Urban Planning, ABCrepes, and biking

Hello again,

I wanted to tell you what in the world I have been up to, because I feel like I have not done that in some time.

Well, I am still in school (huzzah!) and closer to realizing my dream (huzzah!). What is that you ask? I am on goal to get my degree in Urban Planning with minors in Comm and Econ. My plan is then to apply to Grad school and either get my Sustainable MBA or a Masters in Urban Planning.

Planning is so frigging cool, and to think I would have never found out about it had I not enrolled in school again after all this time. With any luck, I will be able to help plan cities! I can't even begin to tell you how cool that sounds to me. Even if I just get to work on some important part of city planning, like sustainable planning, or transportation issues, that would be so cool. Can you imagine that? Design a sustainable business and utilities part of the city. Or, build a mass transit system that will decrease costs and increase revenue in the downtown area. My brain is weeping with joy at these concepts.

AB Crepes

So one thing that is readily needed and abundant in college towns is affordable tasty noshes, and Bellingham is a little light in that area which I am surprise at. Mostly pizza and beer joints, a few fast food places, and then
some late night places like long time champ of late night food. Pel' Meni. Pel' Meni is a small place with a limited menu. You can get either potato dumplings or beef dumplings, or a half and half combo. It comes with some olive oil, paprika, cilantro, a half slice of rye bread and a small serving of sour cream. All for only $6. One of the best things about this place is they have a record player and I would guess over 100 records to choose from that anyone can put on and play.

But a new place has opened up, and is open late, and offers the same price point. Variety is the spice of life, and AB Crepes is that place. Opened up just recently in downtown (which needs some help here) by a couple of WWU students, AB Crepes is a crepe joint. They offer the traditional nutella variety but also some others, like a Mediterranean vegetarian and breakfast ones with eggs and whatnot on them. They even have a gluten free crepe batter you can ask for. And they are open late with a walk up window, so you can just swing by on the way home and get one to go.

I had to try it, so I went there and got the gluten free Mediterranean one. It took awhile as they did not have any gluten free batter prepped, but it was well worth it. The gluten free crepe held together! That itself was a complete shock. The fact that it tasted great and was moist as well, just outstanding. The fillings were plenty and tasty. Overall the crepe was huge! Lucky for me I was pretty famished that day and ate the whole thing, telling myself it was okay, I earned it. Plus I had to walk home so that would help with the digestion of it all anyways, right? (Kidding, of course I am right).

I recently became some what employed again, which is great. As a starving student I needed that. Other than the fact that I now have some pay coming in and some benefits, it also allowed me to finally tune up my bike. It needed it very badly and now, now it rides so smooth that I want to ride it everywhere. I realized as well, that it is like my horse and I have been neglecting it. I will forgo the logic I used to come to the horse comparison, least I sound crazy and scare you off. Never the less, biking is great. Check out this video about biking in Portland.



Polar bears are epic indeed.

It would be great if every city could achieve this sort of rider friendly space. I can't recommend to you highly enough, if you don't bike, start doing so now. It is so much fun.

Anyway, I need to get back to studying for finals. Yes I will be publishing more. Yes I will be taking Summer classes. Yes I will try my best to eat more food and take some pics (although were I live now has a terrible kitchen that is overused and messy all the time. Really makes it hard for me to get motivated to cook in it). I will also get some batteries and take some pics again. I miss posting my OG shots.

Also, I just realized that I have some people (you all) that read this blog from all over the place! Leave a comment!

Also have to give a shout out to Good Capital, a socially responsible investment firm. Check them out.

Until next time...

Cafe Rumba and Canon

It has been awhile, faithful blog readers. To be honest, I have not found anything super exciting to be blogging about, but I recently was able to get out and about and had some divine encounters with awesome cocktails and food.

I visited Seattle a couple weeks ago and met up with a dear old friend of mine. With him, my girlfriend and I went to Canon bar and drank some concoctions of amazingness.

Canon is nothing short of genius as far as bars go. Seattle, this is a shining star you have. With some of the best bartenders in Seattle (if not the country) tending there, mixed the ambiance of an era gone by, and stiff drinks to help ease the pain of living in these woeful modern times, Canon is by far one of the best things to ever happen to any drinking scene anywhere, period.

Located at 928 12th Ave in Seattle, WA, the unassuming store front hides well the powerhouse that it really is. I really don't feel like going into detail here about the great bar tenders, there are tons of articles on them already, but I will say that Jamie Boudreau owns it and Murray Stenson is employed there. There are other capable tenders as well but I am unacquainted with their names.

Their drinks are many, and the mixing is great if not perfect. The bathroom is the best in all of Seattle. Seriously, I could spend hours in that thing.

I had a Canon Cocktail, of which it was made of I can't recall but I assure you it was splendid. Sitting on the corner of the bar are old drink/cocktail books. I am always interested in new drinks and lately have tried a Boss Tweed and a Rapscallion; both are strong and taste good.

I picked up the top book and flipped though it to see if there was anything in there that I might want to order, and I ran across this number, the Bennett Cocktail.

So of course I had to have one. I asked the purveyor of drinks working behind the wood bar top if he could make one of these, and he casually glanced at the page and said "Yeah, no problem."

A few minutes later and I had it in my hand. It was either the two drinks prior to this one, or the fact that I may have drank it too fast that led to me not capturing it in a photograph, but who am I kidding, it was both those things.

A great evening all in all, and a place I would visit again on my next Seattle visit.

Cafe Rumba

I was wandering around Bellingham a couple weeks ago and ran across this new Peruvian deli in town called Cafe Rumba. It was closed when I walked by, but mentally noted their business hours to make a visit when they were open.

I do not regret this in any way shape or form. Antonio and Marco are great hosts and the food they prepare is outstanding. It reminds me of Paseo, but Peruvian instead of Caribbean. Whatever, they both serve delicious pork with a sauce on amazing bread.

I am in love with their chicha morada, a purple corn drink that is out of this world and from what I can tell healthy for one as well. I asked Antonio and Marco if I could buy it by the gallon, and they said yes which made me extremely happy. They also imparted to me that they get the ingredients for their chicha back from Peru as they can't find ingredients here to make satisfactory chicha. I didn't ask to see their invoices as I took them at their word about this, and why shouldn't I. A new business in town could hardly lie to a loyal customer who buys in bulk from them, could they?

As far as music goes, I have not been out much these days. Between the study load and the lack of funds being a student, it is prohibitive. Besides, this is Bellingham, and I am not sure how often well known bands get up here. But I guess that is the thing about this smallish, sorta quaint liberal hippy town; there are new bands every week here, home grown, and one of them might turn out to be the next Death Cab for Cutie or Posies.

Oh well, I guess I can start seeing shows once I get a little more free time (Summer, I'm looking at you) and have some more resources available to me.

Until next time, keep your chin up.