February is too short!

In February, there was the Academy of Sciences trip, a visit to Portland and Seattle, a few parties and a hot tubbing session... and *poof* February's gone with only one plan.  Can I fit three plans into March to make up for February's deficit?  That's my goal!

Plan 6: Acaedmy of Sciences

Cold, rainy, crowded, and expensive: this museum will be more fun in a year or two, but it's pretty much a rip-off now.

Bear with me while I rant about the negatives first so I can finish on a positive note.  Several friends mentioned that the Academy was likely to be crowded, so I moved the event from 2pm up to opening time at 11am.  I called the Academy a few days before and was assured that parking would be tough if I came later in the day, but would be fine if I came early -- plus there was always the $3 garage if I didn't feel like looking around for free street parking.  Planetarium tickets would be, I was assured, readily available if we got there when the museum opened.

Parking was a bear -- I had figured on 10 minutes for parking, and it was more like 30.  The "guaranteed spots in the garage" were all gone by 11am.  We had advance tickets and still had to wait in line for an hour to get in.  Two friends who showed up ticketless weren't able to purchase any.  When we finally did get in, the tickets to the planetarium (which were unavailable on the web) were all gone.  The wait to get in to the rain forest exhibit was 30 minutes, and none of us felt like waiting in it.  Disappointment turned to crankiness as we got hungry, so we grabbed a bite to eat in the cafe in the center of the museum which was, sadly, exposed to the weather.  So there we were about 1:30 or 2:00, sitting in a cold damp cafe eating overpriced food, feeling bitter about the fact that we weren't able to see the two exhibits we most wanted to see.  Georgia commented that the cold rainy cafe was the best thing we'd seen so far.  Heh.

But it wasn't all bad.  The new building is awesome.  We were pretty much alone when we went up to the living roof (see photo).  And we got to see a bunch of really neat sea life in the massive aquariums (over 40,000 specimens).  And we saw t-rex skeleton.  And a blue whale skeleton.  We saw the penguin feeding (over the tops of a million kids' heads).  We saw where the albino alligator would have been if he had been there.

Well, at least the company was great :-).

As for me?  My favorite exhibit was the egress (haw haw).