Spring is in the Air!

After a leisurely Saturday breakfast of eggs and soldiers (soft-boiled eggs and toast, a tradition I picked up while honeymooning in Ireland), I peeked out the window and noticed that all the clouds were... GONE?!?!? Hmmm. I had been planning on recovering from my harrowing week by lounging around on the couch all day, but this rare gem (a warm, cloudless Saturday in Portland) was a little too rare to pass up. Drive out to the coast, I thought? No, I wouldn't make it past Beaverton, since half of Oregon would have had the same brilliant idea. Glancing around my living room, I took inspiration in my birthday present from Dylan. Ladies and Gentlemen, meet Pepper (above).

Pepper is a Schwinn beauty, so named for her "salt-and-pepper" coloring, the "S" on her seat that looks like it belongs on a salt shaker, and her feisty spirit. Pepper is a looker. She turns heads and garners comments from total strangers along the lines of, "Nice Cadillac ya' have there!" She even gets me compliments! I can't tell you how many times I've heard, "Nice seat!" and "Look at that coloring!" Sometimes people even get really inappropriate and say things like, "Now doesn't that look like a comfortable ride." Sheesh.




But I digress. After spotting Pepper sadly tucked away in our living room corner, I decided it was time to take her out for a springtime jaunt. We squeezed into Emmy Lou (my car) and drove half an hour out to Sauvie Island. Sauvie Island is indeed an island, though unusual in that it is surrounded by two rivers. It can be accessed via this bridge:

Sauvie Island is yet another reason I love living in Portland. It's so close, and so charming! It boasts a quaint countryside, featuring farms and livestock,

 
beautifully symmetrical rows of (some sort of) produce,

and photographic opportunities aplenty (especially for those with fancy cameras, unlike my point-and-shoot--but hey, it held up pretty well!).

You can even see Mt. Hood in the background!!!! (Sigh.) Indeed, it was such a beautiful day that it seemed every living creature had made its way out to Sauvie Island to play.

This horse was rolling around in the warm dirt. I was tempted to join in.

I like to think that we made a connection, as he later on stopped by to say hello (then again, I suppose it could have been the fistfuls of grass in my hand that attracted his attention).

Cows lounged lazily in the shade,

except for this guy, who apparently fancied himself Ferdinand the Bull:

Photographers were out in full force,

as were cyclists:

All of the cyclists who passed me were friendly enough, but I'm pretty sure they were either snickering with derision or overcome with waves of nostalgia as they witnessed my blatant lack of spandex:

Twelve miles into my ride (that is to say, at the end of it), I figured I had earned myself a picnic lunch consisting of an apple, cheddar-with-chives and turkey on a baguette, and the tasiest water for miles around:











Special thanks to Tee for the phenomenal water bottle, which kept me well-hydrated.

(Ahhh, that's more like it)

I wrapped up my adventure by driving out to the Sauvie Island beaches, where I didn't pay for a parking pass and, mercifully, did not get a parking ticket. Rumor has it that tucked away between these wholesome, family-friendly beaches there is a nude beach. I've yet to find it.

 

And that's all, folks. You're always welcome to join me and Pepper on a leisurely ride!

 

P.S. I have not-so-secret fantasies about living in a tiny little house like this one, in a semi-remote place like Sauvie Island, where I can bake bread every weekend, sow my imaginary garden, and tend to my three chickens, Isabelle, Betsy, and Fluffers.

Raise a Glass to the Irish!

Here's to you, Dave and Rachel, bearers of sweet nectar from the gods! I'm talking about Irish mead, also known as honey wine. Dylan and I received a jug of this divine stuff as a wedding gift, and we finally broke it open for our 2011 St. Patty's Day dinner. Little did we know the delight that was in store for us. Witness the progression:

Mmmm! Oh, this is rather tasty stuff!

OMG, it's AMAZING. Dylan, you'll have to wrestle this from my cold, dead body!

Aaaaarghhhhh!!! Yummm m m m m mmuuuummmm!

Daaaaavvveee.... Damn you, Dave.

  Erin go Braugh!

Sry guys, wife agro.

That, my friends, is what Dylan typed immediately after this conversation:

Me: Whatcha up to?
Dylan: 'Bout to do a quick raid.
Me: Oh. ...
Me: Do you have to do a raid right now?
Dylan: Uhhh... nooooo?

And then, after an awkward pause, he proceeded to apologize to his fellow gamers for having an "agro" wife. He was met with sympathetic remarks all around.

My immediate reaction was hysterical laughter. Apparently an event such as this one is so commonplace in the world of online gaming that they have a code for it!

But after a second's thought I realized I was being cast as the "agro" wife--not so appealing. It implies that wives are angry, nagging people who crush their husband's dreams. (In fact, I had much more pleasant activities in mind, the details of which I won't go into here as I can already sense my brothers squirming in discomfort). Dylan then explained that "agro" doesn't necessarily mean "aggravated" or "aggressive." A better translation of the phrase would be, "Sorry, folks, I have to go now because I need to spend time with the people I love who do not game." Ah, well, that I can get on board with. Maybe their new code should be, "Sry guys, sxy wife way btr than elf toon."

P.S. Dylan, for his part, deserves credit for being a wonderfully responsive partner who was more than willing to switch his game plan (Ha! Get it? Game plan? .... Right. Sorry.). He's the bestest!

Confessions of a Hand-Licker

Yes, my friends, Bailey has a hand fetish. This is how he insists on waking me up every morning:

 

And recently, how he felt he could best contribute to the blogging process:

 

Just the hands. So weird!

Doing My Part: Part 1

For those of you who don't live in Portland, there is an ongoing campaign amongst the locals to Keep [It] Weird. Observe:

It's such a popular and well-known slogan, it has even inspired spin-offs:

(Evidence for the success of both campaigns can be found in this Portland Monthly Magazine article.)

At any rate, as a budding Portlander, I feel it is my civic duty to help ensure that this city is totally whacked out (OK, that's just a convenient excuse to justify the ridiculous things I would probably be doing anyway). I even roped my sister, Vanessa, into helping out when she came out to visit recently. As we walked home from the grocery store, we encountered an opportunity we just couldn't pass up:

                                                         

We had soooo much fun being whimsical and spontaneous! Right, Vanessa?

Ahhhhhahahahaha! Oh, how I love this photo. While trying to be whimsical and spontaneous was sort of fun, it wasn't until I saw this that I collapsed on the sidewalk, seizing with laughter and wiping the tears from my eyes (for the record, so did Vanessa). I think it's safe to say we've done our part, for now.

More upside-down than "Sideways"

Recently I was lucky enough to have my sister, Vanessa, come visit me for a week. Despite the fact that she finds wine barely tolerable, she really wanted to take a wine-tasting class (no objections from this side of the room). I found one at the Rex Hill Winery that wasn't too expensive and was supposed to help us cover the basics, so we headed down to the Willamette Valley to get our drink on. We were model students, eating all of the tasty cheese pastries that were placed in front of us, and drinking every last sip of wine. Observe our progress:

Lesson 1: How to Look Pretentious While Sniffing Wine:

Clearly, we nailed that one.

We also learned how to tell the difference between older wines and younger ones, between wines aged in oak and un-oaked wines, just by looking at them! We tasted, we picked out hints of chocolate and eucalyptus in our Syrahs (or at least other people at the table did), we played the "tannin-versus-acid" game (our job was to say which one won). By the end of our two-hour class, we were bona fide winos. We were so good, we dropped the pretentious faces and graduated to Confident and Classy:

 

Cheers!

(For those of you who are super observant, you'll notice we're not actually sniffing wine. I'm sniffing star anise, and Vane is nose-deep in vanilla beans.)

Reason #457 Why I Heart PDX: Roller Derby

Two years ago I hopped on a plane and flew out to Portland with my mom's credit card, a place to stay for the weekend, and a job interview. The stars were aligned in my favor. On Thursday, I was offered the job. On Saturday I found a place to live. On Sunday I moved in--and crashed the moving van into the neighbor's car, indebting myself to him for $700. On Monday I started my job (on the same day President Obama started his!). Two years later, I'm still paying off my Mom's credit card. Ugh.

I love living in this city. I had long suspected, since attending grad school in St. Louis, that Portland would be a good fit. The only downside is that my family is so far away. :( Otherwise, this city is simply wonderful--good food, great beer and wine, lively arts scene, lots of dancing, amazing natural scenery, quirkiness in abundance, and a "whatever floats your boat" attitude. There's always something whacky going on. A couple of weeks ago, for example, I came home from my West Coast Swing dance class and announced to Dylan, "Portland has a roller derby team, and this weekend they're playing Detroit!" Dylan immediately went online and bought tickets. I love him so much. :) And so we went to see the Rose City Rollers destroy the Detroit Derby Girls (sorry, D-town, Portland feels like home now. And it would have been so depressing to be rooting for you.) I only had my phone with me, so here's what I managed to capture:

 

The idea behind roller derby is that each team has one "jammer" whose goal is to pass the other team's players. The rest of the skaters play defense, trying to create pathways for their own jammer and to block the other team's jammer. 

What you end up seeing is tough women in spandex skating like demons, elbowing their way through packs of wide-hipped defenders. It was a riot to root for our favorite jammers and get caught up in the crowd's energy! Definitely planning on going again, but with a crowd of people so we can all drink PBR (j/k, j/k) and scream our heads off for "White Flight," Portland's baddest-ass jammer.