Another Park

Everything is so closeby here. I went for a walk, intending to catch the bus to the park. Before I knew it, I was there. It was a lovely, warm, sunny, fall day and Imeandered through the park snapping photos to my heart's content. jc was up when I got back, and we went to Marrakesh for a lovely Morroccan five-course meal, complete with ritual handwashing by the server. I sat on a cushion on the floor, and we ate with our hands. At the end, our hands were sprinkled with a fragrant scented water, and mint tea left a pleasant taste in the mouth.

.

Another perfect day.

.

Rose

The Park

This park is just a few blocks from the apartment. There is a fountain in summer, with children cooling off from the heat. Yesterday, people were playing bocce, tossing the football, and walking their dogs. There's so much to see and do!

Rose

a bit of the Pearl

I stepped out to the Jewish deli this morning for their Nova lox on a pumpernickel bagel. On the way back, I snapped a few random shots of the neighborhood. I've been dying to get out and photograph foliage, but I've been busy with the new job every day this week, and moving before that. Today it's raining a little. Maybe the sun will come out later.

rc

South Park Blocks

In Love with the City of Kooks

hazy downtown view from Mt. Tabor

.

We spent another day in town today, doing a few errands and enjoying ourselves. At the end of the day, we sat outside at McMenamin's Ringler's Annex. I was sipping a nice Stout while jc drank a Coke. A large-breasted, bra-less woman purposefully strode up to our table, loudly warning us not to drive under the influence. Against jc's advice, I informed her that we rode the bus. I should've listened; it didn't help at all. I ordered another pint and a chocolate caramel brownie a la mode.

.

Soon a normal-looking, twenty-something man strolled up to our table:

"Hi. How are you?" he queried.

We'd been waiting for Ben-from-eBay to arrive for a deal, so jc greeted him cordially:

"Are you Ben?"

The answer was self-evident when he replied with:

"Can I ask you about Jesus?"

Most definitely not someone selling an amp. He continued:

"You worship the devil. Even the devil worships Jesus. I used to worship the devil."

As he walked away, I could no longer stifle an outburst of giggling. The reformed devil-worshipper heard and did a funny little dance.

.

Eventually the real Ben arrived, and I assure you, the attractive, well-travelled, intelligently conversant young man, was at once completely different from the colorful kooks previously encountered and the most pleasantly surprising audiophile jc has ever drug me along on a deal with.

.

Did I say how much I love this city?

.

rc

Complaining about a Fine Day

*
I had a perfectly nice day yesterday, riding the bus around the city, walking up one thousand steps to the top of Mt. Tabor to see the view, dodging a semi-solid rainstorm downtown to catch the bus, lugging my camera all over the city and not gettting a decent shot to show for it. That was the good part, and I enjoyed it immensely. (Really, I did.) I also had a pretty nice time at work, despite a co-worker who treated me like a ten-year old ignoramus. It was the drive home this morning in rush hour traffic that so colored the preceding narrative. Can you call it a drive when you don't go anywhere? Can you call it the freeway when all you're free to do is look at the bumper of the car in front of you? That's what I call parking on the parkway, making sense of a nonsensical word. My natural impatience causes me to take the first exit in those circumstances and drive in circles on the roads noone else is using before finding another crowded road to wait on. Well, that's enough of my griping for now. That's temporary sleep deprivation talking. My apologies, dear readers.
*
r. connors

The Dancer

Oregon fawn lily Erythronum oregonum- native

~

We hopped on the downtown bus yesterday with a few errands to run, and made a trip to the Portland Art Museum. The lovely special exhibit, The Dancer, is on display. It features studies of dancers, mostly ballerinas done by Degas, Toulouse-Lautrec, and Forain. The collection is inspiringly beautiful, and worth much more than the hour or so that we spent viewing it. Here is my favorite; significantly less beautiful and impressive in its diminutive, unframed form.

~

We spontaneously took a different bus route home, which of course worked out just fine, and got us home a few minutes earlier, since we eliminated a wait.

~

Rose

The City

.
I am something of a neophyte when it comes to the city. Nearly every detail delights me. I went to work last night. As anyone would have predicted, there was nothing to be frightened of. The worst part was the drive home in Monday morning rush hour, but even that wasn't bad; not even with an accident and some snow factored in.
.
After some sleep today, we boarded our local bus, and rode into The City. We found some food carts and got some excellent Thai food for $5 each. I had drunken noodles. We ate on concrete bench in front of the university's engineering building, pictured above.
.
It suddenly got quite blustery, a turn of weather we weren't prepared for, so we got back on the bus and came home. The people on the bus are the subject of a children's song, but I have a few verses to add about the clothes, both wonderful and appalling, that the people were wearing, the music they were listening to, how polite they were, how the driver helped the girl in the wheelchair, and don't forget the mining of the nares one not-so-sober woman was engrossed in.
.
Back home, I'm delighted by it all.
.
Rose