I Can Dig It

Whilst researching ballot measure 65 to ascertain my vote, I discovered that the Oregon state motto is:

"She flies with her own wings"

It doesn't help me determine my vote with regard to the open primary, but I think that's a pretty damn sweet motto.

Best Landscaping Business Name EVER

For the poor of vision, a closer look:


When I officially move up in the world to "bourgeois pig" status, I am totally hiring these guys.

Mmmmmmmmmmm

Yesterday I was here.

Today I am not.

Yesterday was worth the sun burning my corneas & leaving me in flaming waves of vicious eye pain, paranoid that my vision would be permanently scarred.**

If I'm wrong & there in fact IS a heaven, this is what mine would be. Of course, if I'm wrong, I don't think heaven is quite where I'm going to find myself in the end.

** I'm still in flaming waves of pain, but I can see clearly enough today. That three-hour drive home wins third place in my list of all-time worst driving experiences.

Sporting Life

Confession: I was really really into watching women's figure skating for a brief period of time last century. I mean, I knew my Bobeks from my Baiuls & my Itos from my Satos. So when Nancy Kerrigan got whacked on the knee in 1994, I ate that shit up with a spoon. In case you don't remember, Kerrigan was the polished Vera Wang-wearing princess from Massachusetts. And her competitor Tonya Harding, whose then-husband hired the knee-whacking fellow to knock Kerrigan out of the Olympics, was the tacky-teal-outfit-clad trailer trash from, yep, Oregon.

Some pictures say way more than a thousand words.

You don't even get to guess for whom I rooted & who got what they deserved in my view, but I'll give you a hint anyway: replace those bangs & that teal bit of nastiness with some blue hair & black clothes & by golly, I'd be peering into a tawdry mid-nineties mirror.

The moral of the story is, there is now a rock opera of the Nancy'n'Tonya saga. The world is a beautiful place. I don't think I need to see it, but I'm thrilled by its mere existence.

And ooh, quiz time! Match the words up with the skater on whose website they appear:

1) "Q- What advice do you give those who feel that their dreams are out of their reach?
A- To go for the dreams that you have and you will learn that the journey to get there is the most gratifying part."

2) "It would be having enough money to go hunting and fishing and go to the big four-wheel-drive mud bogs," she says. "And every once in a while put on a really pretty dress and go to dinner at a place like Applebee's or something."

Meaningless poorly-worded platitudes or mud bogs, people. Take your pick.

Also, whatever craven fantasies Nancy Kerrigan's fans have about her, she sure doesn't allow them to be posted in plain sight on her official website. Unlike some former figure skaters. I wonder how much meth it takes to make that sound like a great idea. I can't even bring myself to read 'em.

Folks Get Down In The Sunshine

23.12.2007 theme song:

Eddie Kendricks - "Date with the Rain"

It rained all day & night. At least from 9 a.m. to 4 a.m. It would have been a beautiful day to sit at home drinking tea & touching my new books. But no! My day was a three-mile walk to Northwest to acquire froufy Portlandia Christmas presents & then dinner & bars. It wasn't a date so much as assault. Blasted rain.

However, today I awoke to a pale white thing & mocking shards of blue sky piercing the vast canopy of gray. I even saw shadows for about 20 minutes. Which, in December's Oregon, passes for so much sunshine. Therefore!

24.12.2007 theme song:

Roy Ayers - "Everybody Loves the Sunshine"

Mark It One

Do you have any idea what a bleeding pain in the ass it is to find stone-ground cornmeal in the pasty white state of Oregon?

When I asked a friend to pick some up for me at the grocery store a while ago, she came back with a box of regular ol' steel-ground, saying they didn't have stone-ground. That's preposterous, thought I. What grocery store worth its salt doesn't carry stone-ground cornmeal? I figured maybe she had just missed it. (This article will give a little info on the difference between the grinds, or at the least, clue you in to the Southern obsession with good cornmeal.)

Last night I wanted to make some corn bread sticks (shaped like little ears of corn - it's quite darling) for tonight. Damned if I was gonna sully myself by using steel-ground. So I decided to go to Fred Meyer - I nearly stopped at the QFC on the way, since it's almost certainly cheaper, but then I figured they might, just might, not have stone-ground. It was raining too hard for me to contemplate more than one stop. So I arrived at Freddie's & filled my basket: 2 ears of corn, heavy cream, milk, Gold Medal bleached all-purpose flour (ugh; I know. But Southerners have them some good food, so who I am to fault their abundant usage of bleached flour, even if it makes me feel dirty & cheap?). And then I see it: the problem my friend had. There is no stone-ground cornmeal. In fact, there are only two options, both from the same brand: white or yellow. However, this is why I specifically chose Freddie's - they have a "natural foods" section. I ran over to its bulk products. Cornmeal, yes. Stone-ground, no. Well shit, I thought. But I had knowledge of a secret weapon: Bob's Red Mill, a local business that makes flours & such using quartz millstones. And sure enough, there in the natural baking section, I found a small bag emblazoned with the magic words that made my heart sing: stone-ground yellow cornmeal. (Yellow vs. white cornmeal is a whole 'nother can of worms & arguments.)

As I walked up to the register, what should have been laughably obvious finally occurred to me: I lived in Virginia when I started baking. Right? Pseudo-South though it may be, of course stone-ground cornmeal was practically falling out of the trees in every brand & color you can imagine. Crap, you could even get it at the IGA in Scottsville. Oregon, on the other hand, may be a land of delicious produce, tasty cheeses, & naturally raised beef, but it is clearly not the land of cornmeal.

So there you go, Virginia. You've finally scored your first point over Oregon. Don't let it go to your head.

Whoulda Thunk It?

Apparently I'm living in the right place. In Oregon, you as the voter get direct say in a whole bunch of things. Usually, there are tons'n'tons of ballot measures for your voting pleasure - last year, I recall my friend getting not one but TWO thick voter info pamphlets in the mail. This is why we have medical marijuana. This is why we are the only state to have legal euthanasia. This is why Oregon still has no sales tax. This is why every Oregon voter votes by mail - yep, we voted on that, too.

So, honestly, I was kind of bummed that for my first time out as an Oregon voter (I'm still not sure that my absentee ballot in '99 ever got there on time), I only had two measly measures on which to vote. Granted, they were pretty fun ones, but still.

Measure 49 harkened back to a measure a few years ago that I missed out on, Measure 37. Something to do with land use & property values, yadda yadda yadda, Measure 37 seems to have been intended for individual property owners who wanted to build one or two houses on their land, but due to loopholes ended up becoming the go-to measure for massive claims by developers & timber companies to build crap on estuaries & other bad-guy stuff. Measure 49 is supposed to close those loopholes & get back to what 37 was meant to accomplish.

Honestly, I read the measure. It was like reading Foucault through oatmeal goggles. Meaning I didn't follow a lot of it. I read all of the arguments for & against. But my decision to vote "yes" came down to three things:

• Development is bad news for animals. Hey, I saw Pom Poko. Those poor tanukis! (This also takes me into my idea that "ownership" (i.e., "it's MY property") is one of the sillier conceits we as humans have devised - though of course, one day I do intend to "own" my own house.)
  
• I don't believe in development for people either. We've built enough crap. Let's live with it & not add to it.
• I have passed through the rolling, subdivision-choked hills of Northern Virginia on more than one occasion & endured the traffic-clogged two-lane "country" roads created thereby. Nuff said.
  

Measure 50 was misleadingly labeled the "Healthy Kids" measure. Basically, this measure would have increased the cigarette tax by 85 cents per pack, using the additional revenue to supply medical insurance for those scads of kids who don't have it. Which on the surface sounds really great. Shit, I smoke, & I would've considered it. Except:

• It would have amended the state Constitution. For a tax? Um, no. That's just wrong. I would have voted "no" based solely on that, frankly. I think I'm secretly Libertarian libertarian anyway.
  
• The money was guaranteed to have been used for kids & other medically underserved Oregonians through 2011. So...where's it going after that?
• Oregon already has some program for uninsured kids. That hardly anyone's bothering to use. Why don't they fix that first?*
• Even the writers of the ballot admitted this was a "short-term solution". Which takes us back to...amending the Constitution for something that isn't really going to fix anything, & is only valid for four years?*
  

So, yeah, the majority of Oregon voters came down on my side. 'Cause I'm fucking right. I'm kind of surprised that Measure 50 didn't pass, actually. It had a huge smiley face & voter-friendly pat on the back to obscure that whole fucking-with-the-constitution thing. Props to my fellow citizens for paying attention.

* Yeah, I'm always the person who's like, "Back it up with facts, bitch" but I'm way too lazy today to do that here. This is just based on stuff I heard on NPR & read in The Oregonian.

Oh My God, Little Blobs Of Moisture Are Falling From The Sky!

For serious, people. YOU LIVE IN OREGON. How can you possibly FREAK OUT & drive like MORONS every time it rains?!?!?!


(The 7.9 is on a 0 to 10 scale, with 10 being super-jammed. On the website, it's a little scale going from green to red. The 16 MPH is on the only real interstate in Oregon (no, I-84 doesn't really count, unless you're going to Idaho), I-5.)

Guess it's "Alternate Route" drive time for me!

Narrative: Renting An Apartment In Portland

Per the Oregonian's story on renting in Portland, Oregon:

"Inner Northeast and Southeast are popular with young professionals because they're more affordable than the west side, yet close enough to make commutes downtown to work and the nightlife easy. But inner and central Southeast Portland have the lowest open rentals percentage: just 1.6 percent of units available [emphasis added]. That's a 21 percent decrease from 2006 and a nearly 75 percent decrease from 2005."

This explains why I had such a hard time finding a place to rent last fall! I just thought that late autumn had to be a tough time to find good affordable apartments. It really is crazy out here, though. I was so excited to go apartment-hunting when I got out here, because I'd never looked for my own place before (looong story), & it was NOT FUN. At all. Even a little bit. Because things go so fucking fast.

My "favorite" was the one-bedroom in Belmont (I walk past that building all the time actually). I called about 40 minutes after the ad went up on Craigslist. The woman said she'd already had 10 calls. I made an appointment for 90 minutes later, & by the time I'd parked my car (I had to leave work in the middle of the day. From Lake Oswego, mind), she'd left a voicemail saying the apartment was rented! Granted, the monthly damage was only $550, which is super-cheap for my neighborhood. But things really do go almost that fast.

This is what worked well for me in my search (I hesitate to call it "advice", but I guess it is):

1) Do whatever you can to be the very first person to see an available space. Apartments seem to work on a "dibs" basis. If you are the first person to get your application in, as long as they think your credit's okay, it's yours. I got my apartment because I checked the Willamette Week's online ads before the print edition came out. By the time it did, & people started calling my landlord, he had already rented it. To me. Oh, by the way, you will probably not find an apartment unless you have already moved here & can look at it in person. Because there are already 12 million people in Portland whom a landlord can physically meet who want to rent that space. Why should they bother with someone who lives 2,000 miles away, even if you are the nicest most perfect tenant ever?
2) You will probably find your apartment on Craigslist. It has the most & best listings, but you will have to keep the page open all day & refresh no less than every 30 minutes. I was the first person to look at three places using this method. Every place save one that I looked at was on Craiglist. BUT, it is definitely worth it to keep an eye on the Willamette Week & Portland Mercury websites. For some reason my landlord only listed in Willamette Week. Bless him.
3) Expect to fork over some dough for credit checks. This will depend on how your hunt goes. Me? I spent about $100 on 3 credit checks for potential apartments. The first one didn't like my credit. The second was the place I almost took, until I found the third place. (I also paid a credit check fee for a fourth place, because I wanted to think about the fourth vs. the third, & the property manager said they'd hold it & refund if I decided not to move forward. Which they kindly did.)
4) Be overly honest & give too much detail about your credit (if it isn't perfect). The first landlord asked, & all I said was that it was "not perfect, but not terrible". He rejected me. (Which worked out for the complete best for me, for the record.) Lesson learned! For the next three apartments I gave an exquisitely detailed narrative of my credit. Before they did the check. I said, "This is exactly what you are going to find." Then I told them why they would find it there (making it sound as nice as possible, of course). I threw in some personal information. I was not above mentioning my most recent living situation & its possible effect on my report. I even said that I didn't understand why so much importance was placed on letter-perfect credit. After all, what's the very first thing you're going to pay every month? RENT. And every one of the three offered me the space.
5) Have patience (if you're fortunate enough to have that luxury). I started looking for an apartment immediately after my arrival, in the beginning of October. I didn't find the perfect space for five weeks. And when I did find it, I couldn't move in for another three weeks. Which was really hard. But now? I'm totally in love with my apartment. With my neighborhood. It's perfect. Then again, I hate moving, so crashing in my friend's dining room in Wilsonville for two months was worth it to me.

Because I'm not moving again until I buy a house. And in this market, that's not likely to happen for a while.

Nasty Political Radio

For years I was tormented by NPR. Its demonic intrusions into my life were long, ongoing & utterly irritating. I mean, I hate NPR. Okay, so I know that really it isn't NPR that I hate so much as the situations in which I was forced to listen to it. The simple fact is, I am not political. Which apparently marks me as something of a rare bird amongst my acquaintances. The times during which my ears were sullied with NPR, certain of my fellow listeners were politically-minded, & frequently had a sort of tunnel vision to go along with the political platitudes. There is nothing that drives me crazier.

So I must admit I'm thoroughly baffled by the fact that, on my morning commute, I (1) decided I wanted to hear NPR & (2) actively sought out the local station that would be airing it. True to form, I recoiled at the familiar strains of the morning music, but then I kept listening.

My reactions to this morning's broadcast are as follows:

• It seems the Pittsburgh Steelers have a lot of female fans. The announcer mentioned pink jerseys. If that's the case, thought I, well shit, I'm going to become a Steelers fan. Alas, a quick Google search revealed that the players don't actually wear pink jerseys - they are just sold as merchandise, designed to appeal to women. Oh well. I think the Chargers have the prettiest uniforms - the powder blue & gold? Mmm hmm. Too bad they're "throwback" uniforms. Whatever that means.
  
• Iraq. Oh, Iraq. I know it's a bit ostrich of me to not know much about what's going on. But I've always thought the whole gambit was incredibly stupid. I have little patience for or interest in things I find incredibly stupid, for better or worse.
• Why the hell do people live where hurricanes & other natural disasters not only occur, but are par for the course? I know it's mean but I can't help thinking that they fully deserve whatever travesties befall them. "Oh honey, I've got a great idea - let's move to the heart of hurricane country! Sure, our house may have its roof ripped off. Sure, we may get a bunch of flooding. Sure, our insurance will be expensive as fuck & not actually cover most of the hazards. Let's do it anyway!" Retards. Maybe it's nature's way of winnowing?
• Oregon rocks! Sorry. I always took a bunch of pride in things Oregonian while growing up. We just didn't figure all that much into the national scheme of things most of the time. I was super-proud that Tonya Harding was from Portland. (And I took a bit of malicious glee when the trailer trash tart beat up the New England Vera Wang-clad princess. I admit it!) This time apparently Nancy Pelosi (who is the speaker of the House & therefore presumably a Democrat, though I know nothing else) was in town talking about energy stuff. And she was just raving about Oregon's energy policies. How awesome we are. I don't know. I think it's cool that other people think Portland is cool. Because Portland is cool. As is Oregon in general. The New York Times has, like, a huge Portland-centric hard-on. (Last month, it was PDX's friggin' tea scene. This month it's Stumptown Coffee. And about once or twice a month for the past year they've had an article on Portland.) The BBC did a segment on our public transportation ("The City Where the Car is not King"). It's nice, particularly since I so recently came around to Oregon. I don't regret living on the lesser coast for 10 years, because it allowed me to fully realize & appreciate how much I love the West Coast, & how much better it is for me. Now I'm only in danger of becoming a complete snobby jackass about it. Oh, wait. Shit. I kind of already am.
  

So anyway, I recently turned five. Er, I mean, twenty-nine. I've already had the "WHAT?" conversational experiences. I slept all last weekend (naps, even!) to recover from my previous several weeks of severe activity & lack of sleep.

My question is: Is this another thing that happens when you get old? You wake up in the morning & crave National Public Radio?

If so, I've gone from graceful acceptance to sheer terror about this whole aging thing. I knit. I have cats. I take multiple medications. What could possibly be next?

It's Funny Because It's True

Or, alternately, it's funny because I am (1) in the third straight day of an unrelenting headache, (2) still slightly ill & (3) delirious from staying up until 3 a.m. painting.

Okay, they are admittedly totally cheesy. But while procrastinating today, I came across one of those "you know you're an Oregonian when..." lists & it actually made me smile & nod. Holy crap! Here's a small selection of choicer cuts (I've made no grammatical corrections):

You stand on a deserted corner in the rain waiting for the "Walk" signal.

You consider that if it has no snow or has not recently erupted, it is not a real mountain.

You are not fazed by "Today's forecast: showers followed by rain," and "Tomorrow's forecast: rain followed by showers."

You notice, "The mountain is out" when it is a pretty day and you can actually see it.

You think people who use umbrellas are either wimps or people from california

You blame everything that's not right on ex-Californians.

You know what is in between the East Side and the West Side, and how to pronounce it.

You are sitting at a red light surrounded by Subaru Legacy Outbacks.

You only honk your horn if collision is imminent and never for anything else.

If someone ran your car off the highway, you might drown.

Obey all traffic laws except "keep right unless passing."

You know the exact day you had school off because it snowed like....one inch.

You remember Ramblin' Rod...and you laugh because you used to watch it....or because you were on it for your birthday.

you say "pop" instead of "soda."

you smile at people you don't know as you walk by them on the sidwalk.

you make subtle remarks about washington drivers, but save your real road rage for california drivers.

You've witnessed 300 nude bicyclists just cruising around downtown like its no big deal.

Well, yeah...pretty much.

I Love My Ocean

It may not be yellow-sand-blue-ocean-palm-tree-postcard material, but DAMN! I love me the OR coast. I've yet to find a coast that pleases me more. Granted, my experience outside of Oregon is limited to the following: (1) Virginia Beach; (2) Gulf of Mexico via Florida; (3) Santa Barbara & (4) Monterey; a list which could never be mistaken for comprehensive, but still.

Possibly I find the Oregon coastline more pleasing than the others because it successfully marries the two things that always come to mind when I think about the ocean - terrifying beauty & epic danger. It slightly astounds me that people find the sound of waves soothing considering how violently the act plays out in the vision, for instance. The Oregon coast, with cliffs both jutting & eroded, permanently wind-blown fir trees, virtual forests of driftwood & enormous rock masses against which the waves can most satisfactorily crash, is almost a mirror image to the ocean itself. It doesn't pretend like it can't kill you if it wants.

The Oregon coast is no Beach Blanket Bingo, thank heavens. Although, now that I think of it, the classic late 80s Kurt Russell-Goldie Hawn vehicle Overboard was filmed & set on the Oregon coast. And Wikipedia's entry on the fictional town in which it's set (yes; there really is an entry for this) just drives my whole point home:

"[T]he final scene showing the main characters swimming in the ocean would not have been filmed off the Oregon Coast: the low water temperature would cause hypothermia in minutes."

Damn straight.