Why Dressing Up in Funny Clothes With Lots of People is Awesometastic Fun-Times

That is a picture of me dressed up as my villainous alter-ego, the Defenestrator. His superpower is throwing people and things out of windows. I didn't crack out the leather and goggles on my own, though. The getup was for a pub crawl hosted by the Alter Egos Society, an organization in Portland dedicated to, well, dressing up like superheroes and supervillains. This last weekend several of Portland's enthusiastic geeks donned crazy clothes, took on the persona of characters of our own devising, and cavorted throughout town.

Now, why the costumes? Why not just go on a regular pub crawl? Why not just get a bunch of people together and have a night out? That's possible, certainly, but dressing up in crazy clothes gives it an extra amount of specialness, of awesome-osity.

Costumes are an outlet for creativity

There were some fairly impressive getups on display, from a quartet of horn-sporting demons to a mad scientist character who had an extremely impressive metal mask. I myself worked a bit on a logo for the Defenestrator that I appended to the back of my jacket, and settled on a distressed-looking down arrow that suggested dramatically crashing into the ground. (Several people asked me "Are you supposed to be the economy or something?")

While it's perfectly possible for me to go to an art store and load up on canvas, charcoal, and fixatif any time I want, knowing that I was going to attend a themed pub crawl gave me a reason to start scrawling out a symbol for my own fictional villain. Having a reason for something, a deadline, and looming event fires the productive imagination much more than most things.

Costumes are an instant conversation piece

While I can occasionally get pretty extroverted, it is still sometimes difficult to start conversations with strangers. I found myself talking to plenty of people I didn't know, though. The demons I mentioned earlier- they'd rigged up pitchforks that shot flames out of the end, and of course several of us started using them to light clove cigarettes. Socializing ensued. People commented on my leather pants, I talked to a guy who happened to be wearing an "Ike and Nixon" button, and briefly chatted with a man in a luchadore mask. All of these interactions were smoothed by the presence of weird clothes. "Dude, awesome costume!" was an instant conversation topic.

Costumes can change peoples' personalities

A friend of mine was dressed up as an evil mastermind he called Lord Skullfucker. Now, he's normally a pretty demonstrative guy, but got no shortage of joy talking about how he was going to initiate amorous relations with various peoples' ocular cavities. Likewise, my girlfriend was dressed as the deadly and beautiful Rocktopussy, and found herself voguing and striking David Bowie poses much more than she normally does. A guy dressed up as an 80s metal themed hero kept flashing the horns, and the various heroes and villains pretended to hate each other to amusing effect.

With crazy costumes, you can try on not only clothes, but a whole other bombastic and weird persona that you wouldn't use in real life. I know this is a bit of a cliche, but it's wonderful to see in action, with folks trying on personalities to go with their new tights and masks.

It's fun to freak the mundanes

Obviously, not everyone in Portland was dressed up in crazy duds. There were plenty of perfectly normal people out and about, and we got a fair amount of stares. Most of them were very appreciative, and several cars honked in support of our wackiness. Of course we waved back. Several onlookers from the Portland Streetcar pressed their noses to the glass of their vehicle as we walked by, and we responded with waves and whoops.

I'd venture a guess that most of them later told their friends "Hey, guess what I saw!" and we managed to improve their evening, just a little.

Weird stuff is a source of civic pride

This is probably specific to Portland and cities like it, but I'm quite grateful that I live in a city where quirky stuff happens on a fairly regular basis. The evening before I dressed up a the Defenestrator, I'd been playing extreme mini-golf. This weekend I'll probably see the mayor of Portland dressed up a robot. On Sunday, there's roller derby to be seen. Say what you will about Portland being self-consciously weird, it's not boring.

Of course Portland has other events like this. There's a pirate themed pub crawl. And the one where everyone dresses up as Santa. I hope to be at both, filled with joy at living in one of the funnest towns ever.

A Plea For Coat Checks At Portland Music Venues

Dear Every Portland Venue Ever,

Please have a coat check.

We have a fantastic music scene in this city. On any given night of the week, you can rock out for not very much money. The clubs, pubs, bars and venues here are absolutely wonderful, and I'm proud to call the local music scene mine.

Except for the lack of coat checks.

Why? Please, for the love of all that is decent and holy, why doesn't every single venue in this town have a coat check? I don't want to dance, gyrate, headbang, and otherwise get crazy in my jacket. I want to do all of that sans-jacket. What's more, I don't want to have to worry about my jacket being rifled through while it sits on a bench somewhere. And, even if it isn't rifled through (I admit this is a remote possibility, actually), there is the potential that some drunken jackhole (and I use the term "drunken jackhole" in the most affectionate way possible) will spill beer on it during the festivities. Just the other I was at the Crystal Ballroom (a magical place) and my girlfriend and I left our jackets on a bench. When we got back to them, after the show, her jacket was somewhat moist. This did not spoil the evening, but it was unpleasant.

So, have a coat check. Please.

It rains here. It is often wet and dark and cold. Crowds of people file into concerts and then have to shed various layers of waterproof gear before venturing out onto the floor of a concert. Oftentimes, piles of discarded jackets litter the sides of concert venues. This is messy, undesirable, and could easily be solved. Each venue could make a tidy bit of money chekcing coats. It is mystifying why you don't offer this service.

Every Portland venue ever, I implore you: Give me a place to check my jacket. A place where I can stow it safely and not have to think about it's security, structural integrity, or moisture level while revelries transpire. This is a simple problem with an easy solution.

I love you, Portland Music Scene. A lot. Gobs and bunches, in fact.

However, the lack of coat checks is utterly moronic. Fix it. I will give you all big, appreciative hugs if you do.

Love,

Me

Here's A Picture of Abraham Lincoln With a Bird on His Head

Just because.

Why Portlandia Doesn't Work

One of my favorite comedies right now is It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. The central characters in it are all utterly horrid examples of humanity- each episode is about their various petty squabbles, arguments, idiotic schemes, jealousies, weaknesses, and manifestations of stupidity. The main cast fights, bickers, make horrible decisions, hurt each other, hurt innocent bystanders, and generally act in a contemptible fashion.

But, because the show is made by some very talented people, I still like them.

Even as the creators of It's Always Sunny send up their characters as objects of ridicule and mockery, you can tell that they still quite like their characters. As nasty as Mac, Dee, Dennis, and Charlie can be- they still manage to grab a certain amount of my affection. I know that in each episode they will do awful things, but it's a testament to the skills of the actors, directors, and writers that even as they are objects of farce they are also full, real characters whom I am capable of feeling something for.

Likewise, Alec Baldwin's character on 30 Rock is oftentimes toweringly evil and self-centered. Jack Donaghy is something like a better-coiffed Dick Cheney in his demeanor and outlook. However, as much as he's portrayed as a villainous caricature of a certain type of conservative exec, Baldwin & Co. don't forget that for us to keep coming back to 30 Rock, there has to be some humanity there. As much as I'd loathe Jack Donaghy in real life, he remains a real person worthy of empathy in addition to being a figure of fun.

The deft injection of affection and empathy into farce and satire- the streak of love that runs through ridiculous and mean humor- that is what's missing from Portlandia. That absence of underlying reality- that the people on screen should be people in addition to jokes- is why the show will probably fail.

I've only seen the first episode and a few of the promo shorts, but what I've encountered so far is not inspiring, and so far I have a certain loathing for the show. This is not because Portlandia is insulting my hometown- quite the contrary, I would love it if we had our own version of Northern Exposure. The problem is that Portlandia doesn't lampoon this place especially well.

The first episode starts with a clip that's been going around quite a bit, a song about how "the dream of the 90s is alive in Portland." You've probably seen it already, but here it is:



As far as a big opening number, this doesn't work at all. Fred Armisen was born in the sixties, and Carrie Brownstein in the seventies. Both of them were in the twenties and thirties in the nineties, and, presumably, enjoying what the youth culture of the time provided. They seem flabbergasted, in the opening song, that some amount of youth culture is still extant, like an old hippie amazed that young people still listen to Led Zepplin.

Yes, current hipster/alternative culture grew out of nineties grunge. Which reacted to, and grew out of eighties new wave and hair metal. Which sprang from seventies punk-rock. Which owed a lot to hippie music from the sixties. Who were preceded by greasers in the fifties. Who in turn were preceded by beatniks in the forties.

Arguing that any kind of youth/pop/alternative/creative culture is similar to what preceded it is facile, annoying, and utterly non-funny. The best humor is smart, and hits upon unthought-of truths. When one says of a comedian "he's saying what we're all thinking!" we're talking of comedy's ability to express what was known, but never voiced. Portlandia's introductory song expresses the obvious and holds it up as if it's some kind of profundity.

That was only the opener, though. Sitting down to watch the first episode, I hoped that there would be something more inspiring, something that would actually, you know, make me laugh, something that would make me go "yeah, that is true," and nod in amused recognition.

This did not happen. The sketches seem clunky and joyless, and the whole show occupies a kind of forced, airless space. Not even a Steve Buscemi cameo was able to inject some life into the proceedings.

The central problem was that throughout the episode none of the characters portrayed by Armisen or Brownstein seemed to be real people. I had no sense of connection whatsoever with any of the people whom they portrayed. This is not because they were playing idiots- the crew from It's Always Sunny have roundly proved that one can play an idiot and still connect with the audience- it was because they seemed uninterested in injecting humanity into their characters. (While on the subject of sketch comedy- there's more drama, feeling and reality in a single College Humor sketch than any single section of Portlandia. The CH crew also prove that you can mercilessly mock your characters and still get the audience to like them.)

I do want this show to do well. I want it to dramatically improve, take on some new talent, and become a kick-ass sketch comedy show that makes me laugh. I want to hear jokes about how everyone has food allergies, wears stupid hats, has weird facial hair, and eats doughnuts that have bacon on them. My hometown is, I admit, filled with things that can be hilariously mocked.

But I want them mocked well, and with a little bit of love, and joy, and fun. I want to smile while I see my tattooed neighbors insulted. So far, prospects don't look good.

In Which Elvis Asks Me Who I Am

"Who are you?" asked Elvis. We were sitting across from each other on the MAX and he was looking directly at me. He stared through his massively thick glasses, quizzically. "I've seen you around a lot!"

Given that my primary job is the walk tourists around Portland whilst gesticulating at buildings, landmarks, etc., this wasn't too unusual. A few other people have also recognized me and asked who I am.

"My name is Joe," I said, "I'm a tour guide."

"Oh, that makes sense," said Elvis, "You're in Saturday Market a lot. I've seen your groups. What do you tell them about?"

"Oh," I said, "you've probably seen me telling them about the Skidmore Fountain."

"Ah," Elvis smiled a bit, "You know, you should tell them about me. You tell them about some stony old fountain, but you don't tell them about one of the best things in Portland!"

Portland's Elvis is an old guy, maybe in his fifties, sixties, I'm not sure. I've also got no idea what his real name is, but he's known as Elvis throughout town, so that name works well enough. He's wearing his black and gold jumpsuit is holding a guitar case. I've seen his guitar- it is a beautiful guitar. It has waves and surfers and ships and Hawaiian scenery on it. Everybody recognizes Elvis. He's a fixture of the town. His picture is outside Voodoo Doughnut.

"I've seen you," I said, "but I didn't want to put you on the spot."

This is true. I am completely comfortable talking about buildings or fountains or geographical features. I'm also okay talking about dead people. Talking about a real, live person who is walking around, though, like they're a piece of architecture seems a bit weird to me.

"Why not? That's why I'm there. Next time you see me, say 'hi.'"

I say okay.

"I mean it!" says Elvis, "I'm part of Portland just like that fountain is."

I have to admit he has a point. We talk for a bit and he asks me how I got a tour guide job. I told him I was a teacher, got laid off, and then turned into a tour guide. He says that he's been performing at Saturday Market for twenty seven years. That is quite a bit of time, and he is part of Portland. If I have the opportunity, I would like to say hi to him on a tour, but don't want to treat him like a mascot. I snuff that thought out, though, on account that its a tad patronizing. He is a part of Portland. I'll say hi, next chance I get.

It's my stop and I have to get off the MAX.

"Hey, one more thing," says Elvis, "I've seen you tell that story about the guy launching the airplane off the roof of that hotel. Is that really true?" He's referring to Silas Christofferson, who in 1912 flew an early lightweight craft off the roof of Portland's Multnomah Hotel.

"It's totally true," I say, "But he was later killed in crash."

"That's too bad," says Elvis, "but I'm glad it's true. You say hi, next time!"

"Yes, sir," I say, and step of the MAX.

And I really will, too.

Regarding This Past Friday Night

Finishing work on Friday evening I was in high spirits- my tour had gone well, the weather was agreeable, and I was on my way to meet some friends for burgers and beer at one of Portland's local hipster holes. The streets of downtown were crowded with people who had showed up for the Christmas tree lighting in Pioneer Courthouse Square, and every third person seemed to have a green blinking light on their person. (They must have been handed out as a promotional item.) I passed the Square, took a look at the tree, and a huge crowd of people were still there singing carols. Jogging a few blocks over to Burnside, the newly-lit White Stag/Made in Oregon/ Portland, Oregon sign lit up the night. All was wonderfully festive.

And the next morning I opened my browser to discover that someone had tried to blow all of that up.

The facts of the case are widely reported, so I won't bother reiterating them here. I'm quite happy they got this guy, and all for stings, but there are two things that I can't stop thinking about:

Firstly: As a matter of personal policy, I refuse to be frightened by this. Like the poster says, I'm going to keep calm and carry on.

Secondly: Law enforcement (at least based on reported anecdotes) seems to be targeting foreign-born individuals who have become radicalized. Most of the time, it seems that these guys probably couldn't pull off their desired schemes themselves. The feds are with them every step of the way. Left to his own devices, I wonder Mohamud would have gotten the materials he needed.

Again, I like the idea of stings. It's a great thing to keep potential criminals off balance. Potential terrorists don't know if they're talking to an actual Jihadist or a federal agent. Sowing that kind of overcaution, confusion, and fear among these criminals is great, strategically.

And yet, I wonder how many unbalanced guys the FBI would catch if they targeted the militias in Montana, the self-appointed border guards in Texas, or the white supremacists in Idaho. How many other Tim McVeighs are out there that could be stung into arrest? How many native-born, equally bloodthirsty, equally unbalanced white Mohamuds are there?

I have no kind of sympathy for adherents to radical Islam. They are, at the very best, foolish. However, history tells us that they are not alone. Prior to September 11th, 2001, the largest terrorist act in American history had been carried out by a radical white Christian. McVeigh's kin, gun-toting religious radicals who are doubtless incensed by the very existence black president, are still out there.

What could we reap with a focused effort? Given the collaboration, encouragement, and resources of an undercover FBI agent, what kind of potential violence could we find welling from religious white America? I don't doubt that Mohamud (may he spend his remaining days ingloriously in prison) has an equal and opposite out there, a kind of inverse brother born not in Somalia but in Kansas, reading not a Quaran but a Bible, and just as filled with impotent unarticulated rage, and dreams of violence.

Look! Horsey!

I've seen several of these around town, and the gag is hardly original, but I think it's funny every single time I see it. Honestly, I kind of wish every horse tie had some variant of this going on.

Update: Apparently this is a thing! Like, an organized thing! A friend of mine on Facebook alerted me to the existence of the Horse Project. Check it out!

About A Certain Urban Nickname...

I've never liked the name "Rose City."

Portland, to me, has never been the "City of Roses." That name reeks of airbrushed idealism, it seems forced and false. The idea of this place as some sort of fragrant garden, some sun-dappled manicured lawn redolent of blooms and buds seems hugely false. The region is fertile, yes, it is green, certainly, but it has never struck me as particularly rosy.

The everpresent evergreens seem a better symbol, as do the layered and enveloping clouds. This city isn't suggestive of brightness and perfumed plants. This place is rain-soaked. It is green and awash more with the scents of coffee and hops than any ornamental plant. Roses are an ignored ideal. Portland deserves a sobriquet.

"Puddletown" is more accurate, but there are rainy cities everywhere. Such a name is not terribly unique. A better fit is "Bridgetown," a name that brings to mind our wonderful and inspiring urban infrastructure. "Stumptown" speaks to the actual history of the place, and is a reminder that we stand in the middle of what once was a dense forest. Even "Rip City" works better than the floral monikers. It is full of nonsensical bravado, reminiscent of Drexler-era games of NBA Jam. But, it calls to mind something real, a time when the Trail Blazers were a force to be reckoned with.

All of these are good. All of them are better than the too-cheery names "Rose City" or "City of Roses." All of them seem to have more of that very in-demand commodity; authenticity.

I hope that the roses fade, that "Stumptown" and "Bridgetown" gain primacy. A stand of evergreens or the spires of the St. Johns Bridge are more real and more inspiring symbols of our metropolis than any non-native flower will ever be.

We are Stumptown, Puddletown, Bridgetown, even Rip City. Roses, it seems, just happen to grow here.

In Which the Front Wheel of My Bike Gets Stolen at a Busy Portland Intersection

For the first time in my life, I willingly approached a Greenpeace canvasser.  "Hello," I said to her.

"Hi!" She was smiley and pixie-like and had red streaks in her hair.

"I know you guys have been on this street corner all day. My bike's been parked over there, and someone stole the front wheel. Have you guys seen anything?"

She thought for a minute. "Yeah!" she said, "there was some guy messing with a bike over there earlier, but I didn't get a good look at him."

"Any idea of what time?"

"Maybe two. I don't know. Three? I was watching the pedestrians, mostly."

"Okay thanks."

"Do you want to help save the environment today?"

"Look, I just had the front wheel of my bike stolen."

"You ride a bike! Obviously you care about the environment."

"I'm in a very bad mood right now, and have to file a police report."

"Okay, but it's a great cause!"

I walked away. The corner where my wheel was stolen, SW Broadway and Morrison, is an incredibly busy spot. Several retail spots, tons of pedestrians, a few buskers, some canvassers, and a handful security guards are nearly always there during the day.

I asked around to see if anyone had seen someone messing with my bike. I asked the Baskin Robbins, Abercrombie &, Fitch, Nordstrom, multiple security guards, a few buskers, and a great deal of Pioneer Courthouse Square. I didn't know why. There was no chance that I'd get my wheel back, I suppose I wanted some sort of satisfaction, or wanted to know that it wasn't possible to just go up to a bike in a public place and, you know, steal parts of it without detection. The presence of lots of people would be enough to deter you.

Unfortunately, no one had seen anything of substance. My bike wheel was crippled, and some thief has a new front wheel, along with an old tire and much-patched tube. I was annoyed at the thieves, certainly (I had some nice thoughts about weaponizing my U lock and bruising up their soft tissue with it) but I was also pissed at Portland itself. This was on a dynamic, well-trafficked intersection. I would hope that the light of day, the presence of crowds, and general feel of the area would be enough to deter crime. It usually is, but today I got to be the one guy who happened to get his shit jacked.

In a very, very public place. The whole incident reminded me how easy it is to slip beneath people's perception, as this clip illustrates. Stealing is actually quite easy, as is sleight-of-hand, being unnoticed, and stealth in general. When I was in high school, a classmate walked into a McDonald's, took the gigantic ketchup dispenser with him, and then walked out. Nothing happened to him (he claimed that it was a "social experiment" and subsequently had a ketchup dispenser in his locker all year.) The Willamette Week actually did a story on this, and a reporter was able to very easily steal his own bike. I don't have any profound conclusion here, but I really do want to believe that the presence of tons and tons of people on an intersection an exert enough ambient social pressure to make people behave. It works, I suppose, most of the time, but every so often a crowd of people on a street corner are all too happy to see nothing.

The Price of Weirdness

The night before last I found myself in line at Voodoo Doughnut with Seph and his girlfriend L.  Neither of them had ever been there, and Seph was keen on getting a doughnut as an early birthday celebration.  Standing in line at Voodoo's east side location, we were surrounded by plenty of self-consciously weird and kitschy decor- Kenny Rogers posters, pinball machines, and a cardboard cutout of Elvira.  Sundry other bits and pieces decorated the area, and Voodoo's trademark pink wall filtered out from behind the posters and ephemera.

An elderly couple were in front of us.  They were looking about the room with grins on their faces.  I imagined that they'd seen this shop on the Travel Channel or the Food Network, this crazy pastry hut that puts bacon on maple bars.  At the counter was a young woman who fit right in to the whole tableaux.  She was young and pretty in a Suicide Girls type way, redolent with tattoos and sporting a spetum piercing.  The elderly couple in front of us looked at the Kenny Rogers posters and took pictures of those.  They took pictures of the pinball machines and Elvira.  When they got their doughnuts, they asked the young woman if they could take her picture, too.

"Uh, yeah."  She smiled nervously.  Perhaps she was weirded out by having an older guy suddenly take her picture.  She tried to laugh a little, and look candid, but was obviously slightly uneasy.  The old couple in front of us, though, were quite happy with their whole experience.  They left with a bag of doughnuts and a camera of pictures, satisfied that they had indeed found something that makes Portland as odd as it is.

I enjoy it that Portland is self-aware about its weirdness.  If anything, it pays a significant chunk of my own bills.  In my capacity as a tour guide, I take people to see things like Voodoo and the 24 Hour Church of Elvis, all marks of oddness that allow us to maintain distinctiveness.  On an abstract level, it's a nice source of regional pride to know that one lives in an easygoing and fun place, but more practically it's great for our tourism industry.  Visitors, obviously, want to see something they can't see at home.  We can give them that.  We can give them weird doughnuts and Elvis worship and signs that are really big double-entendres.  Tourists will come here and pay money to see these things, and spend money while they're here.  That's great.  But, there's a price.

The price is the nervous laugh of that Voodoo Doughnut employee, out of towners gawking at us and ours and saying "Wow!  You guys are weird!"  I get it all the time.  I mention to tourists that I ride my bike to and from work every day, and a few have asked incredulously if I'm afraid for my own safety.  I find such questions hugely naive, but understandable if you come from somewhere where everyone drives.  When I've mentioned Portland's penchant for vegan and vegetarian lifestyles, I've been asked more than a few times about alleged attendant health problems- another set of questions I think are naive.

Upon reflection, though, I know that these questions are not dumb, and that that older couple wasn't wrong to gawk at Voodoo Doughnut.  I joyfully provide people with information, and Voodoo joyfully dresses itself up to be weird.  Most of the people that this brings in are not naive gawkers, but there will always be a few.  There will always be a few old people taking tourist pictures of the local tattooed populace, or wondering with disbelief how one could ride a bike everyday.  This reaction is aggravating, but unavoidable, and ultimately part of something much more positive and entirely worth it.

I Have No Idea What These Are

I saw these costumes at Last Thursday on Alberta.  The majority of it was comprehensible to me- various bands set up at regular intervals, drum circles, people on stilts, fairy wings.  Normal stuff.  One particular performance, though, was rather mystifying.  I saw the figures pictured below, and found their presence genuinely enigmatic.  They were dancing, and, later one, stood utterly still.  I wondered if they were some sort of traditional costumery, or merely an invented weirdness.  Are the below-pictured a thing?  And, if so, what nature of thing?  I was perplexed.

Awesome Thing: The Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse Sculpture Garden

If you live in Portland, you've probably seen the looming ultramodern tower that is the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse (MOHUSC). Since it was built in 1997 it's a building that I've consistently admired, a fact that I find continually surprising for two reasons. For one, many of the things that I thought were cool in the '90s (black turtlenecks, Mortal Kombat, putting "2000" on anything) are, in retrospect, sort of silly. Architecture in particular seems to wear its age badly, though. The things that probably looked futuristic and cutting-edge throughout the twentieth century usually look hopelessly anachronistic now. Postmodern buildings such as the Portland Building were edgy once, but they now they're the structural equivalent of a George Michael album; dead-end fashions that everyone involved wants covered up.

Paradoxically, the recently contemporary often seems even more aged than the truly old. The boxy Oregon State Capitol exudes the 1930s, but the much older Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. seems timeless and therefore more contemporary. (Total aside, but this reminds me of the probably apocryphal story of an English professor who, in the 1950s, decided to translate Hamlet into beatnik so that young people could relate to it better. The resulting text ended up being utterly impenetrable ten years later, but the original Shakespeare could still be grokked without much difficulty.)

The point is, that if you're going to make something and have it look edgy and contemporary and neato, you run the very high risk of being passe in a few years. When making big, permanent things like buildings, this is something you want to avoid. People are going to be staring at these buildings for quite some time, and you really want these buildings to seem contemporary in some form or fashion long after their styles were "cool."

So far, the MOHUSC is holding up. When I walked through its lobby the other day, it impressed me as much as it did thirteen years ago. It seems utterly futuristic in a classy, subdued kind of way. The interior is filled with stark, quiet lines and blocky structures that are somehow also elegant. It's big and stark and empty, but also impressive, precisely the kind of thing that made the young me want to be a lawyer.

And it has a sculpture garden on the ninth floor.

Since the MOHUSC is a public building, anyone who wants to can walk right in, go up the elevator, and hang out in the sculpture garden. Granted, the sculptures themselves are sort of silly- a collection of animals and anthropomorphic computers that are collectively titled "Law of Nature" -but the space is highly neat. It is secluded, affords a great view of the city, and is open to the public.

It's a nice space in what could otherwise have been an utterly utilitarian government building. I was alone for the entire time I was up there, which I didn't expect, but was refreshing. Again, the statues aren't great art- they're silly little animals dressed up as lawyers, but I like it that tucked away in a large, ultramodern building is a little bit of flourish, and anyone who likes may admire the skyline, the surrounding buildings, and the greenery below.

Late Evening of the Living Dead Bicyclists

Last night I found myself wearing a Jesus costume and leading a coterie of bicyclists dressed as zombies around NE Portland. Our fair city's (now annual) zombie bike ride was upon us, and for a number of reasons I suddenly found myself leading the thing. Needing to stand out from the biking horde of slavering cyclists, I decided to comport myself as the most famous zombie ever, a dude who shambled out of his grave three days after a rather nasty torture/execution session.

We met up in a park, and my friend L was good enough to show up with a batch of corn syrup, red food dye, and flour. As I'd only recently had the responsibility of the ride foisted on me, and didn't have any fake blood, L was a lifesaver (or rather, unlifersaver) for bringing the hemoglobin. A few pictures-

Here's L, devouring her somewhat chagrined boyfriend:

This gentleman did the "military guy gets zombified" thing. He had very creepy teeth.

"BEEEEERR!"

Slathered in L's fake blood, this girl looked a bit more like Carrie than a zombie, but she certainly pulled it off. She should watch out, though, because the girl behind her seems to be contemplating Carrie-centric mastication.

Our attempt at a zombie last supper:

You can't really see it in the picture, but these girls are covered in glitter blood. We decided they were Twilight zombies.

Zombie dance! We stopped at three places, and rocked out to Thriller at two of them. The night closed with zombie karaoke at a tiki bar where numerous zombies (as in the drink) were consumed. I decided that the best thing for Zombie Jesus to sing would be Highway to Hell.

As people went home, more than a few of them said "Thank you, Jesus!" I kind of love my lifestyle.

Night of the Living Naked Bicyclists

Yes, that's me. In that picture I am wearing the following items:

-Socks

-Shoes

-A bicycle helmet

-A messenger bag

-Paint

...And that's it. Saturday was the World Naked Bike Ride here in Portland, and I was not going to miss it. Last year, I learned of the event too late and wasn't able to participate because I was playing Dungeons and Dragons. Yes, really. While thousands of other Portlanders were getting naked in the streets last year, I was playing D&D. (Though, it was a really fun D&D session...)

The Oregon constitution goes a bit further than the federal one with regards to protected speech. Because the World Naked Bike Ride is technically political speech (we were ostensibly there protesting oil dependence), the ensuing bike-mounted parade of butts, boobs, and saddle-mounted wangs were 100% legal. The police were out in force... corking traffic for us. Several of the cops waved, and one particularly enthusiastic officer of the law was throwing metal horns to the various naked cyclists.

This was the second time in my life that I've been naked on a bike, and just like when I got naked for a flaming lips video, it was pretty much entirely nonsexual. I'm not about to turn into some kind of ideological nudist, but damn it was fun. Lots of fun. Overturning social mores almost always is.

A steady crowd of onlookers had massed on the street, often with their arms out, high-fiving the participants. The naked participants, in turn, often shouted things such as "Take off your pants!" to the crowd. Amazingly, some of them did. There were more than a few naked onlookers, most notably a very well-muscled gentleman sitting naked astride a motorcycle and giving everyone a thumbs up. If there ever was a potential cover for a gay metal album, he was it.

One of the bums I recognized from Old Town also decided to get naked, and there, on the side of the road, he was wearing nothing but dirt whilst bouncing up and down excitedly. I could have gone the rest of my life without seeing filthy bouncing hobo wang, but there it was. Also in Old Town a rather obnoxious frat-boyish sort of guy screamed "Where the titties at?" I thought this was sort of a curious thing to say given that titties were everywhere.

Like I said, overturning social mores is nearly always fun. The feeling of everyone getting together and saying "Hey, guys! Let's temporarily operate using alternative social constructions!" is precisely the kind of thing that can make lots of people say "Woo!" It's a refreshing reminder that things are mutable.

It was highly neat. If I'm in Portland next year, I'm definitely getting naked again.

Thirty-Eight, Cesar Chavez, Forty

I like numbered streets. They are a force of good in the world. If, for example, you are looking for 32nd Ave, you would do well to look between 31st and 33rd. Easy, intuitive, and logical. Numbered streets are wonderful. Only slightly less awesome are streets that are in alphabetical order.

Portland, though, has decided that the beautiful efficiency of numbers is apparently a bad idea, and has started chipping away at this by renaming 39th Ave Cesar Chavez Blvd. Now, I have nothing against Chavez- but I mourn heavily the loss of number 39, an innocent number that really should be nestled in their with its little sister, 38, and its big brother, 40. Instead, the number 39 is now a restless orphan, wandering the streets alone and trying to sell matches, all the while slowly dying of consumption.

I want to reiterate this again- I have no problem with Cesar Chavez Blvd. as a name. However, I would be opposed to replacing any number with anything. If 15th were going to be replaced with Cuddly Bunny St., I would oppose that. If 82nd was going to be renamed Delicious Pie Ave., I would oppose that. If 33rd was going to be rechristened Screaming Orgasm Drive, I would oppose that, too.

Maybe I'd be okay with having 42nd renamed Douglas Adams Ave. Maybe.

If we wanted to commemorate Cesar Chavez, then we should have used a street with a boring, prosaic, name. I think Grand would have been an ideal candidate. It's a main arterial, not a numbered street, and has an entirely generic name that could suffer a bit of erasing. Instead, we got rid of a perfectly lovely number. As awesome a guy as Cesar Chavez was, he can never replace 39. No one can.

Portland, We Need to Talk About "Chinatown"...

Dearest Portland,

Over the past year plus that I've lived here, I have found new reasons to love you. New areas of weirdness and wonder, new quirks and oddities to marvel at. You, Portland, are a tremendous place, and I routinely feel a swell of irrational pride at you being my native city. However, there is something that we need to talk about. Something that you could be doing better. No, it's not the lack of bike lanes on Sandy Blvd., though that is annoying. Nor is it the eyesore that is SE Powell. I have every confidence you'll clean those up eventually. No, what we need to talk about, Portland, is the couple of blocks downtown that you have decided to dub "Chinatown."

Chinatown sucks, Portland. It's more than a little embarrassing. I was recently in San Francisco, and took a stroll through that city's Chinatown. I'd been there before, but it's a fun neighborhood and I was with people who'd never been. I snapped a few photos. Here's an example:



That's not any particular landmark or a significant intersection or anything. That's just a bit on the street. Nothing too unusual. Here's another one:



Again, that's not a famous landmark or anything. I was just walking down the street, snapping away like an obnoxious tourist, and took a picture of that building. Pretty commonplace.

For contrast, here's the House of Louie, one of Portland Chinatown's most "Chinese" buildings. It's kind of decrepit and sort of a sad sight:



And here's Royal Family Ginseng, right next door, abandoned. Someone papered up the windows, but now those brown sheets are peeling away, the markings of abandonment themselves disintegrating:



And that's it, really. There are a few other "Chinese" type buildings, but that's pretty much it in terms of what Portland has. Why the disjunction? Why does San Francisco have a Chinatown where storefronts and apartments are culturally distinctive and Portland has pretty much just a pair of crumbling buildings?

The answer is pretty simple- San Francisco's Chinatown actually has Chinese people in it. The distinctive cultural flair of the area, the storefronts, tea shops, and restaurants, are all a product of the actual residents. Sure, they play it up for the tourists, but it's completely possible to go into a dim sum shop and be the only English speaker in the place. San Francisco's Chinatown actually reflects an immigrant population where they can get together, speak their own language, eat their own food, etc. As someone who's been a stranger in a foreign country, I can totally see why such a place is necessary.

Portland, on the other hand, has a big gate, a bunch of red street lamps, and some rather dubious buildings. That's about it. What's missing from Portland's Chinatown is, well, Chinese people. The are near Old Town is the official Chinatown, but there are a lot more Chinese people and businesses out on 82nd Ave. In the official Chinatown you can find hipsters, drunks, and homeless, but you won't hear anyone speaking Mandarin.

So, Portland, here's what I'm proposing: stop pretending. Stop pretending that we have a Chinatown, because we really don't. We have a neighborhood with some red lamp posts, and that's about it. It is a neighborhood that I really like, but it's not reflective of an immigrant population, it's not an enclave that Chinese people have made for themselves. I'm not saying we should tear down the big gate or anything, but we should all acknowledge that Portland's Chinatown is, at the end of the day, complete bullshit.

In Praise of Coffee Shops

Working at home is possible, but it takes discipline. One must focus intensely while the objects of leisure are right there. I've been working on a manuscript for a while, but to write or edit at home, I have to ignore the Internet, video games, my roommates, and my books. I have to shut out people who may be over, or other stimuli that seems to show up at my house on a fairly frequent basis. Besides, this is my home. This is where I relax and do fun things, the place where I sleep, read novels, and watch movies. I associate it with idleness and off-time.

Fortunately, there are coffee shops.

I'm convinced that coffee is not really the primary product of most coffee shops. Coffee is something I adore, and if I don't have either it or tea I usually am in for at least a noticeable headache later in the day. However, the primary product of coffee shops is really a place to sit. A place, outside of your house, to read, socialize, or work. I've found them an ideal place to focus on my manuscript about Japan. I finally printed out the material I have so far (224 pages, single spaced) and have been editing it for the past week and a half.

I sit there for an indeterminate amount of time, imbibing my favorite stimulant, and spilling red ink. Without fail, there is someone else with a laptop or a notepad or some other such portable object whom I often imagine working away on a similarly creative endeavor. I like the simple presence of others, and I like the atmosphere and smell, the piles of alternative weeklies in the corner, and the paintings on the walls with price tags like footnotes. Oftentimes, there's some kind of music playing, usually jazz or some obscure imported genre that is simultaneously interesting and easy to ignore. I like that, too, a low-level white noise that eases attention to detail.

I've been staggering which ones I go to, and seeking out new coffee shops. Yesterday, I found a new one in Southeast, in the Hawthorne District, a converted house filled with paintings. The owner had dragged in an old-style school desk which I found too amusing not to sit at. When I went in, there was a guy on the porch reading a newspaper. He was there when I left, too. Across from me a guy with extremely long hair and hemispherical earphones sat at a laptop for the entire time I was there. A girl reading what looked to be a gigantic novel said "thanks" to the counter guy as she left, and he said "see you tomorrow!"

Not home, not an office, but another node or point of contact, another place on the map that can be used as "base," a resting zone. If all coffee shops had was coffee, I wouldn't go to them nearly as often, wouldn't drink nearly as much of the stuff. I go there for the state of mind, the focus, go there to be outside and at rest at the same time.

A Most Satisfying Encounter With the Flaming Lips, a Horde of Very Nice Naked People, and a Giant Spherical Vinyl Fur-Vagina

K posted it, and I saw the call up. The Flaming Lips were shooting a music video in Portland, on Mt. Tabor, and they needed naked bicyclists. This was too good to pass up. I am a bicyclists, and in a few moments I can easily turn into a naked bicyclists. I, along with my friend K, were definitely going to this thing. We met up, biked to Mt. Tabor, and sought out fame, fortune, and rock 'n roll nudity.

I was not expecting Wayne Coyne to actually be there. I imagined that the whole project was going to be overseen by a director or producer with a pre-approved shots and images to capture. A limited amount of people, I thought, would be told where to stand and what to do, and it would all be very scripted.

I was utterly and completely wrong. Instead of some functionary that I'd never heard of overseeing the shoot, The lead singer himself was addressing a crowd of semi-clothed Portlanders and explaining the dilemma at hand. Earlier in the day, Coyne and the crew had been filming people riding down a hill on their bicycles entirely naked, as was the plan. The park ranger, however, had come by and told them that such absolute nudity was not an appropriate activity upon Portland's mini-volcano, and demanded that everyone's bums and junk get covered up.



So, as K and I approached the crowd Coyne explained the solution: The next day the shoot would move to Sauvie Island, where full nudity would not be a problem, and there would be more space anyway. For the time being, though, he wanted to utilize the pretty environment. The solution: guerrilla nudity. On a more visible path, several people would be wearing underwear, there would be lights, and lots of whooping. It would all be a diversion, though, designed only to look like filming was going on. The real shot would be down below.

About twenty of us descended down a path for a shot of naked people pushing Coyne's trademark hamster ball (which he calls the Space Ball) up and down a hill. “Okay,” he told us, “we have to do this quick. I don't want anyone to get arrested or in trouble. When I say 'go' the underwear comes off, and as soon as we cut, put it on again.” We got around the big ball, pushed it around, and no one was completely naked for more than thirty seconds. It was still a lot of fun, but only a taste of the next day's activities.

“Wow,” said Coyne after we'd pushed the ball up and down the hill a lot, “for a bunch of naked people you really don't smell that bad.”

The next day's shooting, though, was an entirely different matter.

The lot of us (and our bikes) bused out to Sauvie Island where Gus Van Sant apparently has a house and a fair amount of property, and the director, according to Coyne, was quite enthused about having his land invaded by a bunch of enthusiastic naked people. The house itself wasn't all that opulent looking, but Van Sant has quite the enviable lawn, some nice woods, and a small beach at Sauvie Island. I could think of worse things to spend millions and millions of dollars on.

The day's shooting consisted of a few main scenes- a longer shot of a mob of naked bicyclists, filmed on Van Sant's sizable wooded driveway, more shots of people rolling the Space Ball around as well as us lifting it and Coyne above our heads and carrying it away. The main set piece of the day, though, involved another, similar inflatable ball. Except this one was covered in fur. And, it had a giant vinyl labia on the front of it.

Here's a (NSFW) picture of it.

The whole album, Embryonic, is all about birth and whatnot, and the big idea of the video was that all of the naked people got shot out this giant spherical fur-vag and we were a bunch of reveling, newly-born primitives who encounter Coyne, a supposedly magical being in a crystalline Space Ball and we think that he's special in some way or another. But, his Space Ball deflates, we see that he's just another fleshy organism just like us, so, like any right-thinking group of whooping nudists we of course pull him from his deflated Space Ball, strip off his clothes, and then carry him off, subsequently stuffing him into the giant, hairy mother-vag that recently spat us all out. Very straightforward.

K, who was pregnant, said that the big, round fur-vag would proceed to dominate her maternal anxieties.



I was pleased to be among the twenty or so people involved in the birthing scenes, and even though I didn't get to crawl out of the orb-shaped birthing fuzz myself, I did get to hoist a few people out of it. I can say, with a certain amount of confidence, that it was the first time in my life that I've ever hoisted naked strangers out of a comically large set of female genitalia. K, though, was fortunate enough to get spat out of the thing, which will probably be good practice for when she has to eject a smaller human from her various biological systems. (“I love it that you're pregnant,” Coyne said to her, “it goes with the whole birthing, mother thing. That's great.”) The feeling of the birth scenes was great, what with people shooting out of the giant vag and the rest of us whooping, hollering and generally carrying on in the buff. "Everybody freak out!" began to replace "Action!" as the directorial command of choice.

A bit on the nudity- I was sort of surprised at how non-sexual it all was. One would think that getting naked with a bunch of reasonably fit bicyclists would be an invitation for general bawdiness, but it seemed that everyone was trying very, very hard to not be pervy. I restrained myself from checking out the various highly attractive women too much, and in general the atmosphere was towards revelry and whimsy rather than lewdness.

There was more shooting of naked bikers, and towards the end of the day we did some night shots all carried Wayne Coyne's naked body aloft over our naked heads. I was happy to be one of the guys hoisting him above the crowd, and can go to my grave with the knowledge that my hand has full on cupped middle-aged ass of the lead singer of the Flaming Lips, for whatever that's worth.

The whole affair was easily the most naked people that I've ever seen in one location. Even after seven years in Eugene and attending Burning Man, I've never encountered that many bare asses in one place at one time. It was sort of freeing and relaxing, really, to just be standing around completely nude and not giving a shit. Not that I'm going to stop thinking that nudists are weird- they are. But, it was great to have an opportunity to do weird shit for a purpose. The crowd was fun, though, and I was impressed with how hands-on the Flaming Lips were with the making of their own video. It will certainly not be the product of intermediaries or a studio- it will be unequivocally theirs.

The video should be released sometime in the first half of October. Hopefully me and my ass will be in a shot or two.

A Bit of Awesome Portland-Based Smut

This is just to joyously perverse/sexy to not share with others. Anything that puts strippers, drag queens, a furry and a superhero all together is probably going to get at least a smile out of me.

My sister and her fiancee caught Storm Large earlier this year, and had nothing but awesome things to say about her. This video makes me wish I'd caught the show.

EDIT: Oh yeah, I forgot to mention: She lives in Portland. That's the Park Blocks behind her in the last bit. This here is some good, Portland-grown smut, and makes me all the happier to live here. She performs her all the time, and now I feel like I've got some kind of moral imperative to go see her live at some point.

Yay Portland! Our shit is weird! Woo!

Moderately NSFW, by the way.

Live, Real Star Trek

You know the whole phenomenon of Shakespeare in the park? It's great. Basically a bunch of people do a free performance of Shakespeare in a public place. Last Saturday I went to something like that, but instead of "Shakespeare" it was "Star Trek."



Live Star Trek. It was fucking fantastic. The actors were wonderful, the audience was massively appreciative, and geeky enthusiasm ruled the day. I was amused to see one of the actors from King Lear, which I saw earlier this summer, also in this. I suppose there's a fair amount a crossover between Shakespeare and Trek fans. Also, the whole thing was accompanied by The Fast Computers, a band whom I'd seen a few times in Eugene, and were great in this setting, providing a retro-electro background.

The episode that they chose to perform was a nice one- Amok Time, wherein Spock goes into heat and subsequently battles Kirk at the behest of a sexy Vulcan chick.



The homemade props were especially good. Both of those polearm things ended up splitting in half during the fight, to great effect. All in all, utterly awesome. My geek heart was aflutter the whole time.



And, apropos of nothing, here are a bunch of kids splotching paint all over a car.