One bonus to the last week and a half or so of SNOWPOCALYPSE 2008!!! is that I’ve finally had the time to grind through the entire first, second and nearly third season of Heroes. Here are a couple thoughts I have on the show:
The first season was awesome. Totally sucked me in. The sucking noises could be heard halfway down the street, I’m sure.
My favorite hero? Hiro. Except seriously, he needs to learn to block that nose punch to the face! How many times has he gotten hit, 5 times? 6?
Season three was starting to lose me, until the main characters really started to polarize as good/bad (or misguided). It was just starting to feel like the storyline was starting to fracture and lose focus, so the clear polarization really helped.
Quit messing with my head about Sylar! Bad guy? Good guy? Bad guy? Bad guy with reform potential? Misled good guy? Bad guy again? Or just really really really really confused guy with waaaaay too much power and a hunger he can’t control? Keeps me guessing, I suppose.
If I Were a Hero – If I had to pick an ability, I’d probably go with Daphne’s speedster abilities. Straightforward and useful. I’d never have to be stuck in traffic again, could go anywhere in the world in moments…think of the gas savings alone! And the moral dilemmas of an ability like that would be minimal and straightforward as well. Unlike unraveling time and space – too complicated. And being able to absorb other abilities…how confusing and overwhelming would that get after a while? Yikes. The whole not-dying ala Claire thing though, that would be very cool too.
One thing I want to ask @greggrunberg: omg did you really have to wake up with a live scorpion on your head? Dude! That would have me in a state of panic unsurmountable.
I’m hoping my streaming allotment from Netflix is enough to get me through the rest of season 3. Then it’s off to catch up on the last season of Battlestar Galactica just in time for the final episodes… <insert crazed speculation re: last Cylon here>
Yeah, I know everyone’s doing it. But far be it from me to not partake in the extreme weather catastrophe spirit! Therefore, I humbly submit my entries for the SNOWPOCALYPSE 2008 photographic and video archives:
Will my rhodies survive the winter? I have a hunch they will!
This next shot required a bit of laying down on the job. During which time the denizens of the pictured yard came outside:
Denizen: “Hey, you ok there?”
Me: “Oh yeah, just taking some pictures here…no worries!”
Denizen: “Um. Ok. ” <strange look as he reenters his domicile>
You gotta take some risks when you’re an amateur photog, you know. Great pictures require gettin down and dirty. In the mud. And snow.
I love this town called Portland a heckuva lot. So, in honour of the upcoming 18th anniversary of my arrival in this great town, I thought I’d toss out a list of five things I love about Portland. I know, the usual list number is 10. However, I tend to espouse, at great length, about things I like, so in the interest of keeping this to a nice, blogworthy length, I opted for half the items, but all the love. So here it is…5 things I love about the city formerly known as Stumptown.
#5: Rain.
Rain. Duh.
What?? What did you say? Rain, are you serious? This, from the girl who lists as one of her most traumatic childhood experiences being caught in a NYC deluge? Yep. It was an epiphany level experience when I realized I actually kinda like the rain now. Let me clarify: I like Portland rain. Not torrential downpour, soaked to the bone southeastern US rain, no way. But the misty, pervasive showers, the gentle sprinkles, they cleanse the air and don’t make me feel like I’m about to drown, which is how I felt during the above mentioned deluge. Granted, I’m a bit taller now, so my fear of drowning by puddle is somewhat reduced, but still. Also, the myth (Yes! Myth!) that Portland gets oodles and buckets of rain keeps people away, because we all know that once they get here, they never wanna leave. Like me.
Deep in the stacks @Powells
#4: Powell’s.
Ok I know what you’re all saying. Yawn. Of course Powell’s is on the list, EVERYBODY puts Powell’s on their list, can’t you be original? From my perspective though, I keenly feel the humongous slap upside the head that Powell’s is to other major book sellers (::cough:: Barnes & Noble) Some of my favorite things in New York when I lived there were Blimpie for the subs, catching a Mets game at Shea Stadium (insert heartbreaking sob here), and going to Barnes & Noble. B&N seemed like a reader’s mecca to my young, book-loving soul. Plus, it was in New York, so how could anything else possibly measure up? Now picture me walking into Powell’s the first time. No lie, I swear I could hear a choir of angels. And I remember thinking, clear as if it was yesterday: “Barnes & Noble, you SUCK ASS.” Thankfully, my appreciation of Blimpie subs faded long before that. My Mets fandom however…I’m sad to say is still alive and in mourning.
#3: Dogs.
Jessie @ the Sandy River
Portland is not the number one dog-friendly city in the country. I find this extremely hard to fathom, as does my dog. She has a tendency to get quite squeaky in the car when we pass by locations of particular canine interest that she likes. Therefore, she tends to maintain a fairly constant level of squeekiness as I drive around Portland. Between our usual hangout at the dog park at Mt Tabor, the constant dog cookies the mailman brings, the occasional splashdown in the uber dog-friendly section of the Sandy River, the thrice-yearly baths at Lucky Lab Dog Washes (Dogtoberfest, Multnomah Dog Days, Tails & Ales)…the list goes on and on.
(Err, correction, Jessie says that the Lucky Lab dog baths are NOT on her list of faves. But they have beer! I insisted. And live music! And free doggy samples! She just glares at me.)
There is nearly always some dog-related event going on around town. Not to mention all the dog parks scattered throughout the metro area (Mt. Tabor is our fave!) So what if they’re not exactly welcome on public transportation, like they are in Chicago or whatever. Or Austin Texas. Really?? Austin Texas?? Portland dogs are loved, and everyone knows it. Screw the rest of the ‘we love dogs’ cities…if I were a dog, I’d want to live in Portland.
#2 Nature vs City.
Nature in the city, how I love thee…let me count the ways! I love how Portland has so seemlessly blended the need for expansion with a very green sense of the need for parks, and greenspaces, and community gardens, and, well, nature within the city limits. I mean, just consider some of the bigger natural spaces within the city:
That’s the short list. It doesn’t include the hundreds of city parks and recreation spaces scattered all over. I’ve never lived anywhere in this city where I wasn’t within a few blocks of a park, and all super nice (at least during the day…). Having such a plethora of natural spaces, I think, creates oases of calm for a city’s residents; a place to recharge, to introspect, to run and play and love and think. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons Portland is so progressive, sustainable-conscious and green: There is evidence of nature’s power everywhere you look. Nature is perpetuating itself in Portland.
#1: Community
Some of my friends
I’ve lived in a lot of places, but I’ve lived here in Portland longer than anywhere else. I remember coming to a realization once, long ago, while living in Syracuse NY (aka the armpit of NY state. Trust me). I realized that no matter where you go, where you lay your hat down at night, that the place you live really makes very little difference in your life, when you boil it down. The place is not you, and you are not the place you live in. It can have its effects, true, but they tend to be minor; the thoughts you have and the life you live and the problems you face are universal. I was convinced that that was a statement of truth. Not anymore. There is something about Portland, something about the particular combination of sun and sky and rain and mountain and ocean and desert that make up Portland and the Pacific NW that surrounds it, that make it truly a unique place. And it attracts truly unique people. Never in my life have I encountered so consistently such caring, thoughtful…good people. I have had good friends while living outside of Portland. But never so many, who are so dear to me, and who I would honestly entrust with my life and those things I treasure the most. I love this place, and all the people in it, whether I know you or not, because you make Portland what it is. I will be happy to die here, someday. Um. Someday not too soon, that is. Dammit where is that salt…anyone have any wood I can knock?!?
Well there it is. 5 things I love about Portland. Love Portland too? Then get involved, and get out there and enjoy it!
Yes, I am a Higher Functioning Mammal. To prove it, I demonstrate the use of Tools. For example, consider the following item:
You may recognize this as an every day cap to a medicine bottle, which is entirely correct. However, I, as the higher functioning mammal that I am, have put it to a new use: Laptop Airspace Gap Creator. Because apparently, the approximately 1.5k I spent on this HP Pavilion wasn’t enough to get a laptop with enough cooling power to keep my NVIDIA graphic card cool enough, which creates some very interestingly – timed Computer Freeze-O-Rama. At which point I lean on my power button. Oy.
Seriously, are you kidding me? I bought the bestest fastest uberest l33test laptop I could get for less than 1.5K, specced it out myself, and I can’t simultaneously run iTunes, do some video editing, and keep Tweetdeck running in the background? Seriously? LAME! I mean, I can understand the crashing during WoW. I mean…bad timing and all, that’s for sure. “ZOMG NOO! I was just about to kill that massively uber elite lvl 80 beeelion mob with teh dragon portrait that would drop my Bracers of Ultimate Mageyness!!!! DON’T CRASH!!!” /wailing sob of agony!! Yeah no worries, I got over it. I’m kinda over WoW as a whole, for the time being, but that’s another post.
What’s my point? Um. Any recommendations for a laptop cooler solution? My medicine cap is getting a little melty around the edges.
Kind of like cleansing the palate. Clearing the air. Cleaning up the…erm, yeah, nevermind. I haven’t actually written a blog post since…
(pause to check date on last post. March 21st, 2007??! Yeesh.)
…March 21st, 2007. Yeah, that is a long time. You know, there was… stuff. And things. And general unblogginess happening.
But I’ve lately been sorta surrounding myself with bloggy people. Not intentionally, it just kinda happened:
Neato person: “Hey you’re pretty cool. ”
Me: “Yeah you too.”
Neato person: “What kinda stuff do you like to do?”
Me: “Mostly, play with my dog, work around my house, traipse about town with friends and neighbors…you?”
Neato person: “Mmm, I dunno, blogging is fun.”
Me: “No way, really?? I used to have a blog…”
And THEN, I went to this event called beerandblog. I mean really, what more convincing do you need?
So, much like the spacer gifs you use to create a bit of space between elements on a page, (whoa! Narrowly averted a geek moment there. Sorry, non techie readers!), this post is intended to create a bit of space between the OLD and the NEW. However, unlike a spacer gif, this post is pretty visible. Example:
Spacer gif: [ ]
See? Spacer gif, not so visible. This post…visible.
Why do I not just start over, start from scratch, toss the old posts into Ye Rounde Fyle? Well, I need my legacy, even if I’m the only one who’s gonna be looking at it. Those old posts, they are all about me still, and my PDX Experience. Oh, I’ve cleaned out the private and lame ones, and left just the cream of the crop, so it would be in keeping with the NEW, but…in other words, cuz I wanted to.
So. Unlike my spacer gif example, I certainly hope that my future posts will be equally as visible as this one. Here’s hoping. Staytooooned…
