Gathering The Umphrey Family Site

We went to Seattle because the Yankees played the Mariners on Thursday night and the Red Sox on Friday. We’ve never had as many random strangers approach us as we did as we walked around Seattle—and especially the games-- in this type of apparel (me in my Red Sox shirt, Dev in his Yankee hat).  During his commercial break even the Fox Sports commentator had to ask us how it worked that we were actually there together. 

We went to the games early to watch the teams warm up (and to watch the players up close since our tickets weren’t as close as the fans who had a bit more money).  We both caught balls Johnny Damon hit into right field.  Dev was prepared with his mitt. 

I was less prepared. Since I had no mitt I actually just ducked out of the way of the line drive and then picked the ball up out of my seat as a bunch of teenage boys tried to tackle it. 

Okay this isn’t really a family photo, but for anyone who follows baseball it’s pretty cool. (Maybe at least Gwen will appreciate it.) This is David Ortiz (current homerun leader in the American league) and Curt Schilling (who got his 2,999th strikeout in the game we watched). I suppose the Yankees have some pretty decent players, too, but Dev’s going to have to learn to work this web page if he wants anyone else to know about them. 

This was the only negative part of the trip—our hotel.  We slept in our car, but thought we’d “treat” ourselves to one night in a hotel so we could take a shower and relax. It didn’t work out as we had planned. I think the name of the place was the Jet Inn (though Dev called it Ghettofabulous) and you should never stay there unless someone offers you a large amount of money. Even then I would advise against it unless you really need the money and the amount of money they are offering is a very large sum.  We drove out of the main downtown where hotels were $300+ a night, but we went a little too far.  I guess the sign handwritten on notebook paper and posted behind the desk “we don’t rent rooms for drinking parties for people under 18” should’ve been a clue, as were things like requiring a key deposit and giving us the remote as we checked in, but we were really tired and nowhere else in the area had any vacancies. In addition to the filth and bad smell, every piece of particle board furniture was broken and all the lightbulbs in the room were burned out or missing except one. The bedding was so gross we had to rip it off (top blanket = cigarette burn holes, next blanket = clumps of hair, sheets = brown stains..) and sleep on our own blankets. Dev had to drip dry after his shower because the towels didn’t look safe to touch. There were random holes in various sizes in all the walls. We probably would’ve left and forfeited our money, but it already seemed too late to be out in the neighborhood where we were; this is also why we didn’t just sleep in the car. The police were at the motel as we were checking in; the owner said someone had just stolen a car and drove it through his parking lot and then took off all his clothes and jumped the fence. They had his clothes but were somehow still missing the car and the thief.  As we were going to out room a very drunk man came back to ask once again his room number---he’d forgot it before he made it back to the room from the office last time. I guess the selling point for most of the customers must have been “Free Channel 3.” Dev and I didn’t know what that meant but the owner warned me a lot of times to make sure our TV wasn’t tuned there if we turned it on because sometime people left it on channel 3. I guess I didn’t look like the type of customer that would be interested, but I suppose $50 for 24 hours of unlimited #### might actually be a good deal. (If that’s what you were looking for rather than things like clean sheets, an odor-free room…)

We spent most of Friday wandering around Pike’s Place Market and Pioneer Square. We had some pretty delicious shrimp gumbo and blackened salmon at a Cajun restaurant at the market place. I also had to have clam chowder at the game. They even have an Ivar’s in Safeco Stadium.