Southwest Sunday Parkways.

Portland's Sunday Parkways (where a loop of roads are partially or totally closed to car traffic and the bikes and the walkers come out to enjoy the roads) is in Southwest Portland for the first time.  Matt and I rode from our house in North Portland, stopped at church/Sand in the City and then joined up for a ride.

Headed up Terwilliger, traffic free!
 

Stopping for a banana and a self portrait.
 

In Gabriel Park, Matt did some Zumba.
 

By Maplewood School we stopped for a magic show.  Brian Proctor, the magician putting on the show, was quite good.  He balanced the know-it-all of the kids ("You know, I can hear everything you are saying," he said in response to the running commentary by an eight-year-old: "I know what he's going to do next, he's going to join all the  ropes into one."  The kid shut up and was amazed at what happened next) with jokes for the adults, ("Here's a magic marker," he sniffs it, "I think I know why they call it magic.")

At one point, he asked if anyone had a dollar and, the audience being primarily children, no one did.  I grabbed one and handed it over.  Brian had me write my name on the dollar in sharpie, "Your first felony?" he asked as I was doing it, and then took the dollar from me.  The dollar swiftly changed into a Zambian bill which he gave back to me.  Holding the Zambian bill, we watched as red sponge balls and limes disappeared and appeared in a variety of cups.  For his finale, he carefully cut open an lime and there was my dollar inside the lime.  We were all--adults and children--amazed.
 

So I can recommend Brian Proctor for any of your magic needs.  And if you have no magic needs, then perhaps you can invent some.

At this point, the camera battery died, so there are not more pictures of Sunday Parkways.  Overall, I thought it was a good course.  There were some tight spaces (I wasn't a fan of the two-way bike traffic in a single lane along SW Vermont,) but I was a fan of all the hills.  They kept me busy through the ride.

Bike Ride to The Grotto

Matt and I rode to the grotto, killing two birds with one stone. We visited a Portland landmark I had not yet seen and we also got a good bike ride in. It was a sunny day (still cold, though) and that made both "birds" more enjoyable.

The fact that this statue is illuminated is pretty cool, given that there is a huge rock face directly behind it and a lot of massive trees on the top of the rock face. There is some careful pruning at work here.

I feel that this sign fails in it's job to inform and suggest because it assumes that people will know which stone is the alter stone. There were a few good candidates, but it wasn't obvious to me. I'm guessing that people who could correctly identify the alter stone probably know not to climb on it.


We bought the tokens for the elevator to the top level.

I find this sign to be more effective. Perhaps the "alter stone" sign could be amended with something like (the big one in the middle) to make it more clear.
It turns out that we could have just jumped the gate. We wouldn't, of course, but we could have.

Matt looking up the rock face, while waiting for the elevator.

This was probably the fanciest elevator I've been on in a long time. It talked to us, too.

Looking down from the top.

There were a few trilliums in bloom.

Matt was excited by the Polish shrine as he has Polish ancestors.

There is a fabulous labyrinth which we both walked and enjoyed. On a hot day, walking the labyrinth would be a good activity, as the trees and shade probably make for a cool, quiet retreat.

View over Portland

Best use of the word "perturbed" ever!

There are Douglas Fir trees everywhere in the Grotto. However, this is the only one to get the sign.

Back from the top, a picture of the place where they hold services.

On the way home, we stopped for lemonade, which was a very good deal, 50 cents for that huge cup of lemonade.

Our attempts to look holy. Matt is very good, I can't hold a holy expression for long.

What could it be?

A landing pad for a very small helicopter?

Nope, it's for my fancy leather bag.

It's a rain guard!

I had an old shower curtain and I cut it to fit.

Bridge Pedal

Rarely in our relationship does Matt get up before I do. I'm the morning person, he's the night person. Today was one of those rare days. He was up at 5:00 so he could be at the starting line of the Bridge Pedal on time. I stumbled out of bed early enough to take his picture and see him off. He did the 10-Bridge ride and had a great time.

Car free no more.

Matt has joined the ranks of car owners once again. His commute of more than an hour each way, was finally too much. Having done the hour commute each way, I can sympathize.
Here's the car. It's a Volvo that my father previously owned. It has automatic windows and a sunroof and mostly I feel like a circa 1988 yuppie sitting in it. All that is missing is a very large car phone.

Yuppie feelings aside, I am happy to live in a household where someone else owns a car. It's much like when I lived with roommates who have cats. I got all of the kitty fun and never had to clean a litter box.

Thanks Dad!

What does six months of film plastic collection look like?

I've taken our film plastic out of our garbage stream. We've always reused the plastic bags you get from the grocery store as garbage bags, but now all that other plastic (Raman Noodle Wrappers, Tortilla bags, Produce Bags, Potato Bags etc.) gets separated from the normal trash. In that perfect, ideal world I don't live in, I would drop off the film plastic recycling at the recycling station just down the street on a regular basis. In the world I do live in, the one where intermittent tasks sometimes get put off until they are a bit overwhelming, you can see what six months of plastic looks like. I figure this was enough to totally fill our garbage bin so it makes a difference to take it in separately.
Six months of plastic is surprisingly heavy. On the way to the recycling center I was panting more than usual. "Man, I am more out of shape than I thought" I said as I huffed and puffed. But after I dropped off the plastic, I was back to my usually speedy biking self. I was glad it was the plastic and not me.
Could you recycle your film plastic? It turned out to not be that much trouble for us. See if there is a recycling center near you.

Matt and Patricia get away!

We wanted to get away for spring break, but we had little time and not a lot of money. But we found a perfect mini-vacation. Here we are, ready to go.

Unlike our last vacation, where we rented a car, we began this one on foot.

We walked through the Arbor Lodge Neighborhood. I liked this tiny house with the large front yard.

And this one too.

Matt posed in front of a huge tree.

Funny sign. Saturdays, you will get a very good haircut. The other days of the week, not so much.

The famous Jefferson High School, home of the Jefferson Dancers and multiple attempts to revive the school using different educational models. I find myself referring to the school as, "That poor school." Meaning not that the majority of its students are poor, but in trying to fix the school, the district is constantly trying new things, thus never building any sort of success.

And we arrive at our bus stop.

Here is the local branch of the public library.

Frank, at the Florida Room, hates it when you are sober. Get to drinking.

Portland Community College (we share the same initials) has a campus across from Jefferson and the library.

The bus whisks us away and we arrive at our destination, the Kennedy School.

Each room, one-half of a former classroom, is a theme. Ours was "Old MacDonald."

You can write on the chalkboards. I had never seen this clever coat closet/chalk board arrangement, but I was impressed. On rainy days, it must have been nice to shut the musty smell of damp wool in the closet.

Here, Matt demonstrates the movable-ness of the panels.

Our front door.

We had dinner in the courtyard restaurant and Matt had a milkshake. After dinner, we played a card game and then saw Slumdog Millionaire which I hated, but which Matt enjoyed.

The bedside table held no Bible.

The next morning, after spending time in the Soaking Pool which was magical because it was raining and no one was there, we ate breakfast.

I'm still a little flushed from the soaking pool.

We then took the walking tour. Below: a mosaic.

Bas relief panels that were originally donated to the school by J.D. Kennedy. They are full size reproductions of Luca della Robbia's 15th century masterworks done for the cathedral in Florance.

A landscape by Jennifer Joyce picturing the Kennedy school and its surroundings in the late nineteen teens.

There were many mosaics which used yearbook inscriptions such as this one: "I love you little, I love you big, I love you like a little pig."

You can walk into the brewery, the former girls bathroom, and see these portraits of former students and principals on the brew kettles.

Matt enjoyed this explanation of beer brewing.

Here, on a former chalkboard, is the listing of the choices in the movie theater. Notice that we could have seen "Twilight" and both been appalled by the bad acting. I think that would have been a better choice than me sitting with my eyes shut for large portions of the movie.

Matt poses with an wooden attendant from Indonesia.

Our tour finished, we checked out and took the bus home. It was a lovely holiday.

Note: Information about the artwork of the Kennedy school came from the pamphlet "McMenamins Kennedy School, A Walking Tour of Art and History."