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GABST Day 3: On to the next

Another busy day on the Great American Bookstore Tour. After a final morning in Seattle that included a visit to Mercer Street Books, and a walk up one of the steepest hills known to man (and by man I mean me, as I had to stop three times to catch my breath and covertly air out my sweaty t-shirt), Sarah and I got on the road to Portland.

I’ve learned from Seattle not to judge a city by its downtown, and so I’ll reserve my opinions of Portland for tomorrow, after I’ve visited neighborhoods quirky and hipster enough to qualify as authentically PDX. For now I’ll just say that little gets me in the mood for out-of-town adventuring like a free wine and beer hour, which Kimpton Hotels — my Portland stay is at the impressively furnished Monaco — provide on a nightly basis.

I also picked up two new travel companions in Portland, best friends from high school whose decision to accompany me on the Portland/San Fran leg of GABST will cut down on my “eating alone in restaurants” quotient by a significant amount. Together we enjoyed enjoyed dinner and drinks at Grüner, a German/Eastern European spot that had me hooked at “beet-pickled deviled eggs,” and even more drinks at Scooter’s, a downtown dive our waitress recommended with no small amount of trepidation. Two beers and two Jell-O shots later, I’d spent a whopping $9.50 (with tip) and was ready to saunter home and crash in our almost painfully Portland-esque hotel suite. (Like seriously, the lobby has gourmet dog treats.)

Just your average heavily patterned hotel room.

Having yet to see anything outside a three-block radius of the Monaco, I’m already wishing I’d allotted more time for Portland. And persuaded into the aforementioned Jell-O shots by a boisterous bridesmaid-to-be, whose friend was having her bachelorette party at Scooter’s — on a Tuesday — I also can’t wait to see what Portland has to offer by way of 20-somethings, de facto hipster sister city to Brooklyn that it is.

Anywho, tomorrow it’s on to Powell’s, bastion of books, paradise of pages, labyrinth of literature. As there is a distinct possibility I will get lost and die in Powell’s (intentionally or non is TBD) I just want to say that it’s been a pleasure blogging for you all. I bequeath my cats to my mom and my furniture to my sister. Just please bury me with my books.

GABST DAY 3 BY THE NUMBERS:

Bookstore visited: 1
Mercer Street Books

Books purchased: 2
The Mysterious Stranger, by Mark Twain
An American Dream, by Norman Mailer

GABST DAY 2: Bookstores, book bars and oh, have I mentioned books?

In the spirit of the Great American Bookstore Tour, and in honor of another 24 hours of amazing Seattle weather, GABST Day 2 was the bookiest day in vacation history.

First off, I owe Seattle a bit of an apology, as comparing it most directly with Chicago was based on limited information. Turns out Seattle is more like if Chicago and Georgetown had a baby, and that baby had a few too many hills and a lot of strong coffee and a seemingly citywide love of all things reading.

Day 2 started (after a morning walk through Pike Place Market, and a visit to the first-ever Starbucks) with the much-anticipated trip to Elliott Bay Book Co., which is, I don’t know, heaven? Between the wooden floors, high ceilings, skylights, armchairs, reading tables, and respectful hush — I’d underestimated the value of shopping for books in peace and quiet — I basically wanted to throw down some blankets and camp out there forever, dividing my time between reading, sleeping and…no, just those two activities. In fact, the only thing that would make EBBC better is if its adorable little cafe sold wine. OH WAIT, IT DOES.

GABST Day 1: Champagne, ice cream and mini-golf

photo (7) — The view aboard the ice cream express.

Something very very bad is about to happen.

That’s the only conclusion I can come to after spending a day in Seattle during which the sun shone incessantly and the temperature never dipped below 65 degrees. You guys, I got a sunburn. In Seattle. I mean, the other shoe has to drop, right?

So Great American Bookstore Tour, Day 1, went swimmingly. At first pass, Seattle reminds me a great deal of Chicago, which is to say that the people are nice, it’s very clean and slightly less walkable than you’d like it to be (although, in Seattle’s defense, I am also a truly atrocious navigator, managing to turn what should have been a 1-mile, half-hour walk into a 1.5-hour sojourn through vaguely industrial and highway overpass-y areas that looked more like the outskirts of a sad suburb than the heart of a beloved northwestern city.)

Anywho, after perusing Pike Place Market (eating brioche and drinking 1 p.m. champagne cocktails counts as perusing) my travel-mate and I walked up to South Lake Union, where we boarded — like eager children — something called the Fremont Sunday Ice Cream Cruise. Yes, it’s pretty much what you think: We sat on a boat and learned some Seattle history while eating ice cream. (I also came to the conclusion that I’m going to need a houseboat.)

From there it was back to the hotel for a brief respite (read: me falling facedown on the bed and wondering how I’m going to keep this up for 14 days) before heading out to Smash Putt, a genius suggestion from an ST reader. Smash Putt is like if Mad Max created a mini-golf course in the basement of an early 90s videogame nerd. It’s like putt-putt meets Max Headroom. Best of all, they let you shoot golf balls out of pressurized air guns into various nets and old machinery and pieces of metal. So, not your typical Easter Sunday (though, I guess it depends on your family).

Tomorrow we move on to the main affair: Elliot Bay Book Co.

A Lean In addendum, or why partnering with Cosmo is bullshit

A few weeks ago, I reviewed Sheryl Sandberg’s lady-empowerment book, Lean In. My reaction to the book was cautiously pro—I feel Sandberg has some great points about conducting oneself in the workplace and, for females in particular, not getting caught up in the kind of insecurity that might prevent one from securing a promotion or taking on a new project.

My objections, however minimal, were not to Sandberg’s status as a gainfully employed and happily married wealthy person, someone with the resources and support system to truly balance work and family. (For the record, I find this criticism—that Sandberg is only speaking to fellow rich people—off-base, and think people who latch onto it are missing the point. Sure, many of the things Sandberg has done personally to achieve a work/life balance are feasible because of her perch atop Facebook, but just as many of her overarching themes apply to women of myriad financial means. To disqualify a successful person from making suggestions to those of lesser means is senselessly limiting, especially as people like Sandberg are in a unique position to effect real change.)

I’ve also found myself ambivalent about the revelation this week that a Sandberg PR person laid into former Facebook employee Katherine Losse for writing a tepid review of Lean In. Yes, using the infamous “special place in hell” quote on someone who was simply less than thrilled with your boss’ book is a dickish move, but if we’re really going to have a conversation about feminism and gender equality—the conversation that Sandberg, whether you agree with her approach or not, is attempting to initiate—it serves no one for us to get sidetracked by Internet-fueled cat fights.

But I do have a sizable objection to one facet of the Lean In roll-out, which in addition to Sandberg’s book includes a website, Facebook page (natch), media partnerships and about a zillion public appearances. My objection is this: In a society struggling to move past judgments of females based on their appearance or relationship to men, I find it more than a little hypocritical to peddle your feminist message through Cosmopolitan magazine.

Born round, hungry and addicted to Cinnamon Toast Crunch

For as long as I can remember, for as long as I have existed on this earth—with the possible exception of infancy—I have struggled with my weight. Sometimes it’s been a miniature struggle, a war waged against cafeteria food or bodega breakfast sandwiches, and sometimes it’s been a knock-down-drag-out Battle Royale, a prolonged conflict of interest between me and meals, me and gyms, me and clothes, me and the third dimension.

Throughout my life, I have always felt that there’s a misconception about fat people—and I will, for the purposes of this post, be including myself among fat people—which is that they are most directly unhappy with being fat. While there’s certainly truth in that, you’d be impressed (you thin people) with the mental gymnastics one can engage in to convince oneself that one is not in fact fat, that one is merely temporarily chubby, irreparably big-boned, retaining water, or the victim of a sizing fraud conspiracy perpetuated by the Gap. No, the reality is that fat people are second-most directly unhappy with being fat, and first-most unhappy with being emotionally over-invested in something so innocuous and apparently selectively predatory as food.

Let me take you into my brain for a moment (don’t worry, it’s spacious). Say we’re at dinner, an Italian place. As we catch up on one another’s lives, I’m looking you in the eyes and smiling, but my mind is a million miles away. My mind—since this morning, most likely—is whirring on a hamster wheel of culinary anxiety, which goes a little something like this: