Guy Hehn Day in Silverton, Oregon

9 March 2008. Guy Hehn Day is 12 March, but is traditionally celebrated within three weeks either side of that.




Guest of Honor, Guy Hehn.


Flashmob outside the restaurant.


In the back alley, rug deals are made out of the back of a mini-van. The mean streets of Silverton.


Party Planning Committee member, Wanda Hehn.


Finally, Silverton's signature dessert, fried bananas. In honor of the thousands of banana trees they chopped down to found the town in 1861. Now the bananas have to be imported.

Ferraro in the News

Americana, ca. 2008

This was at the local Fred Meyer, a cardboard display to sell packing materials. Pretty warm and inviting name, CareMail... and you'll notice the planet they chose to "dot" the i -- sure, pick a good, safe planet, one that everyone likes. Earth, yeah wow, big surprise! Mainstream idiots.

Japan!

Last night around dinnertime I figured I just had to get a new rice cooker. Ours stopped working two days ago, and a rice cooker is a necessary piece of kitchen equipment. We had a cheap, beat up one from some Asian market for about seventeen years. A few months ago I bought a new one -- not because the old one stopped working, but because it seemed like maybe we were due for a better-looking one.

It's the new one that stopped working. The old one is still around, but now it's become part of the camping equipment and I didn't want to dig it out. So I thought I'd pop up the street to Than Thao Market for a new one, presuming I could get another little cheap one.

The old Vietnamese (?) guy came over to help me right away, shouting, "Rice cooka? Rice cooka? How many cup? How many cup?"

The smallest ones were 5.5 cup capacity, larger than I really want or need. They had two of them. He pointed to one and said "uh... ninety five dolla!" He pointed to the other one and said "...this one betta! One hundred seven dolla! Betta!"

I said "wow, that's a lot of money!" I was surprised they were that expensive. Every thing else in that store is absurdly cheap.

Again he pointed to the $107 cooker and said "much betta," while pointing to the box, where it said "Made in Japan."

I nodded, but didn't say anything. I was trying to decide just how much I wanted a rice cooker -- enough to buy the wrong one? Again he pointed to the box and said, "betta... JAPAN!!"

I asked "why is that one better?"

He got wide-eyed and said "JAPAN!!"

He pointed to the cheaper one and said "Thai!" and shook his head.

I laughed and said, "you telling me they can't make good rice cookers in Thailand?"

He shook his head again and pointed to the other box. "JAPAN!!" he shouted.

So I took a leap and said I'd buy the one from Japan. Even though it's bigger and more expensive than I'd wanted.

But I got up to the cash register and realized that -- in my haste to rush out to buy a rice cooker -- I had left my wallet at home. I didn't have enough cash to buy either one of his rice cooka.

Japan!

Is It Spring?

It's been very nice here all week.

Jay

Grid Schmid

Tuesday around lunchtime I was coming back from buying coffee and overheard this exchange from a couple of high school boys as they walked past our house.

"Which way is 42nd? It's this way, right?" He pointed from 37th (our street) to the east, which is indeed where 42nd Avenue is.

"Naw, man, it's THIS WAY. You gotta go down this way, THEN over that way." He pointed down 37th, then indicated a turn left that would, indeed, take you to 42nd. They were both right, but they stood there and argued for a couple of minutes about which way to go.

I did NOT think those kids were dumb for their puzzlement, because I know how screwy some of these streets are around here. In this case they wouldn't have run into any confusion, but if they were a few blocks over, it would make a difference if they went a block down before heading east.

One thing you hear in this town is how it's laid out on "a grid," and so it's relatively easy to find your way around. Much easier than, say, Boston.

But of course Portland is full of spots that don't quite fit the grid concept, so when you're new here you drive around and get lost and wonder what the hell everyone was thinking, boasting about this stupid grid that, near as you can tell, is a fantasy.

Near our house is a wacky intersection at 39th and Broadway and Sandy. I have two theories as to how they came up with this complicated design, which I am including here in comic form, comics being the "last great American art form," as someone has once said perhaps.

THEORY 1



THEORY B

Paultaur

With corrective lenses for magickal eye help!

Smacka!

My Taco Bell Experience

I went to Taco Bell today, where the food is so inexpensive I'm forced to come up with mental techniques to avoid thinking about how it's even possible.

I ordered. I wanted some of their hot sauce, but the bins for the packets were empty. There were bins full of mild sauce, but there was no hot sauce.

I asked about the hot sauce and was told you have to ask for it. My first question wasn't enough... I then had to ask for it. As she gave it to me she further explained that "people kept taking too much of the hot sauce."

In an unexpected relaxation of my own personal code ("don't be a smart-ass," adopted in 1992), I said, "...so, you don't want to provide the sauce that most people want to have?"

A nearby do-gooder, who looked to me like Pastor Bob from Central Casting, offered a surprisingly righteous "People abuse their privileges...."

Whoa... WHA-? I was this close to saying "we are talking about hot sauce here, right?"



But I could tell I was outnumbered! I was in no position to explain how krazy it sounded to offer free packets of the unpopular sauce while making it difficult to get the free packets customers actually want.

Plus, a Taco Bell is not the place where I'm finally going to take a stand. Not that Taco Bell, anyway.

Think Logmically

Sauvie Trip

Chuck Boyce is visiting from South Carolina. He and brother Greg and I went out to Sauvie Island today, a lovely sunny day. We saw 48 species of birds. I didn't get good photos of birds, but here are a couple from today:

Bewick's Wren

We've had them in the yard before, but not too often and not for a long time. Today I was out back trying to photograph some chickadees when I heard the distinctive sound of a Bewick's Wren. In the driveway's fig tree there were two of them, hanging out by the chickadees. The wrens are pretty quick to hop around, but they stayed around the yard for about fifteen minutes. At times they were too close for my telephoto lens to be any good. I managed to get one good shot:

Falling: The Rough Cut

Here's the first experiment I did with the "falling" effect.

Trip to Ridgefield, Washington

Today Greg and I went up to the wildlife refuge in Ridgefield, Washington ("Birthplace of U-HAUL"). I took a lot of photos, but only a few are good. Here's probably the best one, of what I think may be a Rough-legged Hawk:


There were lots of birds today, and I saw many interesting ones, including a flock of Golden-crowned Sparrows (the most I'd ever seen at once), a Red-headed Sapsucker, a Red-throated Loon, a Red-shouldered Hawk, Tundra Swans, a Merlin, some Harriers, Great Blue Herons, Red-winged Blackbirds, Yellow-rumped Warblers, a nutria, Coots and Shovelers galore -- and even a few Tree Swallows, here in February.

Then there was a weird human story. On the path toward the blind we noticed the memorial stone for David Dynes was upturned:


This is what it says on the plaque:


Inside the blind, this was written on the wall:


It says "D. Dynes was a child molester who hung himself because I wouldn't let him forget what he did to his students. Swing in hell, Mr. Dynes."

There were many bald eagles there today also, at least two adults and four juveniles. Through Greg's scope we got a great view of an adult, and I stuck my camera up there to see if I could get a shot. Not bad:

Movie Tricks

Cleo and Bowie

We have joined the album cover craze.

Driving Action!