If you’re unfamiliar with the phrase “That’s Tukwila Life” – it’s the motto of the city of Tukwila, where Portent has made it’s home for the last ten years or so. It’s also the phrase used by Portent employees to explain an event or circumstance that can only be summarized as being “Tukwila Life.”

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m a south of Seattle gal at heart. My sister works two blocks away, my first job was at the Ross down the street from the mall and I went to high school not more than five miles from where we are currently. However, Tukwila isn’t known for it’s overwhelming impressiveness, nor was our office park. It’s known for it’s affordability. And in 2008, I think a lot of companies, including us, found being here a really good thing.

So please join me on a trip down memory lane, where Portent, Inc. says goodbye to the city of Tukwila and heads off for new adventures at Smith Tower. These are our Tukwila Life memories, scrapbook style…

Large office park parking lots means lots of space..to play foursquare. BEFORE it was an app.

Dam upstream threatens to break, flooding miles upon miles down the Green River. Sandbags put in. Covering miles of a wonderful trail. Dam fixed. No flooding. No money to remove sandbags. Sandbags stay, slowly being overtaken by plant life.

Aviva doing her best to save the few boxes of paper files in the office.

Fishing hut! Across the river from the office park. I do not recommend eating any fish out of this river, though on any random day there IS a guy with a fishing pole standing in it.

Kids steal car. Kids run from cops. Kid jumps in river. Office park filled with cops. Barnaby’s sees the most action it’s ever had.

If you’ve never handed out candy on Halloween to random cars in a hot dog costume…you’re missing out.

Being close to the airport means you can leave your car here. It does not mean it’s safe from bored employees on a snow day.

We have a Coldstone Creamery. You can by no means walk to it and back in a reasonable amount of time. Let alone in August before an ice cream cake melts. (Yes, someone tested this.)

If you’ve ever wanted to set up a blender, a video camera and add a tungsten ring to said blender in front of a sandbag wall in a parking lot…we know a place you can go.

The Parthenon in Kit Kat form. We rented out the office space across the parking lot just for this.

Tukwila has one of possibly every chain restaurant in the Pacific Northwest. This includes The Sizzler. It also includes dance off competitions between mattress retailers and the Pita Pit.

I’ve take the epic bus journey from North Seattle exactly three times in six years. This happened on time #2. Leading me to believe that it must happen a lot at my bus stop. At least 33% of the time.

If you’ve never been cut off at a bowling alley before, Acme Bowl is very nice about it. No pictures of this one though. It was too dark in the parking lot. Please enjoy this picture of a no parking fire zone being observed instead.

We didn’t get broken into. Upstairs did. We just don’t have any pictures for the time we got broken into.

Being this close to IKEA means you not only get to build your own desk, but go buy it, pick it up and deliver it to the office.

PUPPY DAY. BEST DAY EVER.
(Turns out Smith Tower isn’t keen on not-so-housebroken 9 week old puppies.)

I’ve been collecting photos of Tukwila Life for six years now and I finally got to use them! We’ll miss lots of things about Tukwila. Target. Free parking. Running across Strander Blvd through four lanes of traffic because there’s no crosswalk. 7-11. Bringing pets to work. Giving directions to building A. Squirrels, bunnies and blackberry picking. The dark side.

However, I’m sure adjacency to Pioneer Square, two sports stadiums (maybe three?), a pub in stumbling distance and public transportation holds many, many, many, more stories.

Farewell, Tukwila Life. You served us well.

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