One "Portland" thing a week - check.

Week 1: hiking Dog Mountain, which, although not technically in Portland, "counted" according to my friend.

Week 2: baking gluten-free, egg-free brownies from scratch. What? That is SOOOOOOO Portland, people.

Week 3: Mates of State and the Black Kids at Wonder Ballroom, the NE's answer to the Crystal Ballroom (and let's be honest here, it's the better answer).

Week 4: volunteering for a Friends of Trees benefit BBQ.

Week 5: Storm Large's Crazy Enough at Portland Center Stage. Oh yeah, she's Portland. For sure. When her show comes to a city near you, RUN, do not walk.

Week 6: The Shins at the Crystal Ballroom. I know it's not the better answer, but it's THE SHINS. Also this week, Portland's Best New Band show, free at Berbati's. Can't say I was blown away by either.

Week 7: Yelp Portland gave me two tickets to Loney, Dear at the Doug Fir. That's right. Elitism has its privileges. It was an amazing show.

Week 8: I think going to Bend for a three-day weekend is a Portland thing to do. Yep. I do.


Week 9: This is the week I should've gone downtown to the Starlight Parade, part of "the" quintessential Portland thing - the Rose Festival. But there was a hockey game to be watched, and also, I heard that like 250,000 people go downtown every year for this. So I stayed in and watched some of the live coverage on TV after the hockey game. Much better view, 0% of the hassle, and when I got bored with the parade I switched over to House reruns. Win!

Week 10: The aforementioned Canterbury Castle demolition.

Week 11: Hiking in Forest Park to break in the new boots after the Portland Pride parade (where I overheard the best conversation between a gay boy and a man holding a sign saying that homosexuals would burn in hell: "You know what the worst part of this is? YOU WILL BE IN HELL WITH US! Oh my Gawd that SUCKS!" and also saw the best sign held by an old lady marching in the parade: "Better gay than grumpy!" I love Pride parades).

Week 12: I had hoped to go to one part of the "best of" School of Rock shows Saturday, because really, who wants to sit through a whole Floyd or Zeppelin show? So "best of" sounded like a perfect compromise. But part one conflicted with my haircut and part two conflicted with my (apparently much-needed) nap. Later this week I went to an organic brewery for happy hour. That's pretty Portland.

Week 13: Portland roller derby championship bout... followed by a Broadway show. I had a hard time with the transition from one to the other, and my ears are still ringing from both. But it was worth it.

Woo to the hoo.

If that's not a good weekend exploring Bend, I don't know what is.

Belated Friday five (hundred twenty five thousand, six hundred minutes).

Thursday marked my one-year anniversary in the fine town of Portland. Job aside, I couldn't be happier with my decision. Five favorite Portlandish things from the last year include:

• discovering the wonder that is the Columbia River Gorge
  
• Musicfest Northwest (13 bands + 9 venues + 4 days = AWESOME)
  
• remembering that there is a season called "fall"
  
• snowpocalypse '08
• the Wednesday farmer's market at SW Park blocks (which started back up this week, woohoo!)

What were five favorite things from the last year where you live? (If you can't think of any, why are you still living there?)

Compare and contrast.

I think I like the color one better, but the b/w shot is a more accurate representation of daily life in Portland.

Inspiration point.

I went on a long hike with a friend from work today (she promised that it counted as a "Portland thing" even though it was an hour outside of Portland). We got to talking about places we'd been and where we still wanted to go. I had a sudden, very pleasant revelation that I've seen more of the country and the world than most people, and that I need to remember that on a more daily basis.

I've been a bit at a loss of what to write about lately. So when I got home I scanned in a bunch of photos from my journeys, and I'll be sharing travel stories when I don't have anything else interesting to report.

But first, my new screen saver:

(Columbia River Gorge from Dog Mountain)

Braxton Hicks spring.

Monday was a lovely day for free cake at Pioneer Square (in honor of its 25th birthday) - 80 degrees, sunny, awesome.

Today was 50 degrees, overcast, equally awesome. Here's a little pink snow at the Lloyd Center MAX...

... and a little pink flower action at SW 3rd and Jefferson.

Why I love Portland, exhibit #374.

Welcome to winter in Portland.

Not in Kansas anymore.

Spent last weekend in Oaktown catching up with friends and wandering around my old neighborhood. Palm trees and sun and blue sky, oh my. A far cry from fall leaves and rain and cloudy sky, for sure.

I stayed in my old apartment building (at my out-of-town friends' place, not squatting in the hallway as some suspected). It was a bit disorienting for most of the weekend... especially when I wandered into the antique store on a nearby street and saw a Washington Redskins "collectible" plastic hat - I really had to stop for a moment to figure out where I was.

It was great to visit, but coming back to Portland definitely felt like I was coming home.

That made me happy.

Other things for the "things that made me happy" file:

• my last-minute flaky catsitter came through while I was gone
• applying for a job - any job - with the Obama-Biden administration
• plotting a Costa Rica getaway with my travel buddy (can March come any faster?!)
• my first yoga class last night (I know, I know...)
• the calm that started last Tuesday night hasn't worn off yet

Boss is back from vacation today. I'm fully expecting a 180 degree mood shift in about an hour. :)

There is fall outside my apartment.

I know it’s hard to conceive.

But there’s fall outside my apartment.

And I'm only gonna see it if I leave.

Get it? Leave? Leaf? Get it?

Never mind.

Fall progress, act I.

I'm trying to remember to take my camera with me every day so that I can photojournal the fall season. It's not quite here - but it's teetering on the edge. I have a suspicion that one day soon I will wake up and the leaves will be brilliant shades of crayola (act II)... and the next day I will wake up and they will be littered all over the streets and the rain will start (act III).

But first a little context. I work near the South Park Blocks where they hold the farmer's market spring-fall. There are benches and statues and maybe even a fountain somewhere. Anyway, it's been a stunning strip of green for the past five months:


And the leaves are just starting to turn:


I'm excited to see how the strip changes colors over the next few weeks.

I noticed more significant signs of fall in the Whole Foods parking lot in the NE last night (which I was excited to discover, since it's more convenient than the one closer to my apartment):

But I'm most excited to take a sick day for Act II, head up to Hood River and wear my camera out... My, um, "scratchy throat" is poised and ready.

"Get higher baby and don't ever come down..."

I was walking around at lunch yesterday and noticed a large white V in the sky. Seemed a little odd that planes would make such a thing - possible, but a little odd. Then I realized that there were about six white lines originating from the same general location.

I could only get four of them in the shot because of the trees, but this was now officially odd to me. Walking back to the office I saw something similar in the other direction of the sky:


And for the rest of the day I sang this song.

Portland skies are amazing. Always. I prefer the sky with puffy white or gray clouds, which I suspect I will see a lot more of in the coming months, but the steady piercing blue, and the blue with kindergarten art I saw yesterday, also never fail to stop me in my tracks.

"This is such a Portland thing to do."

I said that myself, and then overheard it at least 10 times, watching the Chapman Vaux Swifts put on a spectacular show last night. Every year thousands of these little birds migrate south and stop by Portland on the way, feeding during the day and roosting in a chimney at a local school at night. And hundreds of people gather every single night to watch their descent.

It starts out slow, with a few birds meandering their way near the chimney about an hour before dusk. As the sun sets, more and more birds arrive:


(All those specks you aren't sure are birds? Yeah, they're birds. I need to get my camera lens cleaned.)


The sun sets, the orchestrated frenzy reaches a peak and the majority of birds fly into the chimney, reverse-tornado-style. A few lingering swarms do synchronized acrobatics in the sky and eventually follow suit.

The show seems to always feature a hawk in search of dinner. The nature-loving crowd oohs and aahs when the hawk comes near, gasps when it storms into the swarm of swifts, and... yes... cheers, hoots and hollers when it finally catches one and flies away. Who'd have thunk. I got some video of this which I'll try to clean up and post, but the clearest part is the roar from the crowd when Mr. Hawk snags a swift.

A guy sitting next to us theorized that we are the show for the birds, rather than vice versa. I can't help but wonder...

Pre-Friday five.

Five new and improved questions I am growing weary of answering, in response to the aforementioned five questions I grew weary of answering before I moved, and their answers, in no particular order:

• How's the new place? As far as apartments go, it's almost perfect. It's just the right size, just the right price, on a quiet street, and although I'm on the ground floor and people seem to live above me, I never, ever hear them. Or anyone, really. I'm really close to all kinds of public transit and within walking distance of dozens of restaurants, shops, neighborhood parks and movie theaters. (And Peets! Critical.)
  
  
• How's the new job? Eight days into it, everyone is really nice, and the organization is doing good things. My actual job should be easy and interesting, and there's plenty of room to move over or up within the company. That said, there's definitely some crazy hierarchy shit that I'm hoping to either change or ignore (e.g. all communications with X go through Y and Y only, and Y just ends up forwarding requests to us and then funneling it back to X, so it seems pretty stupid). I'm a bit scared of how fast the company is growing and it's been strange being a recent hire, seeing all the emails about new job postings, and hearing all the long-timers sigh and harken back to the good ol' days when they were a small company. (I've been in their position a lot, but never in this one before.) All THAT said, people seem to recognize that chaos is imminent if the proper steps aren't taken, and already I've heard about numerous communication efforts that have been established, so that gives me hope... But it's only been eight days. Ask me again in December.
  
  
• Have you met anyone yet? Other than people at work, not really. Well, kind of. I met a guy through salon.com personals but that didn't go anywhere, and then I got busy with contract work and real work and consciously put off new-friend-seeking until after my contract project is done. (Because seriously, if I don't finish that soon I'm going to kill myself. Or at least fake my own death.) This week I signed up for a hiking listserv, and I got a tip on another singles web site I might look into, but let's be honest here - I'm not going to be social until I get through the last episode of Season 5 of The Wire anyway (circa September), so I'm not too concerned about it. In the meantime I can practice my rusty social skills on folks at work.
  
  
• How's Her Majesty adjusting? Other than needing to be fired by Pavlov, she's just fine. She loves the sound her voice makes against the bare walls and wood floor (especially at 5:30am!). It's been amusing to watch her find new favorite spots to lounge among the same furniture from the old apartment - the chair she used to love hasn't been touched in months. She's gotten used to the constant banging of the recycling/trash bin doors outside the living room windows, which used to make her run screaming from the room, and the recent bout of thunderstorms has only caused mild concern. If only the neighborhood cat would stop popping up in the kitchen window while she's eating...
  
  
• (And the biggie.) So, are you happy? I think so. Everyone else seems to think so - apparently I sound happy, I look happy. I will say that I definitely feel healthier mentally and physically. Leaving the last job certainly helped in that sense, but I think the entirely fresh start has allowed me to let go of parts of me I didn't like so much in my previous life (namely a lot of guilt about leaving the last job along with associated baggage), and restart parts of me I liked a lot (namely the running part of me, but also the "reading for fun" part of me and the "learning is fun" part of me). In some ways I still feel like a tourist and in other ways I feel like I've been here forever... So for now I'm trying to find a balance between the two - remind myself it's only been two months and take some of the pressure off finding my new niche of NW friends, but also remind myself of the wise words of Pooh: "You can't stay in your corner of the Forest waiting for others to come to you. You have to go to them sometimes."
  

So that's the update for now. I really don't mind answering questions - this was just churning in the back of my mind for a while, and someone (YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE) nudged me into actually writing it all down...

Happy annual Will Smith premiere weekend. Enjoy a hot dog and some smokeless fireworks in his honor!

Updates.

It's Day Five of the iron supplement/iron-rich food test. The very first day after I changed up my diet a bit and took an iron supplement, I felt a noticeable energy improvement. Instead of needing a four hour nap at 10:30am, I've made it till 11:30pm every day except for yesterday, when I purposely went to bed at 10:30pm in prep for the big first day. And no more pink pee.* Today for hormonal reasons, I'm enjoying comfort food instead of well-planned iron-rich meal but I did take the supplement. One of my new coworkers also recommended B-12 supplements as a cure for similar symptoms. Benefits kick in July 1, so tomorrow at lunch I'm going to find a doctor and see if my current plan is sound and if there's anything else I should be doing...

Thus ends the boring update.

The kinda fun update is that today was Day One of the aforementioned new job. The job for which I have no baggage, no history, no knowledge, just skillz. Mad, mad skillz. I walked out the door this morning feeling much like the day I left for sixth grade, when I transferred to a new "gifted" school to finish out my elementary days. I didn't know a single new person at my new school, I had no idea what was in store for me, and I had to - gasp - ride a BUS.** The first person I met that morning is still my very dear friend after all these years.

(As she tells the story, we were standing in line next to each other the first morning, and we kinda looked at each other, and she said "do you know anyone?" and I said "no, you?" and she said, "no, wanna be friends?" and I shrugged and said, "OK." And the rest is 22 years of mostly ups, a few downs, and lots and lots of memories. Here's hoping this evolves to something along those lines.)

________________
* The "science is cool!" update: for the first two days after taking the supplement, there was pink. It was kinda like when the you were a kid and the dentist gave you those weird pink tablets to chew after you brushed your teeth, to show you what a crappy teeth-brushing job you'd just done. And then on day three there was no pink. My red blood cells' way of saying, "no tartar!"

** My new commute is 4.3 miles and takes about 40 minutes door to Max to door. But it's 100% free so I don't mind the duration. I am thinking more thoughtfully about that bike idea though...

I couldn't let unemployment go without seeing the last Portlandish waterfall I'm aware of:

This one was in the Chinese Garden in the city... a truly remarkable place. I'm considering a membership since it's so close to where I'll be working. If I ever need to chill out after a stressful day, this is the place to do it. A little urban zen, if you will:

And if I ever needed a place to chill out before heading to get hush puppies, only to find that the restaurant is closed (don't Portland people EAT on Mondays for pete's shakes?!), this was the place to do it.

But all was not lost - I caught Mt. Hood looming over the highway on the walk to the restaurant:

So instead of hush puppies I stopped by Fred Meyer for ice cream. On a whim I picked up Stephen Colbert's flavor, and despite my hesitations (fudge covered waffle cone pieces?!) it's actually not bad. The vanilla ice cream is not too sweet and the chewy candy centers are just fudgy and caramely enough.

Tomorrow I hang up the ponytail holder and sweats in favor of working stiff clothes, and rejoin 94.5% of America in the daily grind.

Meh. I need more urban zen... and more ice cream.

Friday five.

Of the 82 photos I took today, five of my favorites, in no particular order... First, Lancaster Falls:

I like how you can see the individual blades of grass and clear outlines of the rocks, yet the water is moving too fast for any kind of focus. Lancaster Falls is one of the least-visited waterfalls according to the hiking book guy. To get to it, you have to:

1. guess that by exit 54 he actually means exit 55
2. guess that the gravel path from the parking lot that follows alongside the exit ramp is actually the trail
   
3. (the full trail name of which is called Mount Defiance, by the way, so I guess first of all you need to be willing to walk up a trail called Mount Defiance)
4. walk right next to the freeway for about half a mile
5. wander aimlessly down a fairly boring path for another half mile until you reach Hole in the Wall Falls
6. go up a steep hill
   
7. cross the creek and get soaked by a cascade of water
   
8. look up to realize that the cascade of water is actually Lancaster Falls and that Lancaster Falls is actually an impressive waterfall that goes far up the mountain
   

Gosh, I can't imagine why it's the least-visited... I'm so glad I crossed and looked up though, because this was the very last waterfall I was to see, and I was getting tired and cranky, and if it had just been a cascade of water I would've had to come home and write a nasty letter to the hiking book guy. I tried to get the full effect in the picture but I couldn't do so without falling off the cliff. Trust me though, it's impressive. (Bonus: I got the schplurgh from last week's hike off my boots in the creek!)

This is Rodney Falls at Beacon Rock, Washington:

Well, part of it anyway - again, I couldn't get the whole shot in the lens. At the top of Rodney Falls is Pool of the Winds, where the waterfall has carved out quite a chasm in the rocks. More photos in the link below. But I stood in this one spot for about 20 minutes just watching all the various nuances of waterfalls coming down. Rodney Falls goes in my "top five" list of waterfalls, for sure.

Next up... Look:


Green! And blue! And clouds! I love clouds.

Next up is Ecola Falls. To get to Ecola Falls, you hike to the top of Multnomah Falls...

[Digression: If any of you come to visit, I will surely drive you to Multnomah Falls. I will wait in the car while you go up to take a picture. I'll even wait while you hike up to the lookout point if you so choose. But I am never, ever setting foot amidst all those tourists again. Unless you decide to trek out to Ecola Falls, at which point I hereby retract this statement. End of digression.]

... behind nineteen thousand tourists who have no trail etiquette, and a million kids who don't know that throwing trash into the bushes is not a good thing to do, and fifteen zillion dogs, and take a left when everyone else takes a right. First you pass a cute little punchbowl waterfall (Wisendanger Falls - there's nothing actually dangerous about it but it might make you smarter if you sit and watch it long enough). Then you round a corner and if you're lucky, the sun will be out and the rays will catch the mist and you'll get a shot sorta like this:


And finally, documented evidence that the sky is not always the same color as the Columbia River:


... just most of the time.

And so eleven waterfalls, eight hours, five hikes, two states, one hefty contribution to the hip replacement fund and a partridge in a pear tree later, I have officially seen every waterfall the guy mentions in my Columbia River Gorge hiking book. All that's left to do is un-earmark those hikes, earmark some waterfall-less trail hikes for the fall, and crack open that Portland Hills book to map out my summer exploration...

But first, a nap.

More photos here. Don't worry, I only uploaded 45 of the 82. (People! Eleven waterfalls, OK?!)

Jen(n) versus the volcanoes.

I have a short list of final things I want to do before the job starts. Yesterday I left at 8:30am headed for #1, Mount Tabor. The views were pretty, the park was lovely and the fact that I was standing on/near an extinct volcano was cool (but a bit unnerving). On the way home I planned the errands I was going to take care of that afternoon, but then I saw a sign pointing to Laurelhurst Park, and thought, "OK!" So I cut left and took an hour-long detour through one of the most beautiful neighborhood parks I have ever seen.

I got home at 1:30pm, and after 5 hours constantly moving in my Chucks my feet were not happy with me. One of the errands I planned that afternoon was a trip to the local outlet stores to look for better (but stylish!) walking shoes. On the way to the outlet I saw a sign pointing to Mt. Hood (#5 on the list) and thought, "OK!" So I bought shoes and took another 2.5 hour detour.


The snow is still pretty deep, hence the date on the picture (to prove it to the folks who are melting over on the right coast). But what a gorgeous mountain.

Today I planned to get some work done but spring fever has finally hit, so I'm going to attempt #3 on the list - see as many of the remaining waterfalls in the Gorge as possible. Maybe someday I'll actually get to the errands, the main one of which is grocery shopping. In the meantime I'll take coffee with no milk and pb&js every single day if it means I get to take pretty pictures like these...

And the hits just keep on comin'.

I accepted a job offer today.

Wait, let me back up. I think I've mentioned the interviews here or elsewhere online. I may not have mentioned the great vibe I got about the company overall and from the people I'd be working with. I also may not have mentioned the return to data wrangling and the significant decrease in responsibility (both of which are exactly what I was looking for in my next job) coupled with the not-insignificant decrease in pay (which I was expecting with said decrease in responsibility).

Anyway, everything went well and my future boss called today to offer me the position. And I totally freaked out. I'd done the math numerous times and it always worked out just fine - I could enjoy the same 401K contribution, same savings contribution, half the rent cost of Oakland, approximately 4 miles of driving per week (and therefore less gas $$), etc. I asked her if I could have the weekend to think it over, and she said sure.

So I did the math again numerous times. With various permeations including increases in "fun money" expenditures and higher allotments for birthday presents and all sorts of variances.

And it worked out fine again and again. So I called her back and formally accepted. And then I walked out the door to head to the grocery store and realized I'd locked my keys in my apartment.

CRAP! I kept apartment keys on one side of this removable chain I picked up a while ago, and the car key on the other side, to minimize the number of keys I had to carry while running - because, you know, that car key was just WEIGHING ME DOWN, MAN - and when I got back today I forgot to reattach the two sides. So all I had in my hand was my car key...

There's no on site manager in this building, so I had to call the property management company knowing that they would charge me $40 for the service call. While I was in the hall cursing myself for thinking that removable key chain was a good idea, I heard voices from the laundry room next door that sounded like they were doing maintenance work. So I ventured over and said, "you guys don't happen to have keys for the units, do you?" One guy nodded, went back and got his spares and opened my door. He shrugged off my "do I owe you anything" question, and the other guy replied, "you got really lucky, that would've cost you $40."

Don't I know it, brother. Don't I know it. And now I'm booking a flight to Vegas because this Midas touch has gotta be good for something other than saving my own ass or getting me uneventfully to a new town...

________________
My third day here, I locked my keys in my trunk. Fortunately I still had AAA, and fortunately I was at Ikea at the time, so I shopped while I waited and the guy got to my car in record time. But I really don't need a "third time's a charm" test on the missing key situation, so tomorrow I'm going to Home Depot and getting three copies of all my keys to leave in the car, at the new office, OH AND ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THIS STUPID REMOVABLE KEY CHAIN.

Can't see the forest for the mud.

When I was four or five years old, I didn't really watch where I was going and I also rarely wore shoes. As a result I was constantly stubbing my toe, or stepping on a bee, or tripping over a sunbeam or some such nonsense. My mom nicknamed me "Grace."

One day my brother and I were at the neighborhood pool with my mom and as usual, I stubbed my toe. But this was no normal "ouch" and move on. This was a bleedy swolleny OWIE that wouldn't stop throbbing. Mom got tired of my whining and told me to stick my foot in the pool and let the chlorine numb the pain. Needless to say, her scheme didn't work, the chlorine pierced my wound like a poison arrow and I screamed bloody murder for about five minutes. From that day forward I kept my head to the ground and watched where I was going. So, I guess THANKS, MOM! is in order?

There is a point to this story.

Yesterday I drove out to the coast for a long hike up Tillamook Head Trail in Ecola State Park. I expected a little mud since it had rained off and on earlier in the week, but I didn't really expect the amount of mud I encountered. For about 80% of the hike I had to keep my eyes glued to the ground to avoid stepping in a mud puddle or twisting my ankle on a muddy rock. I was on a quest for Tillamook Head Viewpoint, but after about three not-entirely-pleasant hours of hiking I gave up, turned around and headed back.

I'm pretty sure I passed right by it on the way out. I'm pretty sure this was it:


I only noticed the "bench" on the way back.

Don't get me wrong. The forest was gorgeous. The views of the ocean along the way were spectacular. I had plenty of sustenance to keep my energy up. I just got tired of hearing, seeing and feeling mud. At some point on the way back I stopped caring about where I stepped and just let my feet go where they may - mud puddle or not. And finally, I was able to stop and enjoy the scenery.

The forest was full of fallen trees and new growth trees. These fallen trees reminded me of the Bay Bridge, as seen from the Oakland side:


There were also funny shaped trees:


The trees on the left looked like they were young whippersnappers busy voguing and having fun while the old grandfather tree on the right sternly glared with his arms crossed over his chest. (Or perhaps I was just hallucinating out of exhaustion. Do you see it?)

And there were tons of moss covered trees:


After the hike I sat on the beach for about an hour just watching the waves:


And that's when I decided that I needed to own Northern Pacific beach front property before I die.

And I also need to learn to surf. And go to Antarctica. And kayak in Alaska. And do about 96 other things. I came up with at least 30 sitting on this beach yesterday.

But liking shoes was not on the list.

________________
Alternate titles for this post:
- This is a long hike for someone with nothing to think about.
- Schplurgh schplurgh schplurgh schplurgh.
- This is such a long hike I've thought of 187 different ways to spell the sound of mud schplurghing under my feet.