Space Needle & EMP

After the exhausting day we had yesterday, we took our time getting out of the house this morning. Another overcast day. What a shocker.

On our agenda? The Space Needle.

Self-portrait with the Needle. To get this, it took about 5 tries. :)

Despite the less-than-ideal weather, we decided to fork over the dough to go to the observation deck.

The view was still pretty cool, but it could have been better. We couldn't even see the mountains!

The sun did peek out a few times.

We spent a good portion of time up there, just enjoying the view. I also read up on the history and construction of the Needle, which I had forgotten since my last visit. It really is quite fascinating!

When we put our feet back on solid ground, we decided to grab Subway for lunch and take it up Queen Anne's Hill to eat overlooking the city in Kerry Park.

Pretty cool view of the skyline, huh?

After that, we decided to head back down into the city and check out the Science Fiction Museum (SFM) and the Experience Music Project (EMP). You pay one fee to get into both places, so we took advantage and checked them both out.

The SFM had some pretty cool sci-fi paraphernalia. We're not really that into sci-fi, but it was fun to see some of the more mainstream things, like say... the Ninja Turtles! They also have a special Jim Henson exhibit going on right now, so there were lots of Sesame Street characters, Muppets, and FRAGGLE ROCK (my favorite!).

We made our way over to the EMP, and ran into this really cool guitar sculpture-thingy:

They have a lot of space dedicated to Seattlite Jimi Hendrix, so that was interesting. Lots and lots and lots of guitars in there, too. The exhibit displaying the history/evolution of the electric guitar was cool.

Our favorite part, though? The playground!

OK, so it's not really a playground. But it felt like one.

They have all of these sound-proof booths set up that you can go into and play around with instruments. Drums, keyboards, guitars, even just microphones for singing. In the microphone/singing booth, they have a system set up where you can play around with different effects on your voice. There was one that made me sound like I was possessed by a demon, especially when I laughed. It was awesome.

We could have stayed here and played for HOURS, but we were running out of time on our parking, so we decided to call it a day.

So that we weren't trying to drive home in rush hour traffic, we had asked Christy for restaurant recommendations downtown. She also polled some people at work, and everyone came back and told us to go to Benihana. Sounded fun, so we decided to give it a go.

We loved it! I had actually never been to a Japanese restaurant at all, let alone one where they cook all the food in front of you at your table. I had obviously heard about it, just had never been. Anyway, our chef was entertaining, and the food was delicious. Mine was HOT (spicy, not temperature), though. Holy hell. The chef asked me, on a scale of 1 to 5, how hot I wanted my dish. I generally like spicy food, so I figured it'd be safe to go with a 3. It was SO GOOD, but it was right at the threshold of what I can handle in terms of heat. Dear lord. So, word to the wise: GO WITH A LEVEL 2. :) It took a few hours for my mouth to regain all of its feeling.

Afterward, someone told us that Benihana is actually a chain restaurant. Who knew?! We didn't; we don't have them at home. But hey, we really liked it, and it was new to us, so who cares, right? HA!

Once back home, we relaxed with Christy and Mike with a few drinks out on their patio.

And so ends another day in Seattle...