It's in a pretty nice neighborhood (if a bit crowded for my tastes), and there's a huge park a mile or so up the road with just about everything one could ask for: playgrounds, sports fields, historic buildings, a birdwatching trail, a leash-free area for dogs (they briefly coincide, which leads to some interesting interactions), a velodrome, and even a climbing wall:
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| Which I... erm... can't quite get up in my sneakers. Yeah. That's it. Totally the shoes' fault. |
All in all, the place was quite lovely for my first month and a half there:
But as September drew to a close, the days grew overcast. To the east, the Cascade Range hid itself in a heavy haze. Clouds rolled in from the Pacific, clustering above us like schoolchildren after a summer apart.
And then, at the stroke of midnight on October 1, the rain began.
