Forget those occasional chain-email suggestions to boycott buying gas for a day–those one-day boycotts don’t do any good, especially if you’re still driving that day, and buying gas to refill your tank the next day. Here’s an idea that really can have an impact, via the Bicycle Transportation Alliance: Gas-Free Fridays! In cooperation with groups […]
Portland
Posted inPuppy
A (Former) Mercury Pug Goes Missing
If you happened to attend the Mercury’s Association of Alternative Newsweeklies party last year at the Ace Hotel’s Cleaners space, you’ve met Morning, the little black pug co-owned by our former promotions coordinator Catherine Cole. Morning and our other office pups battled it out in a licking/butt-sniffing/ear-tugging doggie “fight” that we filmed and broadcast on […]
Posted inPortland
Naked People in the Mt. Tabor Reservoir
I wish all of Portland’s city bureaus were as eager to disseminate information as the Water Bureau is. Last week, we got the news about a missing plaque. Today, news of skinny dipping in the Mt. Tabor Reservoir! Portland Water Bureau finds skinny dippers in Mt. Tabor reservoir PORTLAND, Ore–Portland Water Bureau discovered two people […]
Posted inPortland
Tonight: Follow-up Meeting Between City and Chavez Street Rename Committee
Tonight in city hall’s Rose Room, members of the Cesar E. Chavez Boulevard Committee will be meeting up with city staffers, to follow up on their June 12 meeting that re-launched the rename effort, which I wrote about this week. Unfortunately, tonight’s meeting is a closed session. But committee co-chair Marta Guembes has previously told […]
Posted inPortland
I’m In the Market for Some Unqualified Medical Advice!
So I’m no expert in what these “doctors” call “science” or “medicine” or “leechings,” but I do know that taking all three of these at the same time is probably not a brilliant idea. But fucking A, Claritin decided to STOP WORKING for me c. Friday afternoon, and Benadryl doesn’t seem to be doing much […]
Posted inPortland
What’s Greener: Saving a Tree, or Saving a House?
We got this in our inbox over the weekend: I was on my way to work Sunday morning, when I noticed a house was being moved along NE MLK Jr. Blvd and Tillamook. To my surprise, 3 blocks of trees that line the center of NE MLK Jr. Blvd were being cut down to move […]
Posted inPortland
Plaque Attack!
Red alert from the city water bureau! Someone’s been swiping the historic plaques adhered to the wells in Columbia South Shore Well Field. The recent disappearance of several plaques points to a coordinated, vicious effort by anti-history individuals, most likely The Youth. And, as the bureau’s alert says: It’s rather annoying that people feel inclined […]
Posted inPortland
TriMet Rai$e$ Fare
Better start savoring your $1.75 bus tickets – ten minutes ago, the TriMet Board voted 4-1 to increase bus and Max fare by 25 cents for adults and 10 cents for kids and old folks starting September 1st. One nickel of that price bump is to cover inflation, but the other twenty cents is to […]
Posted inPortland
Behind the Scenes at the (official) Summer’s First Farmer’s Market
It’s sunrise at Dave’s Killer Bread factory. Outside the sky is pale blue and pink and Mt. Hood is picture perfect. Inside, the light is florescent but the air is pleasantly intoxicating — my eyes droop at 5:30a.m. but every breath is a pick-me-up of warm bread and grains. “Bread is a fickle mistress,” says […]
Posted inPortland
Leftbank
Amy and I got a tour of the 66,000 sq ft Leftbank building this morning (here’s a post with more background)—originally three separate buildings that have been built together to form one rambling multilevel structure, the space has at various points housed a restaurant and bakery, MultiCraft Plastics, and a short-lived illegal jazz club called […]
Posted inPortland
Introducing the Leftbank Project
The last time I talked to the folks at PICA about TBA:08, they were still scouting out locations for the Works, TBA’s late-night music/performance mixer. Then yesterday this hit the inbox: Leftbank goes live Web site launched, TBA’s THE WORKS, and Bike Oregon’s Oregon Manifest to be held at Leftbank Wha? At where now? Leftbank, […]
Posted inPortland
Fly Through Downtown
If you can ignore the terrible and repetitive soundtrack (I suggest hitting mute), this is a slick video—fly through Portland’s forthcoming shiny new transit mall: Who put the video together? I don’t know, but the site is registered to Adjustech, LCC.