Matthew Botos

This morning I set off to check out the small Mississippi neighborhood, and enjoyed a tasty breakfast burrito at a cozy coffee joint while waiting for the day to warm up. Amongst the small shops and coffee houses was the Rebuilding Center, where the aisles were piled high with recycled building materials, sinks, cabinets, and odds and ends. True to form, their own building was an eclectic creation, including a very cool fence.

Heading back into town, I finally picked up some postcards and settled into the coffee shop at Powell’s Books to write them. The multi-story, color-coded bookstore is also an attraction all of its own. At noon, I found my way to Pioneer Courthouse Square for the last of the city’s summer “Noon Tunes” free concerts. The sunny red brick steps drew a good crowd to listen to Last Tuesday out of Seattle.

After tracking down a post office and some lunch off one of the local lunch wagons, I returned to Washington Park. The Hoyt Arboretum covers a large wooded area, and includes a living Vietnam veterans memorial. The memorial is spirals out of large spiral bowl, leading you up into tall evergreens. With the day warming up under a clear blue sky, it was perfect weather for a walk in the woods.

After dropping in for a vinyasa class at Yoga in the Pearl, I wandered the Pearl neighborhood and came across Powell’s Technical Books. This branch of Portland institution Powell’s books has all the obscure technical books you’d expect to find in a musty professor’s office, and even captures some of the smell. Along the wall, they had their own “dead tech” collection of old computers. A few other friendly by-the-geeks, for-the-geeks amenities: free wifi and a fee-free ATM.

Walking over to the bus stop, I tripped over another fountain in the shadow of the tall US Bancorp tower. The metal Lee Kelly fountain also made a ready playground for at least one skateboarder.

Dinner Tuesday was at Old Town Pizza, whose old building is rumored to be haunted. The decor and furniture harken back to days long ago when having one too many might lead to getting shanghaied into servitude on the high seas. Nowadays, the biggest danger there is overindulging on tasty pizza.

Wednesday started off with a bus ride and short trek to the Oregon Musuem of Science and Industry (OMSI) on the eastern side of the river. It’s the kind of place I would’ve loved as a kid and still enjoyed as an adult: a musuem with tons of hands-on exhibits.

The USS Blueback, a 1959-vintage diesel-electric submarine, is moored out front along the river. Taking a tour really gave me an appreciation for how cramped life aboard a sub was at the height of the cold war before larger nuclear subs came into vogue.

For lunch, I headed east to the funky/hip Hawthorne district, similar in flavor to Philadelphia’s South Street. After a burger and another Free Range Red at Bread and Ink, I window-shopped, people-watched, and checked out the restored landmark Bagdad theatre.

Starting the morning at the downtown visitors center armed me with many more brochures and a new mission: visit some of Portland’s public fountains. After checking out (and of course photographing) a few nearby, I hopped on MAX back to Skidmore Fountain in Old Town, and walked along the waterfront of the Willamette River towards Chinatown. Many bridges, often gritty, span the river, one even providing shelter for the Saturday Market.

Cooler, overcast skies had rolled in to replace the hot weather overnight, and soon turned to light drizzle through midday. It had a welcome effect on the Chinese Garden, though, creating myriad opportunities for “raindrops on flowers” photos. The garden packs many traditional Chinese garden features into a single city block. Though I preferred the space and aesthetics of the Japanese Garden, it was a still a relaxing respite from the rest of the city.

After lunch in Chinatown, I visited the local retail flagships of Oregon’s own Nike and Columbia before resuming the fountain tour with a ride on Portland’s Czech-made Streetcar. Nestled amongst high-rise riverside apartments I found the remaining fountains, including my favorite. The Keller fountain moves lots of water over a large-scale jumble of geometric shapes.

On the advice of a Portland local, I checked out some local music and beer at Laurelthirst. It’s a real neighborhood place with a regular roster of bands and patrons. Monday night was the Kung Pao Chickens playing some enjoyable “gypsy jazz” which got a number of people up for some swing-style dancing.

The tables were outfitted with boxes of Trivial Pursuit cards for passing the time waiting for food and in between music sets. Noshing on turkey chili nachos and sipping a Free Range Red while enjoying some live music was a nice way to pass the evening. Getting back afterwards tested my mass transit skills a bit, but I’m starting to get the hang of it.

With just one definitely sunny day forecast for the next few days, I decided to take in the views from Washington Park above the west end of the city. A ride on the MAX light rail, a stint on the bus, and a short walk landed me halfway up the hill at the International Rose Test Garden. Beds of roses in every conceivable color combination fill the garden, which overlooks Portland through breaks in the tall evergreens. It was a little too hazy to see Mount Hood, but the rest of the city was nicely laid out.

While waiting for the Japanese Garden to open, I polished off the end of Lance Armstrong’s War. While it was an enjoyable read poking into the multifaceted world of professional cycling and all its characters, I was almost more relieved to be able to unload the weight. My shoulders aren’t up to bike messenger standards, and were already tired of lugging a lopsided pack around. The Japanese Garden was a soothing combination of water and landscape features offering an even higher vantage of the city.

I soon descended in search of lunch in the Nob Hill neighborhood. The area is known for shops and sidewalk cafes, and a roast beef sandwich and beer were just the cure for tired feet and an empty stomach. The warm afternoon weather encouraged plenty of people watching, and my “Ithaca is Gorges” shirt prompted a chat with a family from New York.

(The photo tally is already at 150, though I’ll have to wait until the end of the trip to post them since iPhoto isn’t compatible with my publishing methods.)

It’s a little too early. The house is a little too neat, a hair too empty. Except for a few bags lined up neatly by the door. It’s vacation time, and despite the pang of sadness that comes with leaving home, I know I’ll appreciate it all the more when I get home.

As usual, I’ve slept too little before the early morning run to the airport. Outside it’s alternating between rain and a flat out downpour. Hopefully the weather in Oregon will be better.

The Philly departure is uneventful, and a few catnaps later, I’m in Vegas, where the temperature is aiming for 105. Inside the airport, it’s slot machines and bad food with long lines, so I forage for snacks the gift shop while grazing like a camel over the water fountain in light of the liquid carry on ban.

Portland is a bit toasty, pushing 90, but not so bad without the east coast humidity. An easy ride on the MAX light rail line drops me two blocks from the hotel, my temporary home for the next week.

Earlier this week, I mentioned how I had attended another speed dating event. It seems like a rather profitable business for 8 Minute Dating and parent company Match Events, Inc. 16+ people at $35 each (less a handful of discounts), 1 host, a restaurant or bar with some finger foods (which is glad to have people there ordering drinks in the middle of the week), and some minimal overhead for a website and dating cards.

The truly romantic entrepreneur never stops looking for opportunities to profit from the lovelorn, though. The site also offers a “second chance” option to email someone who caught your interest, but didn’t select you as a match. Given what customers have already paid, sending one (likely to be ignored) email on your behalf seems like the least they could do. Instead, this feature costs $8.88, which is almost pure profit! It appalls me that they try to take advantage of people this way.

Forbes stirred the pot a bit this week with dueling articles on careers and marriage, a topic I’ve debated myself on occasion. In summary, Michael Noer argues that marriages in which a woman continues her career lead to more unhappiness an divorce, citing various studies. In the counterpoint, Elizabeth Corcoran rebuts that slacker husbands are equally to blame and that when both people put in the effort, a dual-career marriage does work.

I definitely agree with the latter; you get out of any relationship what you and your partner put into it. In geeky math terms, it’s the union of the effort that counts; both have to give for it to be successful. In a country with a 50% divorce rate and no shortage of disastrous relationship headlines and study results, it’s definitely a challenge to balance a career and a relationship, but far from impossible.

A few quotes from a Washington Post article on blogging really highlight the generation gap in blogging and public speech:

Like many 21-year-olds, Jared Watts gripes in his blog. He rails against his boss, his job and the misery of dealing with customers at the Cingular Wireless store where he works.

Watts’s views about his employer appear to contradict those of his father, Wayne Watts, who is senior vice president and associate general counsel of AT&T Corp., Cingular’s parent company. His father, speaking through an AT&T spokesman, said: “I care very much for my son. And like many fathers and sons, we have differences of opinion on many subjects.”