Cancelled Wiz Leads To Seattle's Pacific Science Center

 The Wiz was not high on my todo list.  It wasn't even on my todo list.  But when invited to accompany my daughter and granddaughter to see the Wiz, I, of course, said yes!

The ferry into Seattle was jammed with Seahawks fans.

We made our way to the Art Museum restaurant for lunch and while eating my daughter got a voice mail saying that the afternoon performance of The wiz wasn't.  An hour before the show we learn it was cancelled? That's even more bewildering because looking on line today I find this at the 5th Avenue Theater site:

"Masks will be encouraged but optional for audience members at The 5th for performances of The Wiz. We strongly recommend and encourage the wearing of highly effective masks such as N95, KN95, or KF94.  Please CLICK HERE for further details.

Please note, the performances of The Wiz on November 19, 20 and 27 matinee have been canceled."   

If the matinee was cancelled last weekend, why didn't they notify us sooner?  (I suggested to my daughter that they hadn't sold enough tickets and she responded that they'd been sold out.)

Oh well.  Flexibility.   

The Pacific Science Center at the site of the 1962 Seattle World's Fair was my granddaughter's immediate alternative destination.  That meant a short rail ride to the monorail, then the monorail to the Space Needle.  

A walk over to the Science Center and to the laser show.  

I was underwhelmed.  I  expected a laser show in 2022 to be more than lots of moving squiggles and primitive cartoons backed with lame electronic music.  (Note:  I like good electronic music.)

A bathroom break.  This was probably the best surprise of the Science Center.  Most surfaces had great sciencish cartoons.  Though this one leaves a sexist conclusion that lacks some key context.  Did they have this same example in the women's room?  (I think you can click on this to enlarge and focus it, but I won't know until it's actually up.)

Then we engaged in various science activities while waiting for a 4pm planetarium show.  Some time in my favorite spot - the butterfly garden.  

Parts do look like they were built 60 years ago for the World's Fair.  

A four o'clock planetarium show was going to get us to a late ferry back to Bainbridge. And we found out that planetarium had an open house, so to speak, where people could drop in and ask questions.  So we got to visit various planets and moons.  It's been a while since I've considered how amazing and humbling the universe is.  All those stars and planets out there that we only have a tiny inkling about.  

From there, we wandered over to the Space Needle.  It seems the women decided that this was a good opportunity for my  granddaughter to go to the top of the Space Needle since both her parents have separate reasons for not taking an elevator 60 stories up in order to look 60 stories down and Grandpa was a perfect escort.  

It's been 60 years since I went to the top of the Space Shuttle, when three friends and I drove up to the World's Fair in 1962 in a '32 Model A Ford.  My memory of being up there is rather hazy.  

But I remember yesterday pretty clearly still.  There are three public floors.  In the top one you can wander around inside with glass walls, drinks, snacks, photo opportunities, or wander around semi-outside, with large glass walls and benches.  The picture above was from that level.  

I'd point out that if you find the green ferris wheel you can see one of the ferries to Bainbridge and Bremerton right behind it.

Here's another view of that outside top area of the Space Needle.

Then there is a middle level that didn't seem to have windows, but did have bathrooms.  

Finally, the lower level also had windows all around.  And it had a ring of floor, sort of like a ring around Saturn, that was glass and slowly rotated.  That took some instinct erasing to step on.

Then back on the monorail to the light rail and a walk back to the ferry where we encountered the Seahawks fans once again.  You couldn't tell their team had lost.  They were loud and chanting - one person shouting "Sea" and the crowd answering "Hawks."  There also seemed to be some testosterone at work.  Though a women managed to push one of the excited ones back until a security officer took him off somewhere. 

And finally, as the ferry left the terminal in downtown Seattle, we could look back up to the Space Needle - that tall tower just left of the center.  

A long and busy day with two of my favorite people.