Gogol Bordello - Immigraniada (We Comin' Rougher)

Gogol Bordello is made up of band members from Ukraine, Russia, Israel, China, Ethiopia, Ecuador and Trinidad. From the album "Trans-Continental Hustle," produced by Rick Rubin.

Punk immigration--interesting concept. In this political and economic climate, immigrants have to be tougher than ever. I dedicate this to all my former neighbors in Vancouver, WA, who came from Ukraine. Brief memories: one guy always wore shorts in the dead of winter while de-icing his windshield before the morning commute. The teen-agers down the street made a haunted house in their front yard every Halloween. Their sister would warn them when little kids were coming so they wouldn't jump out and scare them. Another neighbor was a stay-at-home mom with eight kids. Her sons were friends with my son and they were the only boys. Their dad was from Armenia so they knew three languages. Hats off.

Interview at BoingBoing

Congratulations to Project Runway Winner and Vancouver, WA resident, Seth Aaron

I have to give a shout-out to Seth Aaron Henderson for winning a very tough reality show (I've never watched a season of Project Runway before--yikes, uptiiiight). All the critiques and cattiness of the fashion industry, multiplied ten-fold during a 7-week shoot in New York City. Some have complained that this season wasn't catty enough, what with all the hard-working contestants and their supportive models, but no doubt, the pressure of competing week after week with challenges like "Make a high-fashion outfit out of burlap (or hardware)," would take a toll on lesser mortals.

I was excited for this season because four people hailed from cities I've lived in or nearby: San Francisco (Jay--lose the scarfs, Jay), Oakland (Amy--love her), Portland (can't remember her--I just lived near Portland), and Seth Aaron from, I'm not kidding, Vancouver, WA. That's a suburb of Portland, across the Columbia River. True fact: Portlanders tend to hate Vancouverites.

I don't know if it's the differing tax laws (Vancouver residents cross the bridge to shop in Portland's sales-tax-free stores--wouldn't you?), or the perception that Vancouver is a conservative hellhole of epic boredom and SUVs. Although Vancouver majority-voted for Obama, recycles prodigiously, and has built an ongoing series of bike lanes and parks citywide--Portland remains smug in its eco-friendliness, dismissing Vancouver as a emissions-spewing, redneck enclave.

Well, no more! Seth Aaron is as whimsical and wacky as any Portlander could hope for. And even if you don't like his clothes (I do), you have to admit--he's extremely creative, talented and FAST at tailoring. His jackets are amazing. I hope he gets to design big theatrical productions of some sort. I would pay to see that.

Bonus: he seems incredibly nice and his family is adorable too. Hats off to you, Seth Aaron! I no longer live in Vancouver, but I was rooting for him the whole way. If only because: that's so strange. And I always root for that, especially if it's affable strange.

Let's visit Vancouver with Seth Aaron and his family.


Jezebel has a clip (#3) of the delightful and Internetedly famous scene where Seth Aaron gets Tim Gunn on the backyard trampoline for a brief cardio workout. Seth Aaron is now known for the phrase, "Papa Gunn's on the tramp!" Also: the whole family and Gunn play Pictionary (clip #2). VERY Vancouver in scope! Final Bryant Park fashion show video is here. Images are here.

He won! Awww...


Seth Aaron's playlist--blast-from-the-past 80s new wave and Goth. Nice.

Parting really is such sweet sorrow

No, I'm not leaving the blog (we're stuck together like high fructose corn syrup spilled on the floor). But I am leaving SW Washington (technically the city of Vancouver, which, while geographically in the state of Washington is STILL a major city-suburb of Portland--a cultural mecca full of elitist eco-snobs who DESPISE Vancouver with every fiber of their being). Keith got himself a job after much effort and frustration. The job is in San Francisco. The job is located where he used to work when we lived in the Bay Area, so it's as if we never left!

Except of course, we did, two years ago, and while we're very happy to return to my birthplace, family and friends, we will miss the Northwest terribly. So many good memories in two years. Ahh, memories. I had to weigh the pros and cons. Not that we have much of a choice, due to the recession and our dismal job prospects here (which amounted to zero), but still, there's nothing more clarifying than boiling everything down to its essence and placing it in a spreadsheet.

Northwest / NorCal - Pro & Con

Northwest: Incredible greenery and stupendous waterfalls / near-constant precipitation as the cause of incredible greenery and stupendous waterfalls.
NorCal: Incredible scenic vistas and beaches. / Once you get through traffic.

Northwest: Clean air. / Eco-snobbery.
NorCal: Foul air. / All encompassing snobbery.

Northwest: Oregon - highest unemployment rate in the nation (behind Michigan). / A culture of politeness, nonetheless.
NorCal: More industry and commerce despite the recession. / When do I get MINE?

Northwest: We're leaving behind a neighborhood and school full of great kids. /We made almost no personal connections whatsoever with adults.
NorCal: Practically everyone we know and love lives there. / We're sure to get on each other's nerves in no time!

Northwest: Art, music, and writing ALL the time. / Galleries closing down ALL the time.
NorCal: Most all of my music and artist friends are still there. / Struggling to afford everything.

Northwest: Gay marriage - Washington quietly and stealthily working on getting it legalized. / Oregon: was for gay marraige; now against gay marriage.
NorCal: Don't get me started. / You disappoint me, California. You really do.

Northwest: It's inexpensive. / There are no jobs to be had.
NorCal: It's a miracle Keith got a good job in this economy. All my freelance work is based there as well. / Everything costs a shitload.

Northwest: The Cascades. / They blow once in a while.
NorCal: The Sierras / All those plate tectonics shifting around.

Northwest: Niceness. / Blandness.
NorCal: Snarkiness. / Excellent Mexican food.

And there you have it: Mexican food will ALWAYS win out with me in the end. I guess that's my way of saying: I miss you, excellent Mexican food. If you know what I mean. We're coming back here to visit a lot, though. We've got wonderful family in Seattle, for one thing, and more wonderful family in Vancouver B.C. And now we know Portland and its environs as well. And let me say this: Portland and its environs are incredibly special and wonderful and now fill a huge part of my heart. I will always love this place and I will always miss this place and I will be back...

Thursday is Garbage Day

EVERY day is Earth Day around here and until there's viable inter-planetary travel, that's what we face for the rest of our lives. So I thought I'd pay tribute to the unsung heroes of Earth: the trash collectors.

Acting as my film producer, Jackson requested that we film all three of our trash trucks. He discovered a few years ago that there's a sizable amount of trash-truck videos on YouTube. When he realized that our film camera could be used for shooting more than his birthdays and T-ball practices, he enlisted my help in obtaining his dream: to be one of those YouTube contributors.

The fruits of our labor: several videos dedicated to our Waste Connections pick-up team. When you think about it, garbage trucks are pretty cool. It's the hydraulic arms--efficient engineering marvels. Perhaps if our beleaguered auto industry could find a way to utilize a hydraulic arm system in American cars, our economy could "pick up" a little (so to speak).

Picking up the trash--yay!


Picking up the weeds (every other week) for compost--whoo!


Don't forget the recyclables--go planet Earth!

Call to Service Day is calling you

Soon-to-be President Obama has initiated a Call to Service Day, starting on Martin Luther King, Jr.'s observance day, Jan. 19th. You can find out what's happening in your neighborhood, then join in and volunteer to make your community a better place.

There are a ton of Northwest events starting this weekend and beyond. I'll be helping out at the Library, packing up some resource kits for single-parent families. There's tree plantings, food and clothing drives, meditation for peace gatherings, neighborhood clean-ups, and so very much more to do.

- Hands on Greater Portland has a local list of events to sign up for.

- Obama's new USA Service site allows you to plug in any zip code to find out what's happening in your area and beyond.

- MLK Day of Service site.

The new president--he's cool.



Photo and street art gathered from the always-inspirational Art of Obama site.

Trees For What Ails Ya

Christmas has sucked the life-blood from my soul. Today I drove in the snow to Dollar Tree for some affordable wrapping paper. It doesn't get any more Christmasy than that. The usually cheerfully polite Vancouverites are feeling it too. I sensed a slight tension in the air at Trader Joe's. No one was rude but people were just slightly less friendly than usual. My checker wouldn't make eye contact. Usually they ask me what I'm making for dinner that night. Then we discuss ingredients, especially if it's soup.

I nearly spilled the beans (not actual beans) at Fred Meyers and told a fellow shopper that I couldn't wait for Christmas to be over. Can you imagine? It would be like telling a relative at a big Catholic wedding reception that you don't believe in god. I did that once. I got the blank stare of incomprehension. I think it was because it was a grandpa of one of my cousins, and not a blood relative. I must have felt I could unburden myself for a moment.

But hate Christmas? That can never be said in public, during a sale. Only among your closest Bohemian friends (where it's a given) can you discuss your dislike of the holiday. I do like the Pagan elements (big surprise). Trees, lights, rum punch, eating rich, highly seasoned and fattening foods, giving presents to my child and to other children and having them rip them open and play with them heartily--that is good. The rest: enforced jolly times--bleh.

Here is my true love of winter: trees in snow. I used to sometimes visit trees in snow with my family during ski vacations, but I never lived next to trees in snow until moving here last year. And here they are--the stars of the season: home to squirrels, birds, bugs, lichen and moss. I can totally understand the sense of worship they have inspired over the millennium. Watching them throughout the year has been a true pleasure and watching Jackson hang ornaments on one in our living room makes me appreciate the traditional aspects of December a little more.

Here's the surrounding area of today. More snow due tomorrow, and the tomorrow after that, and the tomorrow...




Off to bed now...

Recession Buster #1: Basketball in the Park, Plus Bonus Sunset

It's an official recession and we're all hurting. I'll be posting some Recession Buster tips throughout this trying time to help alleviate bleak thoughts and loss of hope.

On Saturday we headed to one of our local parks which happens to be in front of the East Precinct of the Vancouver Police Department. Perhaps it's the safest city park in the U.S., I haven't read any studies on it. Anyway, like many of Vancouver's parks, it's really nice. Hats off to the Parks & Rec Department. We shot some hoops (Jackson practices every day at school and it shows) and then the sky did something awesome: it burned like fire but only visually.

It was such a jaw-dropping sunset that I almost felt I was showing off, just standing there watching it. Like, hey, look at me! I'm watching the world's most intense sunset, right here above the police station! Whoo--I'm so great!

Nature's bounty and basketball--that's value for your dollar. These are from my camera-phone, which could never capture all the intense fieriness, but it did a decent job for having a lens the size of a small nail-head.









If you're a resident of Vancouver, WA (district 4), the East Precinct will be hosting a community forum tomorrow, Tues., Dec. 8, at the Firstenburg Community Center from 7-8 p.m.

Save the Economy: Go to the Mall

My parents were in town this week and it rained on the day we promised Jackson we'd take him miniature golfing. Luckily, the Vancouver Mall (otherwise known as Westfield, whose Web site makes the sassy claim: It's so you), has Glow Golf. This is an indoor miniature golf course, completely painted black with a day-glow under-the-sea motif. You have over 50 holes to golf, all with starfish, palm tree, volcanic rock, and mole-hill obstacles. There's even a psychedelic multi-colored windmill, though that's not very oceanic.

It looks like this (I'm borrowing these photos from another local blog because I didn't have the presence of mind to take my own photos--sorry, glow-golf is a little mind-blowing).


I know all parents think the world of their children but I'm not exaggerating when I say that Jackson is a miniature golf prodigy. He barely aims as he sets up his ball, yet it goes near or in the hole almost every time. He nearly beat his dad (who aims, extensively). Jackson has homing-pigeon instincts when it comes to glow-golf. I am very proud.

Because our economy is so in the toilet and it appears that our country, a former super-power, may I remind you, is about to go bankrupt, I thought I'd pitch in and put my Google AdSense cash back into the stream of currency that ebbs and flows all around us. What better place to do this than the mall? This blog is not earning money on any grand scale. In fact, if this blog were to be represented by a pop-culture icon, this McDonald's Happy Meal toy as spotted in the food court would do the job nicely:
I am a munchkin in the world of wizards (and witches). But if the digital bytes fail to, uh, byte, we're all going down. My 10,000+ hits (OK, some of them were by ME, I admit) and $12.96 in AdSense revenue is just as good as Perez Hilton's 10 gazillion hits and god knows how much ad loot. He's just going to spend it all on ugly, ill-fitting clothes, mark my words.

I, on the other hand, have more refined tastes. But not much money, so what can be bought with $12.96? Let's look through the lens of my camera-phone and find out! Note: my camera-phone is pretty good at taking photos--for a camera-phone. More and more, my instant photos remind me of pinhole-camera prints. That would make it a digital pinhole camera--the mind reels! But that IS the look. And it's SO me.

C'mon, let's ride to the mall! I'm buying! Fifty cents a ride.
No, we cannot afford to buy the toddler Vans. They're $25. Hipster baby-wear is always an oddity to me. There's nothing less hip than a baby. I mean that in a good way.
How about some satanic Halloween accoutrements? I'm sure there's something plastic and imported in here under $6.
How about a colorful, cheap wig? Wigs make life more fun, until the itching starts. Even a cheap wig is probably more than we want to spend. We're just wig window-shopping... Hello Evil Kitty!
Do you need a Lego representation of a murderous, sociopathic, movie-marketing toy? McDonald's has your back. $1.99.
I don't want these, but aren't they a strange phenomena? Big purses that look like little-girl purses. Seems like the cross-over between the sexing up of little girl clothes and the childing down of adult clothes makes for weird, unnatural marketing messages.
These are so serene, especially when you plug them in and flick the "on" switch. Undulating waves of light imitate the movement of garish water. If I owned a bar, I would line these up on one wall instead of having a TV. Then my patrons could drink, watch and meditate on all that is natural and artificial in our world.
The Vancouver Mall has a carousel, hiding in a darkened corner. It's a nice ride with a train ride behind it and lots of horse sculptures on display. You can have a dark little birthday party in there, kind of like being inside the world's largest basement rec room. $1.75 per ride.
My camera was struggling in the low light (and I'm too lazy to read the jumbo manual and figure out how to adjust for that). Here's some display animals for your scenic train ride.
An attempt to capture movement. WHOA! Not successful, but kind of arty, for a mall.
So what'd we spend? Did we make under $12.96? I think so. Unfortunately Google won't mail my check until I make $100, so we've got another year or so to actually buy anything. I'm sure the government bail-out will be under way by then and we can all rest easy, knowing our government is taking care of everything.

I'm going to have insomnia tonight--I can tell.

Things are looking up. The Bedazzler™ is back!

End of Summer Photo Round-up

Sorry if this makes me some kind of "mommy blogger" (that term! Augh!). But it was a great summer and if I want to do a photo round-up, it's within my rights. Living in the Northwest, I know I'll appreciate the three months of bright sun and warm weather all the more during the nine months of rain, sleet, snow and cold.

Growing up in California, I admit, I took the seasons for granted. The weather report was so predictable and dull. Now it's like an exciting serialized novel--dynamic! I like how the weather people mix it up. It's not just "rain, rain, showers, rain." It's "a little rain, some showers, some scattered showers, light rain some of the time, pretty much rainy..." But it ain't over 'til it's over. This week will be "hot, nice and sunny, warm and balmy, a little clouds, mostly sun..."

Here's some photo bits and pieces of our summer of unemployment (thanks, recession) and fine weather.

Sand in the City in downtown Portland sported some big sculptures that were knocked down by a back-hoe at the end of the festival. Here's the Great Wall of China, which was soon ever-present on your television once the Olympics started, courtesy of NBC broadcasting protocol.
If you do a little hike up to Wahkeena Falls in the Columbia Gorge, you come to this wonderful shower-like section which creates a completely air-conditioned and refreshing atmosphere even on the hottest day. Yes, even if it's 100 degrees out (it happens), it will be about 70 when you stand right here. Ahhhhhh...
Pixie Playland in Concord, CA. It's been there since I was a kid and even before that. Walk in, buy some tickets and partake in some tiny-sized rides. Misted overhangs will also keep you cool in the often 100-degree heat.
Point Isabel Regional Shoreline in Albany, CA is the biggest off-leash dog park in the nation. Bring your dogs and your friends. I went with Tuckers and Sue Iconolodge and we went on a fine walk with Sue's new doggie, Midnight. Views of San Francisco and Golden Gate Bridge, plus fine salt air make for an excellent summer outing.
Look at these dogs having the time of their dog-lives.
Stowe Lake in Golden Gate Park has paddle boat rides, ducks, seagulls, a waterfall and a traditional Chinese pagoda. Plus pink popcorn.
Esther Short Park in downtown Vancouver has a multi-tasking fountain that's also a creek and a waterfall.
Sliding works better in dry weather.
Flying a kite when it's not blustery requires running starts.
No photos of us eating ice cream. Sorry.

Oh wait--close enough. Thanks Ju-Ju.

USA: 232 Years Young

Fireworks are legal to set off in Vancouver, WA for a solid week before July 4th. After the big day, you even get an extra 24 hours to detonate your surplus. With all the lawn mowers, leaf blowers and weed whackers around here, fireworks are just one more loud bang to add to our modern-era noise stew. I wish there was a quieter way to celebrate the outcome of the Revolutionary War. Next year could we all sit around and read poetry out loud?

All these fireworks can be bought from the literally hundreds of tents set up around the city, mostly as church and high school fundraisers. Coming from California where fireworks have been illegal for many years (too much of a fire hazard), I'm kind of in culture shock. We used to buy ours on the border of Daly City--a damp town--back when I was a kid. I guess it's nice to see and hear fireworks in abundance for a solid week. I...guess... (trying not to sound like the neighborhood crank).

The Vancouver National Historic Reserve boasts the largest fireworks display west of the Mississippi. That's gotta be big.

Here's a home-made fireworks display from 98th Street. This must be equal the fireworks on the shores of the Mississippi.

Vancouver, WA Coloring Pages

Craft Magazine, harborer of all that is hip and knitted, has an article in April's issue on how to make a coloring book, using photos and a few Photoshop filters. Here's my hastily thrown-together attempt at capturing Vancouver in coloring-book form. Seemingly simple instructions did not make for an easy craft project. Best to attempt this with very high-contrast photos that contain little or no foliage. Washington State: a place known for its high-volume of foliage. But if you like futzing with Photoshop over and over and over again--this is the project for you!

Now, get out your green crayons and let's color Vancouver, WA.

Mt. St. Helens as seen from downtown Vancouver with the Columbia River in the foreground.



Mt. Hood, anchored by the view of townhouses along the river. You'll need a lot of grayish white to color these since both mountains are still, well into April, completely covered with snow.



Birthplace of Burgerville, where I had a Tillamook cheeseburger and shake made from Oregon-grown strawberries tonight.



The bell tower at Esther Short Park, downtown Vancouver.


Historic Fort Vancouver, home of the trillion-ton Fourth of July fireworks show.


The now defunct Evergreen Airport. Torn down in a Crate & Barrel development deal. Its last paint scheme: aquamarine.


Make way for a new Fred Meyer. Shop for groceries, home furnishings, hardware, clothes, and/or electronics. A mind-boggling consumer experience under one roof.


Main Street, USA. I mean, Vancouver.


The Vancouver commemorative plate, coming to a Goodwill near you soon (unless I see it there first).


A raised ranch house.