The Fun Never Stops

I have awesome friends.

No really, I mean it.

Today I got to spend a good portion of my day with one of them running around Seattle again.

This time we hit a couple of different spots.

First up: The Seattle ComiCard Convention at Seattle Center.

(For those not 'in the know', this isn't related to the Emerald City Comic Convention)

Then off to find Kurt Cobain's grave. (Or as we found out... his "memorial")

It all started like this....

My friend Jim (a.k.a. Technogreek) has a cousin who has a friend who is a B-I-G Nirvana fan.

When this friend found out that Jim was from Seattle, he freaked-out and asked if it would be possible to get a picture of Kurt Cobain's grave to put up on his wall.

As Jim was relaying this to me, I mentioned that he might like to do a grave-rubbing as a gift as well. (As I had done it myself not long ago)

This sounded like a cool, yet creepy, thing to do so we planned to get together and do this when the weather was nice.

It turned out that today was going to work out to be that day, so he emailed me earlier in the week and we made plans to meet and take care of that.

Then, last evening (as Hotness and I were coming home from yesterday's events) I got a call from Jim saying, "Hey, how'd you like to meet earlier and go to the Seattle ComiCard Covention? I have to do some shmoozing for ECCC and I can get you in for free."

I didn't have to think twice about, so I said "Heck yeah!".

We got there before they opened the doors to the general public and he went to do his "thing" while I went to talk to a couple of the guests briefly.

One of them was Mike Grell, who is a close friend of my mom's husband.

The other was Roberta Gregory, who I was able to get a self-portrait sketch from to add to my collection.

We didn't stay long, as this wasn't in our original plans, so we left and grabbed a quick bite at Dick's (Washington landmark for burgers) and catch up with what's been happening with each other before going to Kurt Cobain's grave.

After searching around for where he was buried we found out that there isn't an actual grave for him, but rather a memorial bench in a park in Seattle.

Well, okay. So we'll make a rubbing of the plaque on the bench.

Um... no. Can't do that either.

It turns out that the bench is just that. A bench.

And not even a newly placed one in honor of the dead musician, but just a standard, old wooden bench that was already at the park.

Can you say LAME?

I can appreciate that the fans need some kind of object to bestow their gifts on, but it's actually kind of sad that it's nothing more than an old park bench with a bunch of graffiti on it.

It's hardly identifiable from any other park bench in Seattle.

We ended up taking a few pictures and calling it good, then headed back north to the Comic Stop so I could pick up my car.

When we got there, George and Paul were also there, so we hung around and talked for while.

Then Jim had to get home to get some work done and Paul went to go grab a late lunch, so they both left.

I stuck around and talked with George a little while longer, then figured I'd better get going home myself.

Hotness called and asked if I wanted to meet her in town and grab a bite to eat. Food sounded good (when doesn't it?), so I was going to meet her at a place in our neck of the woods called The Duvall Grill.

When I arrived there were more of our friends who were also there having something to eat, so we sat with them and had a great time talking and eating. (You'd think I was from an Italian family, wouldn't you?)

*Phew!*

Now I'm home again. Relaying the events of today for anybody who's interested.

I want to say again that I have incredible friends.

In just two days I..

1) went to a museum

2) visited a toy store

3) stopped at a comic store (THREE times -THREE stores)

4) walked to Pike Place Market

5) met some comicbook professionals and got in free to a convention

6) visited a memorial for a dead rockstar

7) drove through the parking lot of the Greek Orthodox Church in Seattle

I hope you had as much fun as I did.

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03/05/08

Fixed Kurt's name. Sorry.

Thanks Elwood.