Oh Dog, you Sleuth!

This morning Jami, Megan and I went to Powells and then Reading Frenzy and then after wandering around downtown for a while, we ended up at The Virginia Cafe, where we inquired if there were any t-shirts available with the restaurant’s name on it for our friend Ginni (sorry, there isn’t).

Even taking into consideration the huge strides made in gay liberation, this little mannequin boy is setting himself up for a hard path in life. He was spotted in the window at a leotard store in the mall, where we made fun of his faggoty off-the-shoulder sequined top, feather boa and glittery top hat for about 45 minutes. His pose, punctuated by his kick, seems to say, ‘And All That Jaaaaaaaaazzz!’ I tried to drag Megan and Jami over to admire him when we were at the mall last week and they couldn’t be bothered. Now they’ll have to live with it for the rest of their lives. Somewhere, right now, Jenny is on a lonely fishing boat in the middle of the Atlantic, in her cabin playing Push Push on her cellphone and making herself crack up by saying, ‘Kick… and all that jazz!’

Is it me, or is Stephen, um, shrinking?

If this sight seems vaguely familiar, then you’re probably a Goonies fan. Jeremy and I both had off on Friday so we took Megan and Jami out to the coast, to Canon Beach, which is a bit south of Astoria. Pretty much as soon as you turn onto the Pacific Coast Highway, you see the big Haystack Rock and all of us in the car ooh-ed like the characters in ‘It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World’ when they see the big ‘W’.

Some genius drew this perfectly rendered maze on the sand that had exact 90 degree angles. It reminded me how furious I was to have missed out on the Maize maze before I got out to Portland.

I guess one of the personal highlights was hitting the Pig n’Pancake in Canon Beach, which is the only fabled P&P that has a giftshop. I think there’s only three of these in Oregon, so when we drove past this one and I saw the gift shop, I nearly jumped out of the moving car. Sadly, there were no t-shirts or even stickers. I’m turning my ornament into a fridge magnet and drinking out of my coffee cup right now (it’s delicious!). Not sure what I’m going to do with my stuffed animal, though I’m glad I’m not living with the buyer’s regret had I bought the $25 hoodie that featured the logo and the words ‘Property of… The Pig n’ Pancake’, which is one of those bold statements I’m not really ready to make. A client of mine told me today that there’s a BBQ place on Martin Luther King that features a pig happily grilling pork on it’s sign. Anybody know where exactly this is???

Otherwise, yesterday at Trader Joe’s I ran into the guy who sold me my dud Volvo, the one that broke down the day I bought it (and resulted in a protracted fight to get my money back involving threats and screaming). He was right behind me in the checkout line. He said hi, I said hi. I felt really freaked out that he’d see me getting into my new (non lemon, well sort of) Volvo, which I imagined would lead to another ugly confrontation. I immediately went into a cold sweat since I hadn’t had any coffee or cigarettes all day and felt really cloudy and sluggish and then panicky that I was in some situation that I’d have to defend myself. It doesn’t seem like such a big deal as I write this, but I think Katherine will understand, since she was with me back in November when we had to fight this guy tooth and nail to get the price of the car refunded.

About a year ago, when I was visiting Megan in Philadelphia, I had my first glimpse of some of the amazing quilts that she had made. I begged for one for months and months until she decided to make one for me based on a photo I’d taken (technically, perhaps ironically, Jeremy took this photo when we were driving around New Orleans). I sent her a couple of choices and she selected one that shows the sign for a dying chain of Mexican fast food restaurants in New Orleans (is it NO only? I haven’t researched this). In a city truly not known for its good Mexican restaurants, Taco Tico ranks as very sub, sub par Taco Bell, though the chain may be older. Anyway, I’d been hearing behind the scenes news of the quilt for a while and I think she finished it around xmas and decided to fly with it when she came out last week as opposed to mailing it, since it took an insane amount of labor to create. I was so blown away when I saw it. I think she did this amazing job and all the choices are so cool. I can’t believe she actually gave it to me. I just can’t get enough images of old signs and electrical wires, so I think it’s really interesting to see it this way. I plan on hanging it above the fireplace. The quilt is actually pretty huge.

Here’s the most recent picture I have of Megan, only moments before the alien abduction.

So Megan and Jami left this morning and it was super depressing. I actually didn’t get out of bed to take them to the airport or say goodbye. Somehow in my foggy state this morning that seemed kinda okay. Jeremy drove them and said, ‘don’t worry about it.’ But now I feel like a complete asshole.

Otherwise, I changed the layout for my photos page because I’ve always kind of hated it. It’s been edited down to about 30 photos (from 300). I haven’t deleted all the other stuff off my FTP. It may resurface in one form or the other. It’s just a big pain to write all the code. I’d been wanting to set my pictures up in ‘book’ form for a while anyway.

post script: Taco Tico is hardly a Louisiana phenomena though it seems to be a crappy restaurant pretty much everywhere.

I can attest to the barfiness of the food at this otherwise fine Pearl-district dive bar (otherwise, love the place, featured, left). I’ve been thinking all week about how when you first move to a place and then a friend (or in this case, friends) come to visit, you get this perspective on things because you’re seeing it through their eyes (and I’d have to site any visit my friend Kim made to any place I’d ever lived to really make this point — by the way, if you’re reading this, Kim, please rush out and buy the new issue of Bust if you haven’t already). I don’t know if that’s happened so much this time. And this is not due to any shortcomings on their observational skills so much as the fact that I’ve really voraciously tried to devour Portland since I’ve been here and it seems like they’ve gotten to see just a little chunk of it since they’ve been here, which makes me feel like they’re getting ripped off. Anyway, I’ve taken a bunch of pictures of Jami and Megan, but my image production is kind of lagging lately, which I hope to make up for tomorrow by taking a ton of Polaroids. I’m already suicidal that their visit is over, but then earlier today found out my friends Dan, Patrick and Kelly are coming in the summer. So glad there’s something to look forward to. I miss Dan and Kelly very badly, not so much Patrick.

This tree house is within walking distance to where I live though I just saw it in person recently. It got me and Jeremy and Jenny started on this conversation on how disgusted we were by kids who had professionally-built treehouses and obviously couldn’t possibly appreciate them. I desparately wanted a treehouse when I was a kid, but never had one because the house I grew up in didn’t have any trees that would support the weight of a treehouse, much less a child. We compensated for this by digging holes in the backyard in the attempt to make bunkers, which never really worked since New Orleans is below sea level.

So Megan and Jami made it into town okay on Saturday and we hit the karaoke bar almost immediately. It’s been a lot of fun running around and mostly the weather has been incredibly beautiful.
While leaving one of the parking garages downtown today, I had my first sighting of Extremo the Clown’s terrifying car. Jeremy told me about this awhile back and I kinda found it hard to believe that it was really that big a deal and of course now I know better.

I’m so exited that somebody made a website documenting giant fiberglass muffler men. I remember four or five of these in New Orleans when I was growing up. My favorite was a giant bikini woman who had one hand on her hips and another holding up a tire. I think she was about 20 feet tall.

for elizabeth:

Wow!

The house pictured above, in Sellwood, is obviously the home of witches or child molesters. The sides are also covered in depictions of candy and ice cream cones.

Driving to work today, I saw the word ‘vagina’ graffiti-ed all up and down Burnside street, written in this girly script. It made me think of the way Amy Sidaris says it (vuh-jine-uh) in Strangers With Candy and seemed really charmingly innocent. I still follow what’s going on with street art in NY, this is a current favorite.

Megan and Jami show up on Saturday. Can’t wait.

On the left is Kathy’s favorite bar in Portland. I can take it or leave it, mainly due to the strange lighting and bad waitress service. Plus everyone here must drink dark brown yeasty beers and you get yelled at if you don’t like it (it’s like reverse racism).
But I didn’t intend for this to turn into a ’special report’. I took this picture cause I had one more exposure on a roll of film and my favorite lab is right around the corner.

Further analysis of Blue Sunshine can be found on monotonous.

Megan, someone has stolen our idea of making dioramas cool again. Another dream deferred.