I never see anybody else accept a copy, either, and I alway wonder what their handout ratio is — my guess is that they do about as well as the folks who ask for change, if not worse. But maybe all they need to do is make it a bit more sexy or something — at least the cover — to get people to grab a copy. Make it more like a comic, make it pop, give me the promise of a little action or something rather than the usually dull picture of… a watchtower or whatever else is on the cover in muted tones.

By the way, this is my favorite page on the JW website (not that I spent a lot of time there, but I’m sure there’s plenty of golden content), especially the two sets of eyes just about getting it on at the top of the page — see, THIS is what the magazine needs! I’d buy that for a dollar.

I haven’t really been watching the local news, but I’m guessing they’ve been chattering away for days about whether or not Portland bridges are safe to travel over — and just a guess, but I’ll wager Fox 12 has had more “unsafe bridges” stories than the other channels. Either way, I know in my travels this weekend, I was much more aware of crossing over even small bodies of water, though it didn’t really stop me from driving on.

I’ve taken the train to and from Seattle a number of times, and on almost every occasion, it’s been sold out. It’s a fairly pain-free way to travel, and this has got to be a huge headache for both Amtrak and people trying to travel this weekend. But I have to say that I’d rather have them err on the side of safety rather than giving it a quick shrug and continuing on as if nothing was wrong.

Hopefully they’ll fix the defect or find another manufacturer and get the trains up and running again soon. Bad enough that travel by train is dying a slow death in this country — hopefully this is just a slight blip rather than another nail in the coffin. Otherwise, so much for traveling to the Seahawks games in September.

Look, I don’t care how well trained your dog is (and this one was pretty good — besides the one stop-and-sniff, it walked next to him down the next block), downtown post-rush hour is not the place to be walking your dog off-leash. Like all those folks who say “oh, but I’m a great driver”, it’s not you or your dog that I’m necessarily worried about, but everyone and everything else around you. You never know when someone might be afraid of your dog or a little kid might reach out and grab a tail, causing your dog to snap at it, or when you might encounter another (even leashed) unfriendly dog coming around a corner that will affect your animal. There’s just too many unknown, out-of-your-control factors for anyone not to have as much control as they can, and that means leashing your dog, if only for its own sake.

I’m sure that there’s a law on the books of some sort in regards to this, though a quick search at Portland Online only brings up the on/off leash rules at parks. It’d be nice to think that people would use common sense in non-park areas, but we know how well that usually works out, eh?

Rucka’s one of my favorite crime-story writers — his series (with Ed Brubaker) Gotham Central for DC Comics was easily one of the best things they’ve put out in ages, and was a street-level view of what it was to be a cop in Batman’s Gotham City. He’s also the creator of Queen &Country, a long-form spy comic and novel and the soon-to-be-a-movie Whiteout, which I really need to read one of these days.

Anyhoo, though the above-linked article doesn’t indicate when it’s coming, I’ll be putting in my pull request with my LCS very soon.

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Originally uploaded by jonashpdx.

As I write this, a crew is busy cutting down and disposing of the giant tree that lies between my house and my neighbor’s. She’s been wanting to cut it down for a while now — at least since last summer — and announced early this week that a crew would be coming to do the big chop on Thursday. Her motivation is because it’s tearing up her driveway and (she thinks) her foundation. When last summer passed and it still stood, I held out hope that my neighbor had changed her mind due to the cost, but no such luck. I’m no tree-hugger, really, but it’s just kind of sad to realize that it’s going to be gone when I get home from work.

It’s a huge tree — at least 15 feet around at its base and maybe 200 feet tall — I’m bad at the estimates, but it’s twice again the height of any house on the block. I can’t imagine how bare and exposed it’ll feel once its gone, not to mention how hot that side of our house will get, though it’ll probably be better for our roof and gutters, not to mention the sap it drops onto the windshields that turns into an impenetrable crust.

And the dog’ll miss the squirrels and raccoons that use it for shelter. But I’ll miss it. It was a good landmark when we moved in and will take some time to get used to its absence. It wasn’t all that long ago that our entire block was only trees, as the first house on our block was built in 1919.

But then it was off to Miami and the Dolphins last year as their backup QB — a pretty big fall from being the third choice in the first round of the draft to instant backup status on your second team — but he was upgraded to the starting position after four games when Daunte Culpepper imploded. But with a 5-6 personal record there, Miami soon traded him to the Atlanta Falcons, again as a backup to the star QB Michael Vick.

But now that Vick’s in some superheated water due to his (alleged) nasty habits having to do with dogfighting, could this be Harrington’s time to shine, finally? I mean, even with Vick, Atlanta and their new coach were kind of in a rebuilding zone this year, and with Vick probably now out for the season, barring a miracle, the expectations are even lower. So if ever there was a low-pressure situation in which Harrington might be able to shine, this is it. Here’s hoping he and his new team surprise us all and have at least a decent year.

Not that I’ll be rooting for the Falcons, but you know, I’m all for some good (non-dog-fighting-related) entertainment value.

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Originally uploaded by jonashpdx.

Every day on my way to work, I pass by the MAX end station just west of 11th at Yamhill and this stretch of cinder-block wall that has been home to many assorted bits of graffitti, including my personal horrifically non-favorite “I will rape you,” which was there for a number of months during the spring.

Last week, I noticed that the wall had finally been painted over in white, and yesterday, New Avenues for Youth and (the sign says Outside but I’m guessing it’s) Outside In started production –in coordination with the Portland Police– on a mural on the wall that will hopefully take the place of the scattered graffitti, at least for a while.

From the progress they made yesterday, I’d guess they’ll be done by the end of the week.

One more pic of their mission statement below.

I finished my copy on Sunday afternoon*, and even though I was a bit miffed at the relative douchebaggery of the Mercury for putting a spoiler (pseudospoiler) on their cover just to be cool — really, what was that about? There’s no way if you saw it you could get it out of your head, whether true or not, and why they chose to crap on the collective experience of thousands of folks in town is beyond me (though I was told that somebody at one of the parties set a bunch of Mercuries on fire while they waited, which seems fair) — I’m guessing that maybe not everybody’s done with it yet, and that plus Monday plus hazy mugginess and the dog days of summer equal a sloooooow day on the interwubs.

*It was *awesome*, by the way. The absolute opposite of the blue-balls bonanza that was the end of The Sopranos in that something (lots of things) actually happened and many of the threads were brought to resolution. Imagine that.

I actually only found out about it because they asked to use one of my pictures on one of the restaurant listings for N. Portland’s own Beaterville Cafe (though hello, I’m pretty sure they take cards there). Not many of the listings have pics yet, so I’m guessing they’re still looking for shots — they notified me via Flickr, so if you’ve got photos of local restaurants posted there, check your e-mail on the site.

I don’t often find myself in need of an all-inclusive citywide search thingamabob, but if you’re looking for yet another guide to the city complete with mini reviews and map linkies, Schmap looks like a decent bet.