to its end, you'll find, first, that this is yet another piece of the Thornton Creek Natural Area, and, second, that it has a fairly big grassy, level area at its front door.  However, just like all the other TCNA pieces, it lacks plumbing.

Nathan Hale Playfield

I mocked my old map for claiming each high school was surrounded by a park, but in this school's case, it's sort of true.  The parks department has several deals with other entities, in which one party owns the land, the other manages it; here, the Seattle Public Schools own, but the parks department handles some of the management.  (Since the substantial Meadowbrook establishment is next door, this may be as simple as equipment sharing.)

In theory, when school isn't in session, the general public can use the field.  In practice, since this is a high school, it can't possibly be that simple, school teams practising in morning, evening, and summer.  I don't know whether you'd get into trouble if you just wandered over alone and, not seeing kids, started running laps, but the school officially bars unauthorised visitors, and you'd have to be an idiot to bring a team there without prior arrangement.

Anyway, apparently right now, since the school is closed, so, according to the school, is the playfield, park or no park.  I saw several people climb a fence to get in.  In my previous out-of-neighbourhood trip, my phone was very low on power, so I didn't take any pictures, consoling myself that the parks I was visiting weren't my real focus.  This time, I took a few, but more or less of the door shot variety, not neat stuff shots.  Dueling signs at Nathan Hale Playfield:

And yes, that's the fence people were climbing.

There are a bunch of buildings near the playfield, and for all I know some might have plumbing, but I doubt any are open to fence-climbers.

The page with the rest of Thursday the 14th's parks will feature another such deal, and the page with the parks I visited on Friday the 15th will describe one the other way round, with the parks department as the landlord.

I also stopped at Meadowbrook while in the neighbourhood, and so can now attest that its men's room works fine.

All for now, dear Diary.  Isn't it great to be back?