04/18 Seattle with Mom and Lisas Party

The next few days in Seattle involved feverishly putting together my thesis defense. In the end I delivered it to tens of thousands of screaming fans. The cheers reached a crescendo when I showed that the linear elastic time history methods I developed for prediction of shear wall buildings subjected to earthquakes gave a 5% improvement in prediction over conventional methods.

Needless to say I was choked up and was relieved that the smoke from the pyro show following my conclusion hid my tears.


I had always envisioned that my defense would result in an immediate trip to the bars where 12 hours of debauchery would begin at one of the dirtiest bars on the Ave. In reality, after finding myself staying up late and waking up early several days in a row, a nap sounded much more appealing.

I went home, and fell asleep while watching television with Courtney. Much thanks to those who attended, and an extra thank you to those who joined me for a very hard core and serious feedback session over beers at Brauers before my big day.

My mother came into town the following day. She didn't make it to the defense because apparently the music and special effects between each slide was a bit too much for people not in our generation. Regardless, we went out for the day in downtown Seattle since I hadn't really had much time to enjoy myself.

We went to the Smith Tower for my first time ... I don't know how it took me so long to go, but it was definitely a cool stop.






Afterwards we went for a beer at a Pioneer Square pub (not Cowgirls Inc.). We peeked our head into a couple but none seemed inviting, one however was a little older looking bar and my mom seemed fascinated by the old-style bar (she was also a big fan of the old fashioned elevator in the Smith Tower) so we decided to have a drink. I was expecting to grab a small table but she wanted to sit at the bar elbow to elbow with some of Seattle's most colorful characters.

We sat down and settled in when there was a mumble in my general direction. I turned to see the guy next to me saying something that sort of resembled English. The guy was a weathered looking black gentleman with a mouth full of broken and decaying teeth. He definitely looked like he had seen better days. He asked me what we were drinking, I just said "Oh, probably a beer or something." When the bartender came over my mother and I ordered two Mac and Jacks, my compatriot to my right said that he'd have one too and proceeded to pick up the tab for our beers despite our complaints.

He then went on a long somewhat confusing story about how he was on his way back to jail. I think he said he had a DUI and perhaps one time he didn't report to his trial or something. He started telling us about how his girlfriend had 10 kids, and how she gave him the money to bail out. He then kept asking me whether we thought he should get a lawyer or whether he thought he should go with a public defender.

I may have spent a little time in the clink but I couldn't provide much valuable advice on this front. He then without warning bought another 2 beers again to our objections. My mother was driving so in the end I ended up scoring three beers off this guy. We tried to pay but he explained that he had been through some bad luck so maybe doing something nice would mean something nice would come back his way. In the end we bid him adieu, thanked him for the drinks, made sure he wasn't driving home and then headed off.

Afterwards we met up with Byron, Kitri and Courtney, had dinner at Pesos (the scallops are killer) and Courtney and I then walked to Ozzies to meet up with the crew for Lisa's birthday bash. The party was awesome as Wes, Matt and Emily also met us there.

Here's the birthday girl with Kyle:


Very few of these were taken by me. Most were from Courtney's. I've labeled those I took as opposed to the other way around. I spent most of the night in the corner with Emily and Wes trying to find an acceptable song to do with the three of us. Unfortunately they didn't have the latest cooperative effort by AC/DC, Spoon and System of a Down so I never graced the crowd with my beautiful singing voice.

Courtney rocked hard as always:


Here's me excited to be done with my defense!


Me, Matt and Emily.


Courtney and Eset sitting at a table. But Courtney? Isn't that table reserved?


Apparently they had an exemption:


Ultimately this document was edited repeatedly until it resembled our Constitution. In other words, it was a mess of amendments, nonsensical statements and was easily interpreted in a dozen different ways.


Here's the crew at the table ... reserved no more.


Although apparently Kyle, Vik, Brian and Jason weren't invited. Not that they're bitter or anything.


Here's the birthday girl with her arm candy.


Wes still in search of that song ...


Court and I in blurry mode ...


Less blurry, although still not particularly good.


The girls all singing together. No doubt it was the obligatory karaoke "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" or something (one of the few by me).


Vik serenaded the birthday girl (also by me)...


... "I'll make love to you." (last by me)


This set the mood and love truly was in the air.


Courtney, Emily and Eset.


Eset got out of control ... as always.


Not to be out done, Lisa stole it away.


When asked, "How are you enjoying your birthday Lisa" this was her only response:



Thus ended our night. I had one more night in Seattle before flying out Sunday the 20th where I went to work for all of a week and a half before heading out to visit Tamer in Egypt (These posts were completed all out of order).