Smilin' Jack: Lights!! Camera!! Action!!

Or - Let's All Go to the Movies...

First a few random shots and then we're off to the movies.

Even though it is chilly, willy, the birds are still flocking (hahahaha, get it!?! Flocking!!) to the bird feeders. The tube feeder, the one in the top picture, is always full nearly to the top and by 1300 or so, the level of seeds is down below the top-most perch. Then the fighting gets pretty ferocious for those last two pegs!!

Mighty fierce!!

The birds that normally feed on the 'limbs' or pegs, actually get on the ground and begin to scratch out their food. Even here, the competition is fierce as the pigeons are all down there and keeping busy.

Little birds gotta be quick!!

Meanwhile, the ones that are fortunate, or mean enough, to be on the bottom peg eat it as fast as they can. They'll be kicked off in just a couple seconds.

We went for a walk the other day and I got this shot. For some reason, I've taken to shooting streets with my zoom lens.

When I finally get to what I'm shooting for, I'll let you know.

In the meantime, it's a good neighborhood environment picture, right!?!

We were walking down to the McDonald's for a treat and heading down Rainier Ave South.

Just a little further down Rainier and on the other side of the street they have, by the bus stop there, a series of murals depicting the wildlife of this part of Washington. They're on metal panels put up along the fence separating the sidewalk from parking lot.

Actually, they're kinda good. I mean they're not exact but they are, in a colorful way, in the ball park.

Not bad, eh?

Then, just a bit down the road we saw this guy in a vacant lot. I don't know why I take pictures of these rats with cute tails but, I do. Even though when I see them outside getting into the bird feeders, I try and sneak out so I can get a shot at them with the BB pistol.

Nasty little critters.

And then, at the mini-market on the corner of Cloverdale and Rainier, we saw this relic of times past. The funny thing is, this has been on this corner forever and I've driven past this corner hundreds of times and...never seen it before.

I've even walked past this corner over 40 times and...never seen it before.

So much for my powers of observation, y'all.

OK, backstory...Michelle and Matt collect Coke bottle caps and redeem them for movie tickets. I think you can redeem other things but they love going to the movies (Michelle does!!) and so I collect the caps from my DCs and the occasional Coke that Carol drinks and then, when I have enough, I enter them onto an e-mail, and send them off to M&M.

Every so often, they'll say thank you by sending me a small gift. And here it was!! They sent us a coupon for the movies with drinks and popcorn!!

AMC Amazing!!

And, so, we were off to the movies!!

I dunno, I was just taken by the Victory Grocery today. It's an ugly thing, old, smelly and run-down. It's primarily a beer and cigarette stop. I know the last time I bought candy bars there, they were visibly old...I threw them away and, to be honest, I don't throw a lot of candy away!! You just gotta look at me to know that statement is true.

One look at the outside of the store and you can begin to believe what I said is true.

But we're off to the movies!!

Ridin' the Link Selfie!!

Woo, woo!! Let's get on the A Train and hit the rails.

Getting off the Link and hitting the mean streets of Seattle...looking west on Pine. Going west takes you to the Puget Sound and the north end of the Pike Place Market.

And looking east on Pine. This goes towards the inner city and the Convention Center. Oh, and the AMC Theater.

Gotta say, I do like the Christmas Season. I like the decorations and the music. Beyond that, not so much. But the decorations and the music are Grrrrr-reat!!!

Ah, the city sights. Notice the jackets and scarves!! It was a little bit nippy today but not too bad.

And, fun story. We were walking along and one of the Valued Homeless tried to sell us a local newspapers ... and I said no and he asked if we were from out of town. As we kept on walking I said, over my shoulder "No, we're from Rainier Beach." and he said "Oh, don't shoot me, Man."

Hahahahahaha, the neighborhood's reputation has spread city-wide!!

There's the terminus of the Famous Seattle Monorail. You have to go inside and go up to the third floor to get your ticket and board the Monorail for the one-mile ride to the Space Needle.

We continued heading east up Pine Street. Along the way, we saw the entrance to the Pacific Place Mall and a Tiffany's shop there. I liked the entrance and so I got this shot.

Remember this shot, it'll come into play in a little while. After the movie.

In the meantime, we continued on our merry little way.

And they are getting the city ready for Christmas. I bet this is great at night. I am thinking we'll plan a dinner and stroll around the downtown soon during the evening. Oh, and the Thanksgiving Day Parade is coming up soon, too.

And Nordstrom's had Santa's Shop all set up. It was closed, of course, Hahaha, here in the city they do things up right.

I had looked, a long time ago, at where the theaters were. The Regal Theater is just across the street from the Washington State Convention Center. I knew that and I remembered that the AMC Theater was close to it.

Well, we walked right by it. Well, the other side of it. It was in the Pacific Place...a trendy and up-scale mall...you'll see. But there it was, inside this mall and we walked by the other side of it and then, after getting some directions, we headed back to it.

You can just see the AMC sign...barely.

So, when we got inside, we discovered how big and how grand the mall is. First thing we saw was this escalator going up...to the Cinema, well, la-di-dah!!

And here it is!! I never realized this was here!! It's quite a place.

And we had to go up, up and up to get to the theater on the 4th floor. It's an atrium and so you get some cloudy, gray light coming in on the food court.

Thank heavens for escalators...otherwise this place wouldn't get any business above the 2d floor.

And they had their Christmas Decorations out, too!! The theme was The Nutcracker (or, as we in the know call it, Der NussKnacker) Suite.

Way up on the 4th floor, looking down. This place was huge, trendy, snooty and expensive!!

Hahaha, finally!! The theater, or, excuse me, the cinema.

You can tell this place is nice. And the really cool thing is, here they just put the soda machines outside the candy counter. You get a cup and then it's Katie, Bar the door!!

Interesting fact, Katie, Bar the door is a colloquial expression meaning "look out" or 'get ready for trouble," heard primarily in the South. Beyond that, things get murky.

The phrase probably came from an old English Folk Song. In the song, Katie and her husband are, surprise, surprise, arguing and somehow agree that the next one to speak will lose the argument. Sounds legit, so far.

Since neither will speak to suggest barring the door at bedtime, robbers break in during the night and commit various outrages against them.

The end of the song apparently involves the husband crying out at last and repelling the miscreants thereby losing the argument with this wife. "Katie, Bar the door" probably occurs as a refrain or concluding stanza but the accepted meaning of the phrase certainly fits the story conveyed in the song.

Movie Lobby Selfie!!

We were excited to see this...especially Carol. Her daughter, Gretchen, is an animator who worked on creating this movie. Yeah, we'll be there to see it when it releases.

When I first saw this, I thought of the "W" from "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad...World". You remember, it's where Jimmy Durante hid the money and everyone was searching for the "Giant W".

Well, that's what it reminded me of.

Carol thought of a kind of shrine to the All-Powerful MachinesI there in the center. I can sorta see that.

So we saw the movie, had some laughs, ate some popcorn, buttered, thank-you very much, and drank us some soda.

All in all a great afternoon!!

Thanks, Matt and Michelle!!

Hahaha, movie is over and this is a good idea, right?

They put the Johnny Rocket's up on the 4th floor...keep the common folk up and out of the way.

Impressive.

They had more of the NussKnackers spotted throughout the Mall.

They also had a Santa Shop here, too. And, like the other one, Santa was out for coffee.

But they did have a bunch of trees and they were nicely decorated. Sticking with the bird theme.

And another. Yeah, birds, go figure!!

The mall.

One of the show-off and expensive stores. This was a toy store...or so it said. Those aren't the prices there on the side of those signs...that's the recommended age for each of these...educational toys.

Hahaha, I think these toys were more for showing off to your other snooty friends than for real kids to play with. Like that thing on the left there. It's a bunch of colorful little plastic thingies that they made into the Space Needle.

Schauen Sie!! Ein weiterer Nussknacker!!

Now this guy, he had a Seattle pedestal.

Here's the Pike Place Market...

...and a seaplane along with a ferry...

...and of course the Space Needle, Monorail and the PSC.

That about covers some of the more visible of the Seattle Landmarks.

Except for this guy, Prince Metro!!

Monarch of the Busses, Rails and Ferries!!

Being Seattle and being up-scale, they had to have some off-the-wall art and they didn't disappoint.

It's a penguin.

A penguin made of scrap metal...

Like these plates, rulers flooring and tools.

And this, it's the back side of a Eucharist Plate.

Churches have always tried different ways of raising money: membership dues, pledges, bonds, patronage and so on. But in America, the most widely used of all the fundraising tools has been the collection plate.

It wasn't always so. The practice of plate-passing originated early in the twentieth century, and it was a marked improvement on earlier fund-raising methods in America. Prior to that, most churches rented pews or had public subscription lists or they used lotteries and raffles which was criticized as gambling. Only on rare occasions would a hat be passed around to collect money for a specific reason. As global mission movements rose in the late 19th century, more and more people requested special offerings. In time, collection plates became the most powerful fundraising tool the church had.

Here's another, wider shot of the collection plate, and all the other metal items that went into creating this...penguin.

Dance into the Season...and dance around the idea that this is The Christmas Season.

Here's the inside entrance to Tiffany's...anyone for breakfast?

Recall I asked you to remember a picture taken from before we went to the movie...when I was out there walking around trying to find the AMC.

Here it is from the inside of the Mall. Hahaha, we walked along the wrong side of the Pacific Place Mall. So close and yet, I was blocks and blocks away.

We decided to take a walk and work off some of the popcorn we, and by we, I mean me, ate. Going along Pine towards 5th Avenue.

It was a first, walking up 5th Avenue. What a cool clock!!

And the inner workings. Wheels, gears and axles. Ingenious!!

Love the tree-lined streets of the city. Pretty soon all of them will be decorated with lights.

Seattle has hills. Plenty of them. Looking south down 5th Avenue.

And some cyclamen...in a huge flower stand outside a hotel.

Amazing the beauty you find when you look.

Oh, I got my book, Architecture for Dummies, and I've already learned somethings. I know what a hipped roof is. Finally. Also a mansard and a gambrel roof, too. I mention this because I intend to understand the different elements of a building.

Nothing in great detail, but just to have an understanding for the whole thing. Like this. Is it beneath the cornice? Is it part of the frieze?

Hahahaha, what's going on!?!

I'd like to know.

Amen!!

One of the many, hundreds or thousands of boutique, micro-breweries in Seattle. I could get behind this one...just for the picture, y'know.

Speaking of pictures, I got these from a series of display windows featuring old stuffed dolls and other old props.

I still don't know what they were selling. I just liked the window.

Seattle street scene.

We made a quick stop in the City Target and while I was waiting, I grabbed a couple shots.

Seasonal shots.

Birds!! Hahahahaha, go figure!!

This design was on a throw pillow.

All these craftsy things like this throw pillow or the dishes we saw the other day would be cool to have but, honestly, who has the room to store all this stuff the other 11 months of the year?

Oh, how Die NussKnacker has changed with the years.

I grabbed this shop as we left the City Target.

The iconic Public Market Center sign with the Meet the Producers sign just to the right.

Then, while we were strolling back along Pike Street towards the Link we came across a Sam Choy Poke Truck. The guy that is going to open the Stone House, over by Lake Washington, hired Sam's brother to be his baker at the new restaurant. So Carol has been keen on eating at the Poke Truck ever since. We were both excited to see it.

Next up was deciding what to get...it all looked good.

We finally decided on the Big Kahuna Kalua. It's pulled pork over steamed rice with some cole slaw. The pork was very tasty.

Mmmmmm...

Here's the Happy Girl waiting for her order.

Hahahaha, let's grease!!

And it was good.

While I was there, I grabbed some shots of the walls around the parking lot. I have a thing for brick, painted or unpainted. It's a great texture for walls.

And some more walls...of brick.

I don't know the story behind this wall. It faced onto the parking lot and may have been an entry/passageway to another building or a loading dock or...

It's got a great texture and feel to it.

And right below it was this. Five Sheriffs for one Valued Homeless guy. Ah, the Valued Homeless, they take so much and give back so...little.

But I did get something while I was there.

There were a lot of birds flying around including a good number of Seagulls. And one of them tagged my brand-new jacket!! You can't really see it as Carol immediately attacked it with all the napkins at her disposal, but it was there.

Hahahaha, damn seagulls!!

Wouldn't it be cool to understand some of the detail that was put into this gem. I mean, look at all the thought, attention and craft that went into just the exterior of this structure.

Wow!!

We avoided the Westlake Park...Just too nasty and busy. It's a shame, really.

Carol saw this and remarked that it looked like a castle. And it does. I reached out and then zoomed in as tight as I could with my cropping so that when you look at this picture you should get the impression of a castle. Again, look at the thought that was put into creating this building.