I thought I read that Tom Waits was born in the back of a taxi.
Myth? Maybe.
But you gotta admit it would be fitting.

I'm moving to Brooklyn.

#2 was cool. #1 wasn't a total douchenozzle. #4 was a super-douchenozzle. And #3 doesn't count because he's from fucking Beaverton. Why would you hacks interview someone from Beaverton for a story about people from Portland? I mean, even the Mercury should be better than that.

This was extremely unpleasant to read.

i just don't even. what is. uggggggggghhhhh.

By printing this, it seems pretty clear the Portland Mercury now suffers from the delusion that it's the Willamette Week.

I think the Tribune also offers a similar piece.
You guys need more readers? Maybe try your hand at doing something like good 'ol Hearst did. Invent news! Oh wait, you alrea.... nevermind.

This is a joke, right? Were all the plesant people at Trek in the Park?

Alex: Please move somewhere else. Thanks!

Truly Yours,
Portland

No, no, no, no, NO!!! Just, no.

I didn't mind it. I'd even read another one! People are interesting. And this way I don't have to talk to them myself.

What Ginny said. I think some of these readers/commenters hate knowing that there are mundane looking people with interesting stories living all around them. And who the fuck are you, anatta, to tell someone to move somewhere else? I would totally bet on Alex in a debate/fight/fashion walk-off/track-stand competition with you.

giant WHO CARES about all of this.

at the same time it's trying to encourage a "diverse portland perspective," the questionnaire assumes that everyone out there is interested in the OPPOSITE sex.

what year is this? and why do i feel like im looking at a high school rag when i read this shit?

Uh, i'm pretty sure 'conversate' is a word.

For quicker results next time, ditch the questions and simply ask the respondent to describe his or her Oedipal/Elektral complex in detail.

This little column's sort of like the Michele Bachmann Newsweek cover, right? Like if you freak enough people out and generate enough disturbed buzz, it's gotta be worth it, right? If not, this just shows the hazards of making editorial decisions after the drugs kick in.

Alex is a good photographer but these interviews are awful to read and make all these people seem like insufferable assholes. Except "Superman", I'm pretty sure he is an asshole for real.

I meant ALEC the photographer, not Alex the cussin' ginger.

I don't see much of a thing to be made here. These three folks all seem like your very standard, every-dayish types. I wouldn't want to meet any of them, but if i saw them in a horrible car crash, sure i'd called 911.
Merc. should've looked for and interviewed some of the REAL ecentrics in this city. Like that guy who drives around in the crazy copper van with all the stuff on it in SE, who shops at Fred Meyers.

I happen to think this concept (which is old as Methuselah) is a GREAT ONE! and I'm glad you guys started doing this. I like the author's take on it and his goofy questions. We (here in the Western world, Americans, esp.) are becoming more and more of a self-involved, ethnocentric, finger-pointing people. The more we realize the other person is just a GOTTDAMN human being (sorry DamosA), the better for us all! It's okay they don't have to be you, do the things you would do, 'cause guess what!, most of them don't want to be you! and that's a damn good thing because the moment we all become clones of one another is when I learn to build a rocketship. Excellent new section. I hope to see more of it!

+ 2 for Ginny and Dr Pickles. This is color and the mix, with wit, dorkiness, idiocy, delusion of pimpy grandeur sitting on the spectrum. Though you have to wonders how many interviewees/conversations were X'd out for publication (the demoninator?), and for what reason. random sampling would be coolest.

This made me embarrassed to live here.

A hipster, smelly hippy, meathead and bull dyke walk into a bar...

What a total tool fest!

#1 "A.J"
Oh so typical money grubbing hipster, so desperate to be in a "relationship" that he stays in one that's clear to most, is a massive disaster!

""How fashionable are you on a scale of 1-10? 9.5.""

Well, there is a difference between being in fashion and actually having a modicum of STYLE!

""That's gonna sound terrible. I'm gonna look like an asshole.""

You got THAT right!

#2 "T.S"
He looks like a homeless bum but wasn't all THAT crazy with his answers, although...

""What should all women know that they never seem to? That we males should not always have to change our damn minds about something we're planning on doing every time we want to enjoy coitus.""

No means NO! Mr. T! That's why they're trying to get you to "change your damn mind".

He's got a computer AND he's getting laid? I thought both took at least a bit of direction and fortitude. Oh well.

#3 "D.P"

Ugh! Was this a setup? Is the best representative of a Portland black man a stereotypical, violent thug, pussy hound and don't forget "rapper"!

To paraphrase Thelma (Susan Sarandon), "When a woman is screaming like that she isn't having a Good Time!"

Of course HE thinks all his victims have a "good time" he's about as deep as a sun baked wading pool.

#4 "M.B"
Is there a woman left in Portland who ISN'T a "Suicide Girl"? Or as Ann Romano puts it ""tattooed slutlets" or "ink-covered douchebaguettes".

A lesbian who doesn't like penis...Duhhhh!

""cigarettes in one hand, coffee in the other""
Gotta feed the corporate addictions! Aren't you tired of being a cliche?