Dear Diary,
On rainy days, even when there's no rain currently, it's problematic for me to take notes, so I've relied pretty exclusively on the photos for the hike narratives. Which is a problem. Here are some things I forgot to tell you about my hikes of January 9 (hike 3) and January 17 (hike 7), which only included Green Lake and Woodland Parks and only at night, so strictly speaking is still ahead.
You see, on January 17 I set off from the UW campus in late afternoon, and went far enough on NE 45th St to pass the encampments on I-5. And I didn't see the hand-washing station. Had it been stolen? Removed? I worried.
Last night, in a failed attempt to return to a motel I haven't yet told you about, dear Diary, I went that way again. And found this:
I'll have more to say about sinks like the one on the left in future, but for now let me just say that it worked, last night, and probably still does, and hooray for SPU.
So all's well, I guess, that ends well.
Next we return to Woodland Park, and to January 9. Remember, dear Diary, that a man had given me $20 to pass on.
As I pushed my cart up the hill, I heard snatches of music, sounding vaguely good.
I ended up speaking with nobody on that visit to upper Lower Woodland Park. Not even coming close to giving that $20 away.
Coming back down the hill, with my cart for the last time (on my subsequent eighty-four visits to Woodland Park, oh very well maybe only five, I parked it near the north end of the tennis courts) - anyway, coming downhill I heard that music again. Sounded like a good band.
Imagine my surprise when it turned out to be just one guy - and his piano ?
Turns out Jonny Hahn has become mildly famous busking Pike Place Market with a succession of pianos, which seem surprisingly more durable than my carts, but not all that permanent in the busking life. I don't know whether Green Lake Park is a substitute - is the Market COVID-closed? - or a supplement, but anyway I've seen him there again, probably January 21 when I again spent the day there.
Anyway, I did what I usually do when buskers I really like offer the option, and bought an album - in fact, feeling richer than I actually was, with that $20 burning a hole in my pocket, I bought two. Turns out like most modern musicians he's all over the streaming media, YouTube, Spotify, Apple, Amazon... The albums I bought are <Collage> and <Words Escape Me>, and I'll probably listen to them on YouTube before listening to the actual CDs.
Well, given that my next stop was Sandel Playground, and Fred Mayer was on the way, I stopped in with two goals. I wanted to know whether this one had two-pound bottles of raspberry preserves (no, none do, these days), and I wanted, it being a Saturday, not just any old cream cookies, but their peanut butter cream cookies. See, Safeway's cream cookies are significantly better made, and slightly more numerous, and they're easily within my budget so it doesn't really matter that they're more expensive - but Safeway doesn't have peanut butter flavour.
When I came out of Fred Mayer, then, with my cookies, there was a young woman holding up a cardboard sign. It claimed she was in "a bad situation". Now, back when I was younger and had an income, I was well aware of the impossibility of knowing whether money would help any particular beggar. In this case, for example, her "bad situation" could be an abuser or a dealer who would get the money, or an over-strict but loving mother she'd use it to flee. But maybe instead she'd use it to flee the abuser or dealer, and in any event, I'd reverted to my method when younger, made a fast decision and stuck with it. So she got the $20, and had the grace to show gratitude. And I'm left to contemplate the courage of all the strangers who've handed me money over the years, no clue where it'd go. Thank you all.
And good night, dear Diary.
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