We got up pretty early again on Wednesday – we were originally supposed to head up to Burlington to visit with my penpal Izzy.  However, she’d had an allergic reaction to something, her face had swollen away out like a balloon and instead, she was at the doctors office getting bloods taken to see what the heck she was having a reaction to!

Instead, we decided to use our time to fit in some of the touristy stuff that we weren’t sure we’d have time for otherwise.  We took our butts to the EMP (experience music project) and the Sci-fi museum.

Which, as it happened, was right ‘next door’ to the Space Needle!

When we got there, most of the Sci-Fi museum was closed for renovations, but they did have a Battlestar Galactica exhibition open that we both jumped at the chance to poke around (it’s the main reason we went there!).

We really enjoyed the Galactica exhibition, I don’t think there was enough there though.  It definitely has potential to improve – a cylon perhaps? At least to start!

The EMP was a bit more interactive, most of it was a sit on your own and listen to people talking over the headphones which we weren’t particularly interested in.

They DID however, have a sound lab.  In this sound lab they had a ton of instrument booths, you go in, hit the power button and this computer voice teaches you how to play various things.

Col stood for ages learning to play the drums, we tried the vocal area (but I didn’t know/like any of the songs!) – it was definitely fun!

We spent a while in there, cause the place was empty and really Col could have spent all week in there! He came away wanting band hero…oy oy oy!

There were 2 cool gift shops in there, they had the most adorable and funny onesies for babies (Battlestar, Star Trek etc) and if it wasn’t tempting fate to the worst degree, bet your ass I’d have picked a few up!

After the EMP/Sci-fi museum (which took a lot less time than I thought it would!), I suggested we head out to Redmond and see the Microsoft visitors centre (yeah, I couldn’t even believe I heard the words come out of my mouth…).

We stopped en route for lunch in a Chinese restaurant, where I had the best curry I’ve ever tried in the US – only downside was the quality of the chicken they used.  The sauce and veggies were rockin’ though!

Ok, let me state here, just, y’know, for the record, that I don’t do well with technology – not in the slightest.  I tend to break stuff, not know how stuff works and end up in tangles and a panic.  My xenon phone? That was a HUGE achievement for me in the Las technological advancements!

Microsoft? Are you kidding me? There’s technology everywhere! AGH! It’s like my idea of hell…

Then to get there and discover that the Microsoft campus covers, like, half of the planet! It was HUGE! They have a shuttle system to take employees/guests from building to building and I was 100% sure we’d get lost and never be heard from again!

Turns out, Col had to drag me out of the place – I found an awesome new toy and wanted to take it home.  I even had a line of kids waiting to play with it so had to leave it alone and move on to the other one – that no one was playing with…until 2 european men started to ‘hover’ lol!

It was great fun, no idea why you’d need a phone bigger than a 6ft tall person, but it was an interesting place to go visit for an hour.  Downside here was that the gift shop was EXTORTIONATE and only employees were allowed to buy the software – which, Col tells me, sucks!

When we were done at the Microsoft buildings, we finally got a slice of pie at Sharis – which was so sickening that I abandonned half way through and donate to Col!  While in Shari’s, we had a momentary panic as we were originally supposed to be staying in Izzy’s house that night – so, we’d not sorted out a hotel.  We sat for an hour trying to get a deal on a hotel, no power points for our laptops and a waitress who apparently didn’t think, coffee, soda, 2 slices of pie and a pot of hot tea was enough for us to order and kept giving us ‘the look’.

Col eventually sorted something – literally with minutes to spare, it was so ‘to the wire’ that we were pretty sure his laptop would shut down just as he hit the ‘book’ button!

Once we’d booked the hotel, we drove to check in (hotel count:4) – the foyer had a lovely cabin-style fire area, they had cookies on the counter (fresh and smelling delicious!) and the lady at the desk told us that there was a manager’s reception on for another hour.

What that involves is free beer, wine, soda and nachos (the proper kind with chilli, chips, cheese, veggies etc!) for a few hours 3 times a week – what an excellent idea!  (Apparently that Holiday Inn Express isn’t the only one that does it either!) The food was so good and filling that we didn’t need to go out to dinner!

After the reception, Col and I took the rare opportunity to sit on our butts and not do much.  We watched trashy TV, I pulled pics off our camera and started writing the day to day blogs from our trip so far, both very impressed with how much we managed to squeeze into one day!