End of a Perfect Day

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We had a lovely evening last night at the Portland City Grill.  The Portland City Grill is located in the US Bank Tower in downtown Portland.  Here's an image of the building known affectionately to Portlanders as "Big Pink".

(image credit to Dan Haneckow)

The building is constructed in a diamond shape, and so there are no right angles.  I used to work in the building, and if you ride the bus to work, it has the advantage of being the first stop on the bus mall going out of town.  Why is that an advantage, you ask?  Because there are always open seats!  Nothing worse than working an 8-5 job and then having to stand up riding the bus to home.  (Glad those days are well behind me.)  But I digress.

The restaurant is located on the 30th Floor and has amazing views of the city looking north, east, and south.  It's worth waiting for a table by the window, and there were plenty of open seats next to the window in the cocktail lounge last night.  Here's what we saw when we first sat down.

This is the view looking east.  Mt. Hood always looks like you could reach out and touch it.  That is the Burnside Bridge on the left.  On the far side of the river, you can see the walkway that takes you down to the Esplanade on the east side of the river.  The east side of the river was not easy to get to until the Esplanade was built.  Now, we sit on that side to watch the fireworks on the Fourth of July.

This next image is the view looking north.  You can see the tip of Mt. Adams in the upper middle of the image.  Also, that is the steel bridge to the left.  It carries cars, but it also allows Amtrak to cross the river at that point.  At the extreme left is the Rose Garden where the Portland Trailblazers play basketball.  Almost in the center, but a little up, you can see the spires of our convention center...an iconic image in Portland.

Next is the view to the south.  You can see some of the bridges.  The first bridge is the Morrison Bridge, and at the close end of the bridge, you can see a ferris wheel.  There were some sort of festivities going on along the waterfront, presumably a Cinco de Mayo celebration.  There were no fireworks, but we didn't need them.  It was a lovely evening anyway.  Further down the river you can see the Hawthorne Bridge, and the Markham Bridge (which carries Interstate 5 across the river), and a little beyond that and barely visible is the Ross Island Bridge.

We each had a cocktail.  Mine was a Cosmopolitan...it seemed only fitting if we were going to come to the "big city" for dinner.

And we shared a spring roll appetizer.  That was delicious.  I love spring rolls as an appetizer.  They are yummy, but also light, and so I don't feel overly stuffed when dinner arrives.

When we were finally seated at our table, this was our view of the Burnside Bridge extending to the east side of town.

There was Happy Birthday confetti sprinkled on the table.

We had a really nice bottle of Pinot Noir from one of the local wineries.

I had the filet mignon with a pepper crust and a brandy cream sauce.  (I'm sure it was very low in calories.)  It was served with buttermilk mashed potatoes and some fresh lemony green beans.  The beans were delicious, and the steak was cooked perfectly.  Mike's dinner was nearly identical except that he had the rib eye cut.

We watched the sun set.  While we were finishing up our meal, I took this picture of the city through my wine glass.  See the reflections in the window...and the reflections of people in the reflections?  Cool!

They served us a complimentary chocolate fudge cake.  It was served warm with a caramel sauce and a salty component.  I've seen these mixtures of salt and chocolate in recipes, but it always sounded kind of gross to me.  The server explained that the salt enhances the flavor of the chocolate.  I can't say for sure if that was the case, but it was delicious.  Now I'll be on the look out for those salty chocolate things.  Yum.

And that was quite enough food and grog.  We paid the bill and headed for home.  It was a truly lovely evening.  We haven't been out for a meal in a nice restaurant for quite a while, and so it was a real treat.  

Mike's birthday is tomorrow, and so I'm going to get up in the morning and make him his favorite Eggs Benedict.  The kids are coming over next Sunday to celebrate his birthday for real, and it will be nice to have everyone here for Mother's Day.  Mike has requested prime rib.  To read this post you would think we are massive beef eaters, which we generally are not.  Once in a while though, we do loves us our roast beast.

So that's it.  Another birthday come and gone.  As I've told a few of you, a classmate of mine from high school passed away recently.  He was my age, and a truly nice guy.  He had a family with adult children and small grandchildren, who no doubt are missing him terribly right now.  We were not close, and never dated, but we were friends in high school.  He was tall and thin, with an easy smile, a kind heart, and very blue eyes.  I enjoyed seeing him at the reunions I attended.  While I dislike growing older from a physical standpoint--aching knees, wrinkles, gray hair, fuzzy memory--it is far better than the alternative.  My friend's untimely death has really driven that home to me.  Further, as I get older I find things bother me less, that I am more forgiving, that I care less what people think of me (which works well to mitigate my feelings about the wrinkles and the gray hair).  These changes are all very liberating.  Next year I will hit the big 6-0, and it's really okay.  I'm looking forward to my 59th year being a good year, and I have a lot to look forward to.

So here's a birthday toast to all of you...and especially those of you who are getting a taste of what it will mean to grow older and to be just plain old.  [Chink! of glasses and coffee cups.]  Thanks for stopping by with your birthday wishes.  The day was all the better thanks to all of you.

The wind has died down today, and so the weather is going to be really nice.  I need to go out and check the annuals to see if they need water.  Also, I simply must do a little housework, which I have been putting off.  Then I'm going to make some more progress on my Gardener's Journal quilt.  It would be great if I could get the first three sections finished today, but I'm aiming for tomorrow.  Smitty is hard at it already, so I guess I'll go see what he's up to.  I hope you have a lovely day!