beautiful, funny, sad & true

I’ve been an erratic blogger indeed.

Biggest news is that I’ve been home sick (but not homesick) for the third day in a row. Not sure what it is, but it’s been laying me out. Hopefully it’s not AIDS or brain cancer. I’m fairly sure it’s neither–knock wood–because it feels like its hold is finally starting to break. I did give it to Kelly too; what better way to say ‘I love you’? We both spent all of yesterday–day and night–in bed. I was already there, and she left work early, and stayed home today too. Last night, we got up long enough to check our phones and e-mails, and then we watched a cool nature show about bonobos. After that, we watched some episodes of Sealab 2021, and called it a night.

And speaking of Kelly, she and Jamie are moving from downtown Vancouver to one of the cool parts of SE Portland. Yay! They’re signing the lease and getting the keys tonight. Hel-LO, Stumptown and Blue Monk!

I need to clean the kitchen.

UPDATE: Feeling much more like myself. Kitchen cleaned, rose bought, Ali G. episodes watched. Now I’m getting stir crazy, which is always a good sign.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

As you may or may not have already known, I’ve wanted a camera for a long time now. This was the year that I finally splurged and got a decent one. Here, then, are my favorite pictures from this year.

a beautiful October day in Portlandunder the Fremont bridge in PortlandConstruction site in downtown Boise, Idaho McKinley performing “Jamie’s Got a Gun”, taken from backstage at the Night of the Murder Ballad
another of McKinley at Murder BalladKelly on the waterfront in AstoriaKelly warming up with coffee in Astoriainside a cave in Cannon Beach, Oregon
Also Cannon Beach. A kid knocked them down right after this picture was taken.karaoke night
stormy day in Carson, WashingtonJacob Ray of the Young ImmortalsBreanna Paletta of Rye Hollow

but my favorite of the year is this one:

All pictures copyright 2006 by me.  If you’d like copies or anything, please leave a comment and we can work that out.

Why is love in our city
contraband and counterfeit?
We snatch at promises through chinks in the door
and have to beg for letters
or for little scrolls
Why in our city
do they shoot down feelings as they shoot down birds?
Why are we like base metal?
What is left of a man if he is base metal?
Why are we two-faced about our thoughts and feelings?
mundane, underhanded, afraid of the light and the sun?
Why are the people of our city
torn apart by contradictions?
For in their waking hours
they curse braided hair and they curse skirts
and when night enfolds them
they embrace nude pictures.

~Nizar Qabbani, from “Diary of an Indifferent Woman”

I re-posted this from a friend’s blog, because it struck a chord.

Here are some pictures from a day trip to Astoria, Oregon just after Thanksgiving. I had played a gig in Seaside, Oregon, the night before, and instead of going back to Portland via the direct route, we (my girlfriend and I) decided to do some more sightseeing instead. We’d both been to Seaside a million times, but for some reason it had been ages since either of us had been to Astoria. Off we went.

Astoria is probably most famous for being used as the location for the movie The Goonies, back in the 80’s. These days, it’s really just a little tourist town. It’s right at the mouth of the Columbia River, where it meets the Pacific Ocean, so the weather is notoriously strange. That, combined with the hills and beautiful colors, makes for some tremendous and seemingly unlimited picture opportunities.

These houses are just about the first things you see when you enter Astoria from the south. They’re not in a particularly nice area of town (in fact, none of Astoria is particularly ‘nice’), but I was struck right away by their matching colors and symmetry.

For this one, we got almost-but-not-quite-all the way to the top of the hill, but we couldn’t see a ‘public’ way up any further, so we drove up a bunch of private roads and driveways. :) Sure glad we did, too, because this picture made it all worthwhile:

Everyone–meet Kelly. Kelly–meet everyone. :)

After a cold, gray, rainy morning of picture taking on the waterfront, we’d just had lunch and coffee, and were feeling good, so we decided to explore the town a little more. The sun started to come out, and the light changed, so we went back down to the waterfront and get pictures of the bridge in this new light. I had already taken a bunch of pictures, when suddenly a double rainbow started to appear. “V. exciting,” as Bridget Jones would say. This one’s really a once-in-a-lifetime shot:

Can’t wait to go back. I like the idea of going to the Washington side of the river and exploring up there, and maybe coming back over the Astoria bridge. Only problem with that is we’d have to come back over the Astoria bridge, which reallyreallyreally freaks me out, ’cause it’s like four miles long. Whether or not I’m up for that will depend on what the weather’s like.

Either way, there will be lots more good opportunities for pictures, and for fun with friends.