Building Move

For those who are a little out of the loop that have wondered “what in the world is Cori doing that takes her away from her blog?!?” well let me tell you… a lot. We moved buildings at work, which for both David and I involved 18 hour days and a lot of hard work.



We moved out of the Smith Tower, a 90 year old building in downtown Seattle that I loved. The building used to be the tallest west of the Mississippi, then someone came in and made a taller one. Well the owner didn’t like that, so he added a flag pole at the top so he could maintain his claim of the tallest building. This is the basic history, you can get a lot more plus cool photos here: http://www.smithtower.com/History.html . But for now, let me share with you some pros and cons to our Smith Tower adventure.
Things I loved about the Smith Tower:
**Its beauty
**Marble on the walls
**Copper elevators, with glass doors. Don’t worry you get used to it after a while. I never had motion sickness before, so I was glad when it started to wear off. Here is a virtual tour of the elevators, for those not “technically savvy” use your mouse button and you can view top bottom & all around. http://www.vrseattle.com/pages/vrview.php?cat_id=710&vrs_id=vrs868
** Elevator Operators. That’s right, the elevator’s don’t run on their own. Even though we weren’t suppose to have favorites, it was hard not too… Hamilton was by far someone I enjoyed talking to. He was an elderly gentleman who loved his job and loved the Lord. We had great bible study talks and we learned a lot about each other’s lives.
**the view!!! I had a window seat that over looked the water, which was amazing. I’m going to have to frame these photo’s for my new desk.
**Leaving at the end of the day and having six or seven people saying goodbye & you wishing them a nice evening. I really miss that, and I think I’m getting a little “home” sick. I may have to run down there just to say hello.
**The lobby. It is wonderful, hand carved Indian heads on the ceiling. And at Christmas it was wonderful. Here’s another virtual tour that you can enjoy…. Be sure to scroll your mouse up so you can see the ceiling. http://www.vrseattle.com/pages/vrview.php?cat_id=710&vrs_id=vrs867
**A Starbucks IN the building (now we have to walk across the street and IT’S JUST NOT THE SAME). I guess I will be saving money .

The View from my window...



Things I am happy to leave behind:
**The windows!! Oh man! My biggest complaint… I FROZE year round. I had two desk heaters & a quilt at my desk and when the wind blew it was like you were standing outside. The blinds moved with the breeze. Cindy and I (my cube buddy, Cindy) complained a LOT, we both froze every morning. We would remind each other to wear layers if it was going to be bad the next morning.
**Elevators. I know, I just said they were amazing, but… they were SOOOO SLOW. Sometimes you could wait 10-15 minutes for an elevator
**Elevator Operators. Ok, so I had my favorites, I also had those I dreaded. The old man that smelled like smoke and never put his teeth in. The Disney freak that would not open the doors til he was done talking to you. The guy that sings chants all day. I could go on. After a while it gets old, your patience wears thin and 20 flights of stairs doesn’t seem so bad.
**Pioneer Square. During the day, not so bad. At night, bad. During the day you still see things you wish you never had. At night you quickly move to the parking garage and if you needed you ask the security guard to escort you.

The new building is just 4 blocks away and it’s another world. A clean one (LOL). There’s no one in the lobby saying “good morning”, we don’t even have to go outside cause the garage is in the building. Outside we see people rushing to and from work, no drug dealers or homeless people (if they are there they aren’t easy to spot). It really is a different world.
The exciting part is all the “Disney” stuff they decorated the office with, but that will have to wait for another post.