KK. I probably won't be able to show you around the Seattle area proper just yet... I don't know it very well! I'll say Redmond is a very sleepy area. Bellevue looks semi-urban though, and it's just across the way. We'll see!
BTW, I'm glad to see that you'll be here during some week days. You'll have to come by and visit me during work.
That's understandable since you've just relocated there,
. No worries, I've got a friend from college that I can use as a resource who has lived in Seattle for several years and works for Microsoft (I think he worked more in the business/ management side of things than technical, left the company, and is now back in a consulting capacity).
Good to know about Redmond/ Bellevue, makes sense looking at their proximity to Seattle. I'm more attuned to the idea of working in a suburb of Seattle anyways, at least compared to the say downtown Seattle, since I've never lived or worked in a city- open to the prospect though.
A visit to the Microsoft campus is on my TODO list for sure, and I'll definitely be dedicating a day of my trip to the Bellevue + Redmond area. It's the main reason I booked a rental car since Redmond is about 25 miles from my hotel/ SeaTac.
The way flight prices worked out, I pretty much will be in the area for
only the weekdays anyways, lol. I leave early Saturday morning. I kind of regret I won't be able to check out what weekend life in Seattle is like, but I'm trying not to use a lot of the paid time-off (PTO) I've accrued, so that when I leave my current employer all my unused PTO will be paid out in my last paycheck to the sum of an extra ~160 hours/1 month worth of salary
.
I'll definitely give you a holla as it gets closer to my arrival date. For the most part, I don't have planned any real itinerary besides reserving time to meet up with you and the friend from college.