I’m back! From a hopefully short-lived extremely busy time at both work and home and everywhere in between. And yes, I have some new exciting information for you. This will likely not be a surprise to most anyone, but Portland has come in as number 10 on Walk Score’s top 10 most walkable cities, with the Pearl, Old Town/Chinatown, and Downtown all being our most walkable neighborhoods. Looking through the other cities, all of the “most walkable neighborhoods” are in downtown areas, which seems to be a “well, duh,” statement to me, since, well… duh. Of course the more urban areas tend to be more “walkable” with the increase in amenities in a small area. Anyhow, iff you haven’t checked out your neighborhood’s Walk Score, fill in your address and compare against your friends’ neighborhoods. My own Center comes in with a score of 80 (with my more immediate area coming in with a 71/100 - very walkable, though for some reason the map does not see some amenities near my place, like the QFC on Burnside, but denotes some businesses incorrectly, like Commercial Refrigeration on Glisan as a restaurant). And in fact, I do tend to walk to a number of places in my ‘hood often. This is a fantastic tool for checking out other possible neighborhoods for relocation (also points out how many bars there are, whether that’s a good or bad thing is up to you).

Speaking of bars, the boyfriend and I will be hitting up the Brewers’ Fest tomorrow at opening time. As these type of things tend to grow exponentially each year, I’m excited about trying all of the tasty wares, but I’m not too excited about the possible hours of waiting in line. If things look too bad, we may just head to Belmont Station to attend the tapping there of some kegs not featured at the OBF. Have I mentioned that I’ve been here now a year? My Portlandversary was on 7/15, and I can’t think of another place (within reason) I would rather be. ^_^

One of the few people I’ve met in my old visits (you know, before I moved here) to Portland was Mistina, the bassist for The Prids. She was kind and friendly and she drank with me, which is always a sign of a good friend to be, no?

Well today I have to sadly report that The Prids, whilst on tour in California near Fresno, were in an accident that was really quite bad. The van, I was told, blew a tire and they lost control of it. The van went off the highway and rolled several times leaving the van wrecked, the equipment broken and the band members rather beat up. One band member, when last I was given information, was still in the hospital, but the others were released after being treated for various broken bones, cuts and bruises. Unfortunately, they are left with little to no money to get them home, pay hospital bills and buy new equipment, not to mention a van.

A couple of close friends of theirs rented a van to drive down to see what they could help possibly salvage and to see what help they could be. Any help would do and if you’d like to donate to the local band you can contact donate@theprids.com.

Channel 12 ran a small story on it here

My grandparents lived in a small town in southern Minnesota where one of Birds-Eye’s plants was. Trucks came in everyday from the fields of Minnesota and Iowa loaded down with sweet corn. Locals would drop by the backdoor of the plant a couple times a week and pick up a full brown-paper bag of corn for just a few dollars. We ate fresh corn nearly everyday in the summer. And when I say fresh - I mean it was picked less than 24 hours ago. And in the winter we ate the corn she cut off those fresh cobs and froze weekly all summer long.

Now I know that we are in a bit of a food shortage* and that corn is on of the most talked about shortage items. But you know that the corn we at is not the same as the corn that is fed to animals, the corn that is used in Ethanol, or even the corn that is popped. Farmers may be planing more of the fuel type corn and less of the food type corn - but that shouldn’t mean that the sweet corn that is planted should be any less tasty than usual. And yet it is. Now I know I’m not going to find anything as sweet and juicy as that Midwest corn, but Oregon corn can be decent, and even for early in the season, the stuff this summer has just been abysmal! We had delicious ribs from Gartners last night, and alongside them, some really really sad sweet corn.

I’ve tried getting it at a variety of places - but so far not much luck. Any suggestions? A particular farmers market or stand? A certain grocery store? Your backyard?

Please help - I need my corn-on-the-cob fix!

*I have a really hard time saying ‘food shortage’ in a place where we eat so much and waste so much and for many of us it just means fewer fancy meals out, but for many people, I do know it’s truly a problem we must solve!

Photo by Rich Oskin

As gas prices are rising local Portlanders are looking for alternate means of commuting around town. Bicycles are a number one as far as this city goes (we all know that!). But have you noticed more mopeds on the road? We’re talking small motorized engines with pedals here–not scooters! I certainly have.

According to founder and co-owner Patrick Fitzgibbons, local scooter shop P-Town Scooters has been selling new Tomos mopeds by the half dozen load every week. Portland Craigslist has been popping up quite a few vintage ones as well.

In my personal opinion, it’s a great thing that more people are hopping out of their cars and riding mopeds. They are efficient little machines that get about 100 miles per gallon. The vintage mopeds can be a bit of a pain with how much you have to repair the aging parts and mechanisms but so worth it once you get it running.

Now–for full disclosure–I am a part of the local moped gang Puddle Cutters, a part of the national Moped Army. Much like the local bicycle culture, we have our own scene. What is amazing beyond the transportation issue is that Portland produces such unique subcultures such as this one.

The Puddle cutters are having our annual rally this weekend, Hold My Beer, This is Going to be Awesome. We are raffling off a brand new Tomos moped with the generosity of P-Town Scooters. Raffle is this Sunday at Plan B, 5PM. Don’t miss out on the other events, rides, and parties either!

Once upon a time, way back when, the McMenamin’s movie chain showed movies worth watching. Art house stuff, cult movies, or movies that were just plain fun (like showing “The Creature From the Black Lagoon” on Halloween). For the past, oh decade or so, that’s changed. It’s now almost exclusively yawn-inducing big Hollywood second-run fare - stuff you’d see on an airplane. A look at this weeks listings shows crap like “Run, Fatboy Run” and “Fool’s Gold” (although I will give them points for showing the wonderfully dark “In Bruges”). Beer loving movie geeks like me can still count on the Laurelhurst to bust out something worth seeing on a fairly regular basis.

Thank God for Clinton Street Theater. Combining an art-house sensibility with a small brewery on the premises, the theater caters to those Portlanders who want to have a couple beers and see movies worth watching. Take a look at the current listings for an example. That’s more quality viewing than you’ll see at a place like the Baghdad all year. “Eraserhead”, a documentary about The Gits, the Portland Underground Film Festival, a freaking “Repo Man”/”Maximum Overdrive” double feature, for God’s sake!

That’s a whole lot of good stuff right there. Combine the movie with a couple of beers and a trip over to Dot’s for one of their awesome french fry concoctions, and you’ve got an awesome night out.

And McMenamin’s, I’m rough on you because I love you. You can do better. You know you can.

Michale Graves is castor oil to hipsters. Strike one - he had the audacity to replace Glen Danzig in a reformed Misfits during the 90’s. Strike two - his fame has come largely through the “horror punk” movement - not exactly the first choice in music for the hip ones. Strike three - he openly supported George W. Bush during the 2004 election.

Well, I’m here to tell you that the hipsters are wrong - Michale Graves is cool and you should go see him this Friday. Yes, he fronted a Danzig-less, reformed Misfits during the mid to late 90s. He also wrote a lion’s share of the material, much of which is pretty good. And if Jerry Only came to you, a 19 year old kid, and asked you to front the Misfits, would you say no?

Yes, he came to fame by playing “horror punk”. For those not familiar with the formula, it largely involves wearing black, face paint, and singing about things like bats, zombies, and vampires. Done badly, it’s embarrassing. Done right, it’s a blast - the musical version of watching a 1950’s B-movie. Graves did it right.

Yes, he supported George Bush in 2004. Last time I checked, it was okay to disagree on some things. Some people may be willing to discredit someone’s artistic output because they’re not okay with who they put a checkbox next to in the ballot box. I’m not one of those people.

Finally, the guy has managed to release some varied and very interesting material since leaving the Misfits in 2000. The first album (”Web of Dharma”) was, perhaps, the perfect coda to the 1990’s “alternative” era. It’s one of the best albums that nobody’s ever heard. If you manage to find a copy, I highly recommend picking it up. Graves followed up with “Gotham Road” (an interesting mix of melody and crushing heavy metal), “Punk Rock is Dead” (a swaggering return to the “new Misfits” sound and a pointed “f you” to detractors), and “Return to Earth” (an honest but hit and miss attempt to broaden his sound). The latest, (”Illusions”) is a largely acoustic collaboration with Damien Echols of the West Memphis Three.

Graves’ albums have been either self-releasing or released through small labels for the better part of a decade now, but he’s still somehow able to launch national tours on an almost yearly basis. And no former Misfit (with the exception of Glen Danzig) has released such a prolific and varied output. Graves really marches to the beat of his own drummer. And what’s more indie than that?

Yesterday I saw some maintenance workers in front of a business digging up all of the beautiful yellow and white flowers planted in front of their building. They were just tossing all of the plants into a garbage can, that I assume will just be recycled, it didn’t look like they were being careful enough with the plants for them to be transplanted anywhere.

This morning I drove by the same business and looked - there were new, different flowers planted there.

Now I don’t know much about gardening, so I’m not sure what they are, but the plants that were being dug up and tossed away - looked very much like what we’ve got growing along the boulevard in front of our house. They’re small, ground cover flowers - almost like on a low bush, they’ve been in bloom for quite some time now - and if I remember correctly from last year, will stay in bloom for awhile. We do nothing with them - they just come back every year - and have spread out a bit which is great for where they’re at in our yard.

So is it normal practice for businesses to just dig up perfectly good plants and throw them away so that they can change them out? And then they’ll maybe do the same next year and put back in what was there before because of seasonality? Do the companies that do landscaping and yard work at business every keep those plants and offer them to the public? Maybe they wouldn’t be any good, but it just seems like such a waste to me.

Yesterday the Los Angeles City Council passes an ordinance limiting the size of houses and remodels on residential small lots. These behemoths are also known as mcmansions and pretty much every major city has to deal with them. In the past year or so many cities have placed restrictions on house size in certain neighborhoods in an effort to preserve the character and keep the peace among residents.

Curious to know what Portland is doing or has done about the threat of steroid-sized homes, I started doing some research. While it seems the most threatening building type in Portland proper is the skinny house, which is actually a decent solution to infill, I learned that what is more pervasive and threatening to the common good is the local attitude toward growth of any kind. I read a boatload of venomous comments by residents who seem to think that they have a slice of paradise here and no one else can partake. What’s worse, they blame Californians for all that they consider has gone wrong here. Having been raised here, left for California, then returned, I find this attitude so ridulous and their arguments null, considering California is full of people from everywhere else, including Oregon. Growth in all metropolitan areas is on the rise and will continue to do so in the next century. We are a civilization of city dwellers so rather than spend the energy bemoaning those who want to live in a decent city, among decent folk, I say put the effort into making sure that growth happens in the best way possible. Complaining about newcomers to Oregon is old hat, and really stale.

For those not in the know, Sam Adams is proposing to use the old Sauvie Island Bridge to gap I-405 across NW Flanders Street. I’ve lived in Portland long enough to appreciate the fact that we do stuff different here. But really? Is this necessary? Aren’t there perfectly usable spans one block on either side of Flanders? And if, as proponents claim, the sidewalks are too narrow, isn’t there a perfectly suitable means of walking under the 405 just a few blocks north?

I think this is a bad idea. Sure, it’s a neat idea, but a bad idea. Let’s forget about the fact that it’s unnecessary. We have some of the crappiest roads on the west coast. There are a small ton of potholes beggin’ for a-fixin’. Also, there are parts of the city that still don’t have sidewalks. Maybe we could fix these first? Secondly, this just smells like a pet project, and gives those folks out in the eastern hinterlands more ammunition for arguments of west-side favoritism. I can’t say I blame them, really. It does look bad when the city is seriously contemplating an absolutely unnecessary (but cool - I’ll admit it’s a cool idea) handout to peds and cyclists when their roads are crumbling.

Am I wrong here?

Cash-strapped Clinton fails to pay bills

From the article:

Hillary Rodham Clinton’s cash-strapped presidential campaign has been putting off paying hundreds of bills for months — freeing up cash for critical media buys but also earning the campaign a reputation as something of a deadbeat in some small-business circles.

A pair of Ohio companies owed more than $25,000 by Clinton for staging events for her campaign are warning others in the tight-knit event production community — and anyone else who will listen — to get their cash upfront when doing business with her. Her campaign, say representatives of the two companies, has stopped returning phone calls and e-mails seeking payment of outstanding invoices. One even got no response from a certified letter.

Remember how some Oregon small businesses got dinged when Paul Allen dragged the Rose Quarter into bankruptcy? Don’t let it happen again…