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Good Morning, Portland! I've spent a good amount of time pondering the lyric: "She gon' make me slide with my dog like I'm Mega Man" and eventually a teen will probably explain it to meā€”embarrassing us both. Get hyphy this morning with this Peach Rings' cover of Jay Eazy. What a cutie. Happy Pride.

IN LOCAL NEWS:
ā€¢ Pamplin Mediaā€”the newspaper group that owns local publicationsā€”like Portland Tribune, Gresham's Outlook, and Newberg Graphicā€”announced yesterday that it has been sold to Carpenter Media Group, a Mississippi-based company. The publication's former owner, Dr. Robert B. Pamplin Jr, cited "age and health reasons," as his reason for selling, although Willamette Week has reported on the newspaper group's financial troubles several times, in recent years.

ā€¢ In another troubling blow for Oregon journalism, the Oregonian's Mike Rogoway reports that EO Media Group, publisher of a dozen newspapers across the state (but especially in eastern areas of Oregon) said it "will scale back publication of several papers in July, lay off 28 staffers and seek a new owner with more resources."

ā€¢A man who shot a rival and a stranger in July 2020 was found guilty of manslaughter last week and sentenced to six years yesterday, the Oregonian reports. There's something about murder that is, quite often, deeply ordinary. TV shows and movies crank the situations up for drama (and the emotions created by death are absolutely real), but when you actually explore the circumstances you get: grudges, acrimony, video poker, choosing the wrong exit, an unregistered gun, and a guy chatting on his cell phone in a parking lot who missing from the lives of his loved ones.

ā€¢ That guy who escaped Oregon State Hospital, after an employee left the keys in an a hospital vehicle, only to promptly get stuck in a muddy lake was also sentenced yesterday, to 22 years for a spree of assaults and one instance of manslaughter that preceded his capture.

ā€¢ Don't sleep on Free First Thursday at the Portland Art Museum this week, where you can catch the current exhibition Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicksā€”you can read more about the show's curation in this piece from our Spring Arts Guide (still relevant and feeling so fiiine).

ā€¢ Once again, the Trash Report begs ScarJo to reevaluate her careerā€”get your important infusion of celebrity gossip:

ā€¢ It's Highball Week, which I'm pretty sure I named when I was an intern after some story I read about poet Frank O'Hara. Mr.Ā Lunch Poems was gay (happy Pride!) so thisā€”the first week of Pride, which lasts for essentially two months in Portlandā€”seems like a good week for a craft cocktail. There are 29 locations this year, and at each one of them you can sip upon a fancy signature cocktail for a mere $8. The drinks are not constrained by happy hours, and you can drink them through Sunday. A quick gander reveals that Moonshot Tavern has a drink called šŸ¤˜šŸ¼ šŸ”„ šŸ‰ Trogdor Lives! šŸ¤˜šŸ¼ šŸ”„ šŸ‰ with enough cucumber FOR ONCE. That's not a complaint about Moonshot, but everyone else.

ā€¢ ISO other fun activities this week? Our EverOut calendar team has some suggests.

IN NATIONAL / INTERNATIONAL NEWS:
ā€¢ India's week-long national election draws to a close with Prime Minister Narendra Modi claiming victory. The Associated Press reports that the election drew "a lackluster performance from [Modi's] own party as it faced a stronger than expected challenge from the opposition, which pushed back against his mixed economic record and polarizing politics."

ā€¢ Egyptā€™s government has been objecting to Israel's ā€œoccupationā€ of a buffer zone on the Egypt-Gaza border, the New York Times reports, saying that the presence of Israel's military forces could violate Egyptā€™s sovereignty and national security. The relationship between Israel and Egypt already isn't great, and this isn't helping.

ā€¢ Today and yesterday mark the 35th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, which led to the deaths of hundreds to thousands of civilians during the '89 student-led protests against government corruption. The protests raged for months in many cities throughout China and tomorrow represents the anniversary of the Tank Man incident, captured by Jeff Widener for the Associated Press and a handful of other photojournalists. The identity of the lone man who momentarily halted a column of tanks merely by standing in front of them, holding what appeared to be two plastic shopping bags, has never been widely confirmed. Another photographer who caught the image, Charlie Cole, told the BBC about hiding his version of the photo from China's Public Security Bureau:

"PSB agents crashed through our hotel room door. Four agents swept in and assaulted me while a few others grabbed my cameras. They ripped the film from my cameras and confiscated my passport. They then forced me to write a statement that I was photographing during martial law, which unbeknown to me carried a hefty prison sentence. They then put a guard at the door. I had hidden the roll with the tank pictures in its plastic film can in the holding tank of the toilet. When they left, I retrieved it and later made my way to AP to develop and transmit it to Newsweek in New York."

ā€¢ This week, you'll also see history and memorial pieces about the 80th anniversary of D-Day (June 6), a common nickname for the Allied forces invasion of Normandy in 1944, which is seen as a major turning point in World War II.

ā€¢ A very big cow in Brazil is the most expensive cow ever sold at auction. Associated Press reports: "Her massive, snow-white body is watched over by security cameras, a veterinarian and an armed guard... Along a highway through Brazilā€™s heartland, Viatina-19ā€™s owners have put up two billboards praising her grandeur and beckoning ranchers, curious locals and busloads of veterinary students to make pilgrimages to see the supercow." Her owner says she will be the "grand matriarch" of his future cows. This story is a fairly fascinating dive into cow cloning, but if you don't think this is essentially Okja you're fooling yourself.

ā€¢ The web is enjoying some levity from Tennessee Rep. John Rose's young kid, who gave CSPAN life yesterday, even as his father read comments objecting to former president Donald Trumpā€™s felony convictions.