Tag / coffee

by Adron

SEAFAB Cafe

I took the Sound Transit 542 over to University District today to check out some coffee shops, get some work done, and generally just hang out like I do. The first stop on my galavanting about Seattle today is at SEAFAB Cafe. I’ll start off, first with the negatives and then delve into the positives of this place. Wrap it all up with a rating and features of the shop.

Negatives

The first thing to note, is that the vast bulk of these negatives are just stupid car culture carbrain shit, bad infrastructure, and completely unrelated to the cafe itself. I’ll enumerate:

  1. The sidewalk is parked on. Yeah, that carbrain shit is in full force down here. The really stupid thing is, there is parking down here that is availbe right out front still, since people just park in what appears to be the side of the road that converges into a gravel lot.
  2. The bike infrastructure out on the main road here is decent, albeit dated PBL (Protected Bike Lane) that merges/egresses from the Burke Gilman Trail. This is a positive, but then it dumps you into this heavily parked road which is hellsihly confusing exactly where you should or shouldn’t really be with atrocious street and sidewalk amenities.
  3. Speaking of that, the parking situation for bikes is less than desirable. Which is oddly out of touch considering that Recycled Cycles is right next door, you’d think there would be better bike parking and sidewalk amenities considering, even if they were just kind of non-city standard stuff. But it’s instead this oddball rack and a few sign posts here and there. Of course, Recycled Cycles has some staple racks and such out front but the cafe doesn’t. So no biggie really, just something that ought to be improved.
  4. Ok, this is the only cafe related negative. Their stock of items in the fridge and their ice cream machine were just empty. It’s possibly the newness of things and they’re working on it, but it’s always a little unsettling when the counter space, equipped to hold items, is empty. Kind of gives you the “are they in business?” feeling.
  5. The wifi didn’t have internet access. It seemed a bunch of folks were working away on their laptops, so I suppose someone had internet access or they were just making due.

Positives

The positives outweight the negatives significantly.

  1. The music was chill. Albeit dated 70s-90s stuff, but if that’s in your wheel house, then good stuff.
  2. The coffee, very importantly, was good. I ordered a capaccino and a dirty chai, but where a good solid 8 out of 10. Good job SEAFAB!
  3. The vibe in cafe was super chill. Good spacing, seats, and the like, which just makes it easy if you’re going to do some laptop work or if you’re going to chill with some friends and talk, or even have a quick coffee or lunch meeting.
  4. I ordered some salmon avacado toast to spite out of touch right wing financiers spouting clout since I’m a home owner and it was really good! The food seems to be consistent, clean kitchen, and all that good jazz!
  5. Location is great, with lots of connected transit, easy to bike too (albeit the previously stated concerns) and the clientale seemed super chill too.

Ratings & Features

  • Electrical Sockets: Readily available with numerous around the entire cafe. Many literally on the top of the counter that rims the windows.
  • Wifi & Internet: I didn’t get the internet working, so I ended up tethering. This did make me depart a little earlier than I would have otherwise. I’ll be back again to check this out.
  • Seats: The where 3 comfy chairs and everything else was modern standard metal and wood. Impressive considering most cafes and coffee shops these days are just hard uncomfortable chairs everywhere!
  • Prices: The prices seemed pretty average, not expensive but nothing cheap.
  • Lighting: Good lighting and good places to shield your laptop from errant sun when needed.
by Adron

Talking Bakfiets

Recently I was out running errands on my R & M Load 75. I’d stopped by my storage unit to drop off a few crates of things that didn’t need to be sitting around my garage. Then I’d headed over to Village Square Cafe for a diner like breakfast.

Then went about seeing if I could find a plugin somewhere to charge my bike, as my charge was low. I had my spare battery set just for good measure, but I was down to ~35% because I’d forgotten to charge the bike earlier the previous night. So I didn’t technically need a charge but I figured it would be nice to charge up if I could. Albeit, something I’m astutely aware of now, is that there are next to zero publicly accessible outlets in Redmond. Not really surprising, electricity isn’t cheap, but I was sure I’d seen a few I could *borrow* a charge from. 😬

In the end, that would be kind of stealing, but places also let you easily charge your laptop, albeit that’s negligible vs. two monster bike batteries. Still not charging an excessive multi-ton car, but substantially more than I presume most places to want to offer for free.

Anyway, I didn’t find one but I did go rolling into the Town Center and met Nina (Spelling?) as she walked right up to me and inquired about the R&M Load 75. After discussing for a few minutes I hope to see her riding about on a new Load 75 in the near future with her kiddo! It’d be great to have more company over here on the east side in the bakfiets community!

On that note, I’m going to finally get around to setting up a bakfiets meet here on the east side, stay tuned over @ https://bakfiets.bike/ to get that notification (i.e. subscribe for email and you’ll get notified in your inbox). So far this year has started off a bit nuts and with the closure of G&O a few months ago it really threw me off for starting the bakfiets meets!

Eastside Link Light Rail

One of the places I’ve started frequenting to work in, as it’s nice and large, plenty of seats, is the Dote at Redmond Technology Station. Two issues, which is kind of standard for Microsoft, is that they get places like this on campus but then don’t really truly open them up to the public. They don’t offer a public wifi but sometimes have the public Microsoft account that you can use. But that’s a bit sketch, to which hopefully Microsoft sorts that out with the private businesses that they invite onto campus to operate but then make them operate as pseudo private establishments. A coffee shop in this modern era has wifi, so come on Microsoft, let em’ have truly public usable wifi!

But I digress, wifi aside, it’s a really interesting location. Super chill to work there, however I am concerned it stays open over time considering the current state of light rail opening (it’s partially open).

The starter line, as it has been dubbed, runs from Redmond Technology Station to Bellevue South. The key population center it runs through is Bellevue, which provides some anchor to a degree, albeit very few people seem ready to use it in Bellevue and as many in the area know, Bellevue is about as auto-dependent and pedestrian friendly as a parking lot. There are parts of it that are nice but overall it isn’t really acclimate to walking or to using transit, sadly enough. It’ll get there one day, considering the transit center and routes, but overall the people here are a bit myopic about the whole situation – so far.

That’s it for today’s thoughts, back into introspection.

by Adron

The Early Week in Pittsburgh

The day after arriving, I headed out into the city for a day of work. On this day I wanted to try out Gasoline Street Coffee. With a short ride up over the bridge from South Side Flats into the city I arrive at Gasoline Street. One of the excellent things about the South Side Flats, is if you’re commuting into downtown Pittsburgh you could literally walk and beat most commuters into the city. The commute from this area is wildly easy to get into and out of the city.

The week that I was in the city, the weather was absolute perfection every day I was there. I kid you not, perfect temperature, perfect visibility, zero rain (until literally the last few hours while I was departing), zero fog, no smog, it was just spectacular!

Once I cleared the bridge into the city from the South Side Flats I made a kind of zig zag through several blocks, on one I went the wrong way not realizing it was a one way, and eventually passed under tram station shown below, which looked pretty nice and modern. As I was rolling along too there were a ton of police all over this part of the city, which I realized the station was over this way and it all made sense.

As I rolled up to Gasoline Street Coffee, it wasn’t an street nor was it related to gasoline, but there were plenty of private vehicles parked on the literal *public* sidewalk in front of the place. Which, as usual for this sort of behavior, makes for a very unpleasant approach to any type of establishment.

I strolled inside for my morning brew and was greeted by – contrary to the outside – a pleasant hello and a spastic and cool interior! The inside of the place definitely had more of an street feel to it, and overall had a bunch of cool seating, tables, and other amenities. But being the weather was absolute perfection, I opted to have my coffee outside at one of the tables.

After fueling up with caffeine, it was time for the remaining commute – all of about 6-7 minutes – into the downtown office building city core.

Car Free Core? Pedestrian Focused?

As I finished up the last 2 blocks, I realized that these last two blocks were heavily, VERY heavily focused on pedestrian oriented activities. This first one, is this park in between these gleaming cavernous glass lined towers. It’s an open space park where people often sit and eat during the day, or just meet for discussion or whatever else may be going on. I made several visits to this area and it was nice, a great way to get some air and get out of the building environments.

The next space, which is literally just the next block over, is another square but lined with restaurants, bars, and other eating establishments, along with a rim of trees that adds a great aspect to the whole square. Again, just like the other park(square?) I ate here several times during the week and it was rather splendid.

Just for the detail, here’s where the two blocks are in downtown Pittsburgh.

Anyway, watch the video, and see it as I travel through the streets and narrate it all for you!

Pittsburgh Day 5 Part 1 – “Daily Commute” & a stop at Gasoline Alley

Millvale & Attic Records

Later in the day, after all those working hours, I headed back to South Side Flats and then headed out with my pack to go explore Attic Records. Attic Records is just outside of Pittsburgh in a small town called Millvale. Just on the northeast side of Pittsburgh along the north side of the Allegheny River.

This next episode is all about that trip back out of the South Side Flats, across the city core of Pittsburgh, and along the north side trail along the Allegheny River. It’s a stunning route, and one – for those visiting – I highly recommend riding!

Once I rolled into Attic Records, I wished I’d brought another $5 grand to spend on records and a larger pack to carry it all in! Attic is a jack pot of albums! I could have just stayed in this shop checking albums out all day, but alas, I managed to keep it to about an hour of perusing and then purchasing only 2 albums at the time! Just crazy!

Overall though, an absolutely great shop, so if you’re into or getting into vinyl and live around the Pittsburgh area just go ahead and put their address in your “places to go regularly” list!

For a full review of the record shop, plus a few other details check out my record shop review on Vicious Shred here. This trip and visit marks the start of Mission 2 of my record recon missions for Pittsburgh.

Pittsburgh Day 5 Part 2 – Attic Records in Millvale! CHECK THEM OUT!

Finally I wrap up day 5 of this trip, with a visit to Government Center Records, Randyland, and The Government Center. Wrapping up record recon mission 2! I’ll leave you to watch the VLOG instead of elaborating however. Enjoy!

by Adron

Proper Portland Brew, Transport & Week Kick Off

Mmmmm

Mmmmm

by Adron

The Side Door

Barista

Barista, classically amazing coffee.

Today I headed to The Side Door as my second office of the day. After making my postal pick up at the UPS Store and enjoying a good Barista espresso & cappuccino to kick off the day I wanted a different side of the Willamette. I cut through along Yamhill to Naito Parkway and then along the water front and over the Hawthorne Bridge. Once on the other side it was a loop under the bridge and out to Water Avenue up to The Side Door.

At The Side Door I had a great working session before heading back out for an easy commute back to the home office via the Portland Streetcar CL Line. Yup, that’s right, two trips confirmed on the CL Line.

The working session at The Side Door was great too, in that I was able to get a lot of work done, but also got introduced to a lot of rocking doom metal via the rocking staff. Thanks Side Door staff!

…with that, I’m at the home office and it’s all foot traffic for the rest of this day.