On day one, just before we left Fort Collins for Grand Junction on our way out of Colorado, Liz turned to me and said, “I think the only thing I forgot is a towel.”

I froze in mid-step down the stairs.  ”I’m sorry, I have to go back.”

“What?” she said.

“One second.”  I returned with a bright green towel.  ”Never leave home without your towel,” I said.  ”Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy.”

The first thing I did when I realized we were actually going to make this trip from Fort Collins, CO to Seattle, WA happen was contact @Brady from Ignite Seattle.  He was more than willing to meet up with us and discuss some of the cool things we’re doing with LaidOffCamp and Ignite Fort Collins.

At the same time, Kevin had phoned his friends Marc and Clint from StartUp Weekend – who would meet us there.  As an added bonus, my friend Rob – a Seattle native, and our friend Cassie from Portland and her business partner Lisa, would join us as well.

If you’re not aware of who any of those people are, just think of it like a meeting of the Jedi Council… all bad-ass with a lightsaber and all somewhat ninjalike.

Before we could head to Seattle, though, we had a quest to complete.  While in Oregon, Brady phoned us and let us know that he was in the process of making bitters, something which requires high-alcohol content grain alcohol.  Brady had effectively turned us into bootleggers, a task which we giddily subscribed to.

A few phone calls and two jugs of grain alcohol in hand, we departed Portland for Seattle, sans Liz (and the Voodoo Doughnuts) who would remain in Portland until the morning and ride the train to Seattle the next day.

We hadn’t showered that day; though Xena was a lovely host, we had only my towel and one for four people just won’t suffice.  There just aren’t enough corners.

The level of intellectuals we were meeting demanded less grime, so at the last gas station out of Oregon, we pulled over and I ran in to the only “functional” restroom – the women’s.  Functional isn’t exactly the right word, because while it had all the elements of a traditional bathroom, it had none of the actual usability.

The door “locked” by way of a duct-taped latching mechanism which was clearly invented by drunken MacGuyver.  The toilet didn’t flush – at least, not with the handle.  You had to use the actuator inside the tank.  The paper towels were few and far between… so the counter was soaking wet.  Somehow I managed to clean off a bit, change into nicer clothes, and escape in one piece with both the bathroom and myself nicer than I’d started.  Still, somehow less creepy than the bathroom in Vail.

Rolling into Seattle right around 6PM, we met up with Brady and some of the Ignite Seattle team.  Seattle’s streets, by the way, are tagged all around with sticker graffiti (some of them benign, some a little less – those were my favorites).  A fun dinner ensued with lots of ideas being exchanged and as the night came to a close, Lisa and Cassie arrived – kicking off a brand new dinner and a brand new conversation.

Rob, my friend in the red jacket in the picture above, is a quiet genius.  Having been unable to find a company in Fort Collins smart enough to hire him, he moved to Seattle to pursue other job prospects.  In an economy where people are settling for work as Walmart door greeters, Rob kicked some serious economic tail and landed himself an amazing job and a plush apartment in a beautiful part of Seattle.  We didn’t get to spend nearly as much time with Rob as we wanted; he had to work the next day at 5, but he shared with us a few things.  First, the view from his roof:

Here we are, looking out over this huge city, filled with the noises of a huge city, when all of a sudden, a couple is walking past on the sidewalk below.  The girl stops and sort of fiddles with her shoe for a second.  Her companion turns around without missing a beat, gets down on both knees, and ties her shoe for her.  Like it was nothing… this incredibly tender, human moment in this monument of stone and metal and manpower, had been offered just for us to witness.  We were floored.

Rob also shared with us one of his favorite places in Seattle – Alki Park.

Alki Park is a dock on West Seattle’s eastern coast.  From there,  you can see… well, I’ll let the pictures tell the story:

These pictures can’t possibly do this moment justice… as Kevin, Si and I looked on over the city, each of us had a moment when we realized that our day is coming.  We’re going to change the world. We can do it – we were standing in Alki Park, only four days after leaving Fort Collins with one day of notice.  We’re going to change the world.