Portland

Edible Schoolwork

November 10, 2008

Parents like to display schoolwork the kids bring home. At our house we put it in on the dining table and eat it. To be precise, Daniel isn’t our kid. He’s my nephew and twenty-three. But he’s living with my wife and me for now. With increasing frequency he’s bringing home what he prepares at […]

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Pot Room Confinement

November 9, 2008

Every spring I start filling up the front porch with potted plants. The porch extends the width of our 1920s Craftsman house, so there are long wide ledges begging for greenery. The back deck next to the small goldfish pond gets a few plants too. I gravitate toward the tropical and cold-sensitive, mostly begonias because […]

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I was a human dynamo today. Literally. Working out on a specially outfitted exercise bike, I generated electricity while burning calories. Sweat dripped from my nose at the Green Microgym whenever I glanced down at the flashing numbers showing how many watts I was producing. It’s too soon to call me Megawatt Man, but I […]

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Tree and Fish Fashion Show

November 6, 2008

In our yard, autumn turns elegant Japanese laceleaf maples into flashy look-at-me strippers. For several days each year, the tree hovering over the pond dons the color of the goldfish swimming beneath its branches. An exception is their recent offspring, little gray clouds that won’t brighten until spring. Cold has already induced torpor among the […]

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Iraq, Lest We Forget

November 4, 2008

Slipping from top of mind amid economic and election anxiety is the tragedy we call Iraq. But a soldier, a tiny plastic one in an unlikely place, reminded me today why Barack Obama appears on the verge of winning won the presidency. Only Obama among Democratic contenders voted against the war. Without that opposition, he […]

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Obama in the Window

October 31, 2008

My artist friend Benjamin Alexander Clark churned out twenty paintings of Barack Obama in three days this week. An amazing feat by any standard, though I’m not surprised given Benjamin’s talents and energy. As of this afternoon, four had sold — the fourth to me. The Obama paintings are prominently displayed at Cannibals on NW […]

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Street Scenes

October 28, 2008

My periscope breaches the surface in Northeast Portland and takes in the outside world: Larry the trash hauler introduces himself when he sees me photographing the Halloween decorations on his truck, which blocks my car on NE 11th Avenue. Until now we’ve been on a wave only basis. Larry poses for the camera and without […]

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What Is Up?

October 26, 2008

A new video making the rounds on YouTube updates the famously funny “Wassup” commercial, using the same actors but in scenes of grim poignancy. Instead of hawking beer, they show the travails afflicted upon the citizenry during the last eight years. What once made us laugh has turned tragic. The video reminded me of a […]

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Words on a Vine

October 26, 2008

“Literature is written on her body — 597 words of love and passion.” That’s how I described Tasia Bernie in a story I wrote for The Oregonian last month. I first met Tasia at the gym where we both work out. I asked her about the tattooed words circling her body like a vine, which […]

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Art Amid Gibberish

October 24, 2008

Consider me an accidental archeologist of urban blight. No academic journal will record my find yesterday during a trek through part of Portland where I don’t normally walk. But the thrill of discovery is reward enough. I was retrieving my car, in the shop for overdue maintenance. I turned onto NE Everett off Grand after […]

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Escaping the Giant Butt

October 23, 2008

In the throes of cardio exercise, the senses heighten. I guess it’s the endorphin rush. How else to explain the gym scene around me: twenty-five people on various pieces of fitness equipment suddenly appearing to move in choreographed rhythm to the Fleet Foxes blaring in my ear buds. The scene jars me from whatever world […]

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Evil Eyes Watching Me

October 23, 2008

The first time I walked by a house today, a cat gave me the evil eye. It was perched in a window next to a Halloween tombstone. I imagined the cat scanning the most private recesses of my brain and feeding off the dark thoughts hiding there. Several hours later, I passed the house again, […]

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Man at the Park

October 21, 2008

Assumptions are dangerous. That maxim was drilled into me years ago as a newbie journalist. But I’m not writing a news story. I’m speculating about a man at the school park up the street. He was sitting at a table, alone, surrounded by squealing kids and watchful parents. My son, Atticus, was playing nearby on […]

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