Category: All (-ish)

Postcards from China & Finland.

This is from Lu, who wished me a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.  This caused confusion on my part as it’s the end of April.  The Chinese postmark says April 21.  When I registered it, I found that Lu sent it at the end of December.  Where did it go for four months?
Fun stamps.  I love the fish one especially.

This is from someone whose name was obscured by the bar code stamp.  She asked me about spring in Oregon and says that it’s 10 degrees in Finland. Google tells me that  is 50 degrees Fahrenheit. She tells me also that fishing season has started which is a good reason to stay outdoors.  She also hopes her choice of card is acceptable and it is, because I adore the two old ladies.  
Fun stamp with this one too!

World Book Night

Have you heard about World Book Night?  Me neither. It’s a night where publishers publish books (list is here) so people can walk around and give them away.  How fun is that?  Powell’s had a kickoff event where Cheryl Strayed, Matthew Dickman, Amanda Coplin, Paul Collins, and Chelsea Cain all talked about a book that had influenced them.
Here’s Cheryl Strayed introducing the night. 
Matthew Dickman told us of his favorite book.  In the manner of all of the speakers, he managed to call out several before he got to the one he was really talking about.  He mentioned Island of the Blue Dolphins, (and I knew right then we were the same age, because that was a big one for me too) then talked about the poems they read in school, which were dense and heady and hard to comprehend.  So it was a watershed moment when he found All My Pretty Ones by Anne Sexton and he could read and understand the poems.  That lead him to Charles Burkowski and then his teacher gave him a copy of Allen Ginsberg’s Howl.  Along with the book came a postcard with Allan Ginsberg standing on a corner in New York with all his poet friends, and Dickman said that where he grew up, guys standing on the corner was a bad thing, and bad things came from guys standing on the corner.  To see a bunch of poets hanging about in such a way and creating art instead of trouble, was something to remember.  And so he read us an excerpt from Howl.
Chelsea Cain bought up her copy of Synonyms and Antonyms. Her mother had given it to her and inscribed a note in the flyleaf.  So we know that it was bought after a viewing of My Friend Flicka.  Cain pointed out that her mother made a habit of inscribing books, which means that now she can never get rid of said books.  Also that this was the first tool she was given as a writer and she used to page through it.  Now she uses a website to find her synonyms, which is a different thing than flipping through a book.  She then read to us from The Mystery of the Glowing Eye, one of the many Nancy Drew Books she read over and over again from first to fifth grade.
Paul Collins brought his copy of Three Men in a Boat, by Jerome K. Jerome.  Despite sharing a last name, too much time has passed between this event and this write-up of the event to remember why he chose that book.
Amanda brought Mouchette by George Bernanos.  She especially liked the version of the New York Review of Books Classics.
Cheryl Strayd brought her copy of Black Beauty that her mother read to her when she was three. (!)  Strayd said that she hasn’t read this book to her children yet, even though they are something like eight and ten years old.  The horrible things that happen to the horse are too much.  However, the book was incredibly influential in beginning the Society to Prevent Cruelty to Animals and the writing is beautiful.  Plus, her mother was a horsewoman and always had a horse.
This was an excellent presentation and introduction to World Book Night.  Thanks Powell’s.

Postcards from Taiwan and Ukraine

I loved this card, because the illustration is so detailed, plus there is gold filigree all over it that makes it very pretty to look at.  This is from Katherine and she is an 18-year-old student in Taiwan.  She said her parents used to go to grocery stores like this when they were young but such stores have been replaced by convenience stores.

You have to look sideways (sorry) but that’s a beetle and some kind of berry.

This is called “May Wind” and is from Caroline.  Her three facts are:  “I’m happy today very much because my mother has birthday.  I gather sugar packets.  I have more than thousand. I’m 27 years old but I still think and feel that I’m 15 years old. But I think that this is my advantage rather than disadvantage.”

When I registered the postcard, I told her how my friends and I used to bring each other lighters when we went on trips, even before any of us smoked.  And she wrote back and said that her friend’s daughter married a millionaire in America and when the friend went to visit they collected sugar packets everywhere.  
Postcrossing is so awesome.

Requiem: Rubber Scraper

Received for Christmas one year from my Aunt Carol (“It will not melt up to one thousand degrees! One Thousand Degrees!” she said more than once) there is also a larger green one.  It’s been a handy fellow, not melting at all and very good for scraping the last bits out of the peanut butter jar.

Sadly, the silicone has given up the ghost.

Postcard from Taiwan & California

This is from A-Chien who lives in Kaohsiung and is 37 years old.  A-Chein especially likes this tower.
I’m going to start taking pictures of the super awesome stamps that come with some of the postcards.  This had four different stamps, all different.  So cool.
This is from Lori, who works at the Chandelier Tree and is a non-drinking bartender.  When I registered the card, I wrote her that I was once a vegetarian meat seller.

Trimet employs white-out to eliminate racist statement. Probably not ironically.

“No Blacks.” Someone had graffitied, in answer to the statement, “What makes this place great.”
Then the word “no” was covered in white-out.
I don’t really know if it was a Trimet employee who used the whiteout, or a random passerby with whiteout in their backpack.  Either way, I snickered.

Unique apartments.

These are near my house and I love them both.  I worry that they will be torn down for something fancier, so thought I would snap a few pictures just in case.
Here’s the street side of this complex.  I love the swinging modern silhouette of the building and the fact that the garages are underneath, with the apartments hanging over.  Some of the garage doors still work, and some are permanently sealed shut.

Front entrance.  There is a pretty shrubbery outside of every door and a garden area on the other side of the parking lot.  I’ve never seen inside these units, but I imagine they are all one-bedroom jobbers.

This fourplex is right next door.  I like how it looks like it has been added onto over the years.  There’s even a random bay-type window in one unit.  And the corners of the building have art deco glass.  A few of these units have been vacant for some time, and it’s a hot rental market here, so this is building I’m most worried about.