We're still buying the Portland house, as far as we know. For the past few days, we've been working on gathering the financial documents required by our lender, and Patrick is going to fly back out to Portland for the home inspection, which is scheduled for next Wednesday. We have started a to-do list, and Robbie has been doing a great job of staying on top of everything--he even scheduled the inspections for us. Having a realtor is awesome!

We're still very excited to be buying a house, but now that the offer has been accepted, the pace of things has slowed down a little, and we've had a chance to relax somewhat. We should make sure not to get too complacent though, since we need to start thinking about packing soon! Anyway, here are some non-Portland-related things that I've been meaning to write about:

1. Back at the end of May, we spent an afternoon in Napa with Tree and Andrew. They are members at Merryvale, so they get free wine tastings whenever they want (with two guests allowed). I tried some sips of Patrick's wines, but I still haven't learned to enjoy wine, so mostly I ate the free crackers. At one point, we heard the strains of Bon Jovi's Dead or Alive coming from behind a closed door. I don't know what was going on back there (maybe a game of Rock Band?), but I bet it was fun!

We had a very good lunch on the patio at Go Fish--I had the wakame salad and sushi plate. Yum! Next, we drove over to COPIA and caught the tail end of the art show there. While there, we ran into Jordan, whose husband was participating in the art show. Tree went to school with Jordan, so they spent a little while catching up while Patrick, Andrew, and I admired Jordan's very cute baby, Moses.

We walked around COPIA for a little while, and it looked like it would be a nice place to spend a day. They offer some exciting classes, like cheese-making! Their grounds are really pretty. And they're right next to the Oxbow Public Market, which was just as awesomely delicious as I'd anticipated. First, we got ice cream from Three Twins. I had scoops of both the strawberry and the mint confetti ice creams. The latter was an excellent specimen of mint chocolate chip, and I was tempted to go back and get another scoop. But I restrained myself.

Tree and Andrew stopped by Tillerman Tea and got a cup of really good lemon jasmine iced tea--so good that Patrick and I went back and ordered the same thing for ourselves. The secret is lots of honey. Tree managed to perfect the recipe in her home kitchen, so now we can have her make it for us whenever we visit :)

And finally, we stopped in at the Fatted Calf's new storefront. Oh, I love the Fatted Calf. I wish we lived closer to the farmers' markets that they sell at, since we haven't been able to eat nearly enough of their delicious charcuterie, and now we're moving away. Sigh. Since we didn't have a cooler, we were pretty limited in what we could buy from them. Andrew bought some beef jerky and salami, and I bought some Rancho Gordo beans (I know, beans aren't even a Fatted Calf product, but normally I have to go to the Ferry Market or order online to get Rancho Gordo beans).

2. A couple of weeks ago, we got all dressed up and went to the SF Opera on a Friday night to see Wagner's Das Rheingold. We were going to go out to a fancy dinner beforehand, but in an attempt to save money, we got burritos in San Mateo instead. An excellent pre-opera meal! Apparently we could have also had dinner at the buffet in the basement of the opera house. There was some good people-watching to be done down there. We saw a guy hitting on two buxom young ladies. Who knew that the opera was such a good place to pick up women.

We were way up in the balcony, so it was kind of hard to see what was going on on stage. I really liked the idea of setting the story in early industrial America, and the performance was good, but despite all this, we both fell asleep toward the end. The music was just too slow and soothing. Maybe next time we should try an opera by somebody other than Wagner.

3. Later that same weekend, having obtained both strawberries and rhubarb from our farmers' market, I made a batch of strawberry-rhubarb creme fraiche ice cream. It was based on David Lebowitz's strawberry sour cream ice cream, but I used only 11oz of the strawberry-sugar-kirsch mixture, and then added roasted rhubarb with syrup (inspired by Nigella Lawson's rhubarb ice cream recipe--roast 10oz rhubarb with 1/2c vanilla sugar at 375F for 45 minutes). Right out of the ice cream maker, the texture was disconcertingly light and fluffy, but after an overnight freeze, the texture was normal. The flavor was good, though it's not the best ice cream I've made to date. Not bad though. Here it is garnished with a Miette graham cracker.

4. We continue to eat unremarkable (but pretty healthy) dinners, without much planning on my part. Last weekend, Patrick made some chicken patties (from Nigella's How to Eat) at my request, and we had them with mashed potatoes and frozen corn (time to start cleaning out the freezer). The patties were easy to make (especially if you're not the one making them!) and pretty tasty, if a little boring. They're intended for children, and I think they would be well received by that audience.

5. Presented with mixed summer squash in our box, I made some zucchini fusilli for dinner last week. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't worth the amount of butter involved. Not worth a remake, I'm afraid.

6. Today we decided to take advantage of our proximity to the ocean while we still can, and we spent the afternoon in Pescadero. It was a good day to go to the coast, since Menlo Park apparently broke 100 degrees today, while Pescadero was in the low 80s. Much better!

Pescadero is very small and has limited lunchtime choices, but what they have is good. The line at Duarte's was long, so we decided to enjoy some BBQ at the Pescadero Country Store instead. We grabbed a seat at one of the picnic tables in the store's backyard and ate ribs and a tri-tip sandwich while two amiable guys played guitar for the crowd. It was a good way to spend lunchtime.

After lunch, we checked out a few of the stores along the main street, and then we stopped in at Duarte's for a piece of olallieberry pie a la mode. Very good! We were also given a basket of hot-from-the-oven crusty sourdough bread and butter (I guess every table gets bread, even if they're just having pie), and it was excellent. If I hadn't just eaten ribs, I would've gotten some artichoke soup to go with the bread.

We made a quick stop at the beach (the water was pretty chilly, so we didn't stay long), and then we headed to Harley Farms, which we've been meaning to visit for years. It was a fun visit. We got to see all the goats being fed, and there were even some baby goats to see, because apparently the goats continued foaling (or whatever it's called when goats do it) later than usual this year. We stopped in at the store, sampled some cheese, and then bought a little round of tomato-basil goat cheese for dinner.

We had picked up some garlic-artichoke bread at Norm's Market earlier, and we bought a basket of cheap strawberries at a little farm on the way home. After getting home and napping for a while, we packed up our Pescadero haul and had a picnic in the park behind our apartment. The only thing that would've made it better is if we'd had some salami to go with it! We should really have more picnics. We used to have them so often when we were in grad school.

I think we may have bought a house today! We made an offer on it yesterday, and the seller accepted it this morning, so barring problems with inspections or financing, it'll be ours on July 18. I don't think it has totally sunk in yet :)

We ended up going with the house I mentioned as our top choice from this past weekend's Portland visit. I'm getting more excited about it now that it may actually be ours. There's some work to be done on it, but I enjoy that type of planning and decision-making (not sure if I'll enjoy actually getting the work done though). Here it is--our little yellow maybe-house (click for more pictures):

We were able to get them to knock $19,000 off the asking price, which is great! This is like a third or a fourth of the price of a decent house in the Bay Area, and its location is great (in Hosford-Abernethy, walkable to Clinton and Division Streets). I'm so excited to live in Portland!

Did you know that there is a tattoo parlor in a renovated house only four blocks from our maybe-house? I feel like I should get a celebratory welcome-to-Portland tattoo (Portland is full of people with awesome tattoos after all), but I don't think I actually will. I think buying a house is a big enough commitment for right now :)

I have majorly fallen off of the interesting cooking wagon since our trip to Portland and Bend. We've been eating a lot of salads (nothing wrong with that!). I think this is partially because it is summer, when it's nice to eat light, simple meals, but it's also because I've been distracted by our new summer project--moving to Portland! Yep, we've decided that this is the year that we'll be moving to Portland, no later than September 1 (that's when our apartment lease ends). We're very excited (and also a little bit nervous)! Read all about it below...

When we visited Bend and Portland over Memorial Day weekend, we hadn't yet decided to move to Portland, though we enjoyed our trip very much. Once we got home, we kept thinking about that awesome Craftsman house we'd passed in Hosford-Abernethy, so I looked it up online. It sounded great--it was in our favorite neighborhood, there were raspberries in the garden, and it had been remodeled with lots of green features. And hey, we could actually afford it (barely)! I especially loved the front door; so nice!

Based on a little google detective work, we found out that the house belonged to a prominent green building consultant, specializing in restoring old homes. It seemed pretty awesome to be able to buy a house that he'd restored, on top of everything else. And they just happened to be having an open house on the following Sunday (June 1). One thing led to another, and we ended up buying plane tickets to Portland for that Sunday, arriving that morning and leaving that evening (in retrospect, probably not the most sensible way to begin our homebuying efforts, but at least it got things started).

We flew out as planned on Sunday morning. It was a little surreal to just be going to Portland for the day. Who does that?! We took the bus down to SE Clinton St (a few blocks from the house in question) for lunch at The Press Club. This was about a block away from Broder, where we went for breakfast the previous weekend. We sat down and had some yummy crepes. Mine was filled with egg, prosciutto, spinach, and brie. The crepe itself was pretty thick--more like a pancake--but still very good. It seemed like a nice relaxed place to hang out. We waited around there until 1pm, when the open house started.

We walked over to the house and circled the block a couple times, hesitant to be the only people at the open house. But then we just sucked it up and went in. A nice lady (the realtor, perhaps?) welcomed us and then left us alone to look around. There were some really nice parts, and some parts that were disappointing (a good lesson in not trusting online real estate ads). The main floor had been redone nicely, but there wasn't really an obvious master bedroom--the two rooms on the main floor were really small, and the attic room was too short for a tall guy like Patrick to walk around in. Plus the "granny flat" in the basement wasn't very exciting. We did like the yard and garage/workshop a lot, but we definitely weren't as eager to buy the house after walking through it. Plus the price was at the very top of our range, and it would be hard to afford the mortgage if I ever stopped working (which may very well happen when we have kids).

Spirits dashed just a little, we walked down to the Clinton Corner Cafe, ordered drinks, and sat down to discuss our options. We agreed that we weren't totally sold on the house, and we decided to take a look at other open houses in the neighborhood while we were there (good thing Patrick brought his laptop and the cafe had free wireless!). We walked around and looked at a couple more houses. Only one house (on SE 26th Ave) was actually open, and we were the only couple there at the time, so the realtor was able to walk us through and tell us all about it. It turned out to be a really wonderful house.

It was a 1909 farmhouse-style home, which the owner had just finished renovating using eco-friendly methods (oil-coated hardwood floors, VOC-free paint, marmoleum in the bathroom, dual-flush toilets, etc.). The owner had clearly put a lot of work into making this house nice and preserving its historical character. It had all sorts of exciting features, including a bunch of previously walled-over nooks upstairs, a pretty rose stained glass window in the dining room (as well as an awesome heavy-duty wood and cement table, which was unfortunately not included with the house), bathroom fixtures salvaged from the Governor hotel, and pretty leaded glass in the windows. I was smitten, which (as the Internet tells me) is a bad thing to be when you're looking to buy a house.

Here's some cool wood and glass art in the downstairs bathroom (I need to find out who the owner is so he can tell me where he got all this cool stuff--maybe at the Rebuilding Center?).

The yard, though small, was very nicely arranged, with a new wire and wood fence. It had (among other things) a Japanese maple, blueberry bush, mature rhubarb plant, and a whole bunch of roses, some of which were secreted out of the International Rose Test Garden by a previous owner. And there were two cats living in the basement, who were very sweet (the owner was also living in the basement, so I'm guessing the cats will go away when the house is sold). The owner had built some cool planters faced with corrugated metal, to give a little more garden space. There was also a rain collection barrel, which apparently gets you a discount on your water bill from the city (the metal plate below it is purely decorative--I like it!).

On top of all that, it was $70,000 cheaper than the other house! However, it wasn't totally perfect. The ceiling above the stairs on the second floor was low enough that Patrick had to duck to go down them, so it was inevitable that he would bump his head on it at some point. Also, Patrick is ideally looking for a garage in which to build stuff and work on bikes, and the only space for that in this house was in the basement, so he would have to carry his bike up and down the basement stairs every day if he wanted to store it there. Also, the street it was on was relatively busy for the neighborhood. A bus runs up and down it, and we later found out that it's commonly used as a shortcut between two major streets in the area. So, not perfect.

We headed back to California that evening with a lot to think about. We realized that we hadn't even for-sure decided to move to Portland, yet we were all of a sudden thinking about buying a house there, which seemed pretty backwards. So a few days later, we went out to eat at Cafe Borrone, sat at a table outside, and discussed what we wanted to do. We agreed that we both wanted to try something new and different, and three possible big life changes appealed to us: moving to Portland, having a baby, and/or changing jobs. After much discussion, we decided that we most wanted to move to Portland this year, putting off the baby for a year or two. California is pretty near perfect, but we want to try living someplace else, and this seems like a good time for it.

It was satisfying to have the decision finally made, but also a little scary. I figured that I would have to start looking for a new job in Portland, but just in case, I asked my boss if I could continue working at my current job. I proposed spending three weeks a month working from home in Portland and one week a month back in California, doing the things that I can't do remotely. She talked to the head of our department, and it turned out that they are willing to let me work from Portland, which is great news! I can't believe I get to live in Portland and keep my job. So cool! And Patrick can work remotely for his job as well, which takes a good amount of stress out of this move. I'm sure there will be some hard parts about working remotely, but I'm really glad everything worked out. Plus if it turns out Portland isn't for us, it'll be easier to move back to California (but I think we'll like Portland).

So, it has been an exciting couple of weeks! After deciding that we would be moving this year, we decided to educate ourselves a little more about home-buying, and we found ourselves an awesome realtor (Robbie Ratkai) with Portland's Alternative Realtors. He sent us a bunch of listings in neighborhoods of interest (we're primarily interested in the SE part of Portland, but the NE is appealing too), and we made plans to fly out again this past Saturday (this is getting to be an expensive habit, but we don't expect to fly out again for a while). While we were waiting for Saturday to come, I put together a spreadsheet of homes we were interested in, with points assigned based on proximity to good grocery stores and farmers' markets, good schools, walk score, home features, and price. Fun!

This time, we were a little more relaxed and even-keeled about the whole endeavor. We flew in this past Friday and spent the night at Motel 6 on Powell Blvd. After our excellent stays at Bluebird Guesthouse and Ace Hotel, the Motel 6 was especially underwhelming. The crazy thing is that Bluebird costs less than Motel 6! But Bluebird was booked for the weekend, so we did the best we could.

Powell Blvd., much like Sandy Blvd., is not my favorite part of Portland, but I suppose it's pretty standard for a big city. It's lined with fast food joints, bail bonds offices, and strip clubs. But if you need a cheap place to sleep, it's the place to go. We got to the motel around 12:30am and went to bed, and then around 1:00am, we heard the revving of motorcycle engines getting successively louder. There was a strip club (apparently with an indoor pool, though those reviews don't make it sound too great) next door to the motel, and from the sound of it, a bunch of bikers were meeting in the parking lot, getting ready to go off cruising Portland's streets, I suppose. Thankfully, after about 5 minutes of crazy loud engine revving, they all sped off, and it was blissfully quiet. Ah, sleep!

The next morning, we checked out of the motel and headed up Powell, destined for more pleasant parts of town. We had planned on getting breakfast at Broder again, but when we got there, we realized that we were too early, and the only place in the neighborhood that was open was a little corner coffee shop down the block from Broder (and across the street from The Press Club and two blocks away from the cute little renovated farmhouse we liked on our previous visit). When we went inside, we were greeted by a very nice barista. We got a vanilla steamer and sat by the window watching cyclists and people with dogs pass by on Clinton Street. It was nice, and I could totally picture us living nearby, walking our dogs and riding our bikes past the cafe. (This was all in Hosford-Abernethy, by the way, which, as I said above, is currently my favorite Portland neighborhood and has an excellent neighborhood development association, which I would love to participate in if we end up living there).

While watching people go by, we noticed that SubRosa (a cute little restaurant next door to the Press Club and across the street from the cafe) was open for breakfast already, so we headed over there for breakfast. I had a yummy breakfast burrito--good sustenance for all the house-hunting we had planned for the day. We had arranged for Robbie to pick us up at 10am, and we finished eating a little early, so we went back to the cafe, this time for a chai. The barista offered me a frequent drinker card, since we had already been in twice that day, but I told her we don't live in the area (yet!). A little bit later, Robbie pulled up in his Mazda Protege, and we hopped in to go look at some houses!

Since this was our first time house shopping, I don't have a good frame of reference, but I'm really happy that Robbie is our realtor. He was really knowledgeable and made us feel at ease and gave us lots of helpful advice. We had sent him the list of houses we were interested in, and he had gone through the list, weeded out the ones that had already sold or that he didn't think we'd like (e.g., located in sketchy neighborhoods), which left us with 11 houses to check out.

Our first stop was a house in Creston-Kenilworth, which was a little south of Powell Blvd. It was right next to a park, and the house itself had been redone nicely, but Robbie said it was priced pretty high for the neighborhood it was in. Plus its walk score wasn't that great. One thing that I liked was that the owners had left little notes all over the house advertising good features ("Check out the view from the upstairs windows," "Trader Joe's is just a few blocks away!"). I also really liked the dining room and kitchen--the owners had installed a cute little stove, and the room was nice and sunny.

Next, we visited a house in Hosford-Abernethy, a block away from the one we'd liked on our last visit. This one was on a quieter street, but it wasn't as pretty inside, especially the kitchen! There were four tenants living there, so it was hard to imagine the house without their possessions inside. But the bedrooms were a good size, which seems unusual for homes from the early 1900's, based on the houses we looked at. It had a nice front porch and a detached garage for Patrick's workshop. Our favorite part of the house was that the tenants took their breakfast out to a picnic table in the backyard and ate out there. It seemed like a nice thing to do (I suppose you could do that in most any house though).

Although I'm not smitten with this house, I like it well enough. It's currently our top choice, because it's in the neighborhood we want to live in (which, according to Robbie, doesn't always have homes for sale in our price range), and it has a good basic layout. It also has some nice features, like hardwood floors throughout and pretty leaded glass windows. But it'd need some more interior work before I'd be really excited to live there for 30 years. Part of me wants to hold out and wait until we find the absolute perfect house, but it's pretty likely that that won't happen, since a newly renovated house in this neighborhood would be out of our price range (unless it's a smaller house on a busy street, like the house we liked on our previous visit). Plus, if we buy a nice house and then do some work on it over time, we can ensure that it will be exactly what we want. There's just less instant gratification than with a house that has already been totally redone.

Next, we headed down to Sellwood to check out two houses there. The houses were nice--one had some excellent parquetry on the living room floor, and the other had a little fenced off garden that would be perfect for some chickens. Sellwood seemed like a really nice neighborhood, with a good number of shops and restaurants and quiet, tree-lined streets. Its main drawback is that it's pretty far south of all the places we'd want to go. We want a neighborhood where we can walk, bike, or take public transit pretty much everywhere, and I think if we lived in Sellwood, we might have to drive more frequently. Also, it felt a little too quiet for us. It seems like it might be a good place to move to 10 or so years down the road, but it's not right for us right now. So although the Sellwood houses were both nice, they didn't make the cut.

We headed up to Boise-Eliot next, home to one of my favorite streets in Portland--N. Mississippi. The area is still being gentrified (or "revitalized," if you'd prefer), so the housing situation there is hit or miss. We visited one house that had been recently redone and looked great both inside and out, but there were indications that it might not be so good underneath the new coat of paint. The basement wall was damp in one corner (even though the house had only been on the market for a week), and there were cracks appearing in the brand new living room paint. It's sad, because it really looked nice, but I agree with Patrick that it seemed to be of questionable quality. Also, I don't know if we'd want to live in Boise-Eliot just yet, since there aren't a lot of grocery stores and other basic amenities nearby (but I'm sure more will pop up over time as they develop the area).

Next, we stopped at a couple homes in Alberta, which is in NE Portland and was revitalized starting about 7 years ago. Apparently homes there have been pretty pricey in recent years, but the housing slump has helped bring the prices down to more reasonable levels. The houses we visited there were nice, but they all needed some work, and I'm not as excited about living in Alberta as I am about Hosford-Abernethy. We visited one house whose owner was clearly very creative and had put a lot of work into personalizing his home. There was an art railing that had been featured in a magazine, a built-in bookshelf with card catalog drawers that could be opened from either side of the wall, and a side table made out of a hand from what must have been a gigantic clock. Super cool, but not really our style, and it wouldn't have been easy to undo the work he'd done (plus we wouldn't want to destroy his art). The backyard was totally overgrown (generously described as a meadow in the MLS listing), which actually would have been kind of exciting to tackle, like my own secret garden.

We visited one house in Irvington, a neighborhood that would normally be out of our price range. The front of the house was beautifully redone, with big tall doors opening from the dining room onto the front porch. Totally awesome. Unfortunately, the house was only half redone, and, as the owner pointed out very matter-of-factly, the kitchen was a "total shithole, as even a man with one eye could see." We liked that guy. He was sad, because his project at work had been moved, so he had to sell the house before he had a chance to finish it. It was too bad, because he was doing a great job remodeling it. But the house was already at the top of our price range, so wouldn't be able to afford to do anything else to it, and the kitchen was in really bad shape (not only run down, but also half torn up). Too bad.

We headed back to SE to show Robbie the house on 26th Ave that we had liked on our last visit. He agreed that the interior was really nice, but he emphasized that it was a busy street. The noise levels from traffic on our second visit were definitely higher than on our first (possibly because the bus that runs down the street doesn't run on Sundays, but it does on Saturdays), and he said it was even worse during rush hour. It also didn't seem to have as much bedroom space as some of the other houses we saw. I don't think we'll buy it, which is too bad. Maybe we can find out who the owner is and get him to help us improve whatever house we do buy!

At the last minute, we decided to visit a house in Overlook, which Robbie had originally ruled out because the neighborhood wasn't that great. We decided to go take a look anyway, since it sounded nice, and its proximity to the MAX yellow line seemed like a good deal. As it turned out, Robbie was right--the neighborhood wasn't great. The house was just off a very busy street, only a few steps from a 24-hour adult video store called Fat Cobra (classy), which was across the street from a middle school (double classy). Meh, not great. The house itself was pretty nice, especially the backyard, which had a nice big pine tree and a trellis and a beautiful detached workshop/garden shed in back. The only weird thing about the house was an upstairs room that had some sort of a wet bar attached to the room (like a bathroom with only a sink in it) and a very detailed fairy mural painted on one wall. Huh. I don't know if I'd be able to bring myself to paint over a mural that clearly took so much effort to create!

And so ended our day of house-hunting. It was pretty tiring! Robbie was kind enough to drop us off in the Pearl District so we could grab some lunch and be close to the MAX when it was time to go back to the airport. We agreed that he would keep sending us listings, and we'd think about the houses we'd visited. It was a productive visit.

We had some tasty lunch at Silk (formerly Pho Van, which I went to on our first visit to Portland), and then we split a chocolate-mint cupcake from Cupcake Jones (not as good as Seattle's Cupcake Royale, but I think it was better than the other Portland cupcakery, St. Cupcake. I'd have to eat more cupcakes to be sure though).

We killed some time shopping and sitting around Pearl Bakery, and then we headed toward the MAX stop. Along the way, we encountered an awesome temporary urban meadow in Pioneer Courthouse Square. The square was filled with pots of wildflowers and other plants, destined to be sold off later this month. The effect was striking, and we sat down on the steps and admired the meadow for a while. We saw a foursome of teenage girls steal a bunch of the plants, which made me righteously indignant, but what can you do...

And then we hopped on the MAX and headed back to the airport.

I like Portland. I'm really excited that we'll be living there by the end of summer! Life's going to be pretty hectic for the next few months, but hopefully we'll find time to appreciate what could be our last California summer! (I bet it won't be our last though; we'll probably come back here sooner or later)

As I mentioned earlier, we visited Portland and Bend, Oregon, over Memorial Day weekend. The main impetus behind the trip was that the Decemberists were playing a concert in Bend. This was the only Decemberists show scheduled for the near future (though it turns out they performed at an Obama rally in Portland the previous weekend), so we figured we might as well visit a new place and see the Decemberists perform while we were at it! I had only ever heard favorable things about Bend (both from Sunset and from Oregonian coworkers), so I was excited to see it firsthand.

Thursday, May 22

We flew to Portland after work on Thursday, rented a car, and drove to our favorite affordable place to stay in Portland, Bluebird Guesthouse. Since we were going to go straight to bed that night and then leave first thing in the morning, we weren't too picky about which room we got, and we ended up in the Elliott Smith room in the basement. It had low ceilings and not a lot of light, but it did the job just fine. I liked the carpet! I'd definitely recommend Bluebird if you want to stay in SE Portland and don't mind sharing a bathroom with a few other people. (Sorry, these are all cell phone pictures; our camera wasn't cooperating on this trip)

Friday, May 23

We woke up the next morning and got all packed up. There was a nice but confused old woman staying at Bluebird. She seemed to think that we were backpackers, and she recommended that we hike the Appalachian Trail someday. We thanked her for the advice.

We headed up to Belmont for breakfast at Jace Gace, a waffle and art cafe. The weather was drizzly and gray (it was actually that way most of the time we were there), and the only other people around were construction workers. I liked the decor at Jace Gace--they had cool woodwork on the ceiling (planks ending in a grid of wood blocks of varying heights) and a Jace Gace crest, with a waffle and some leaping stags.

Patrick had an attractive cup of hot chocolate and a traditional Belgian waffle with yogurt and strawberries. I was more in the mood for a savory breakfast, so I had the huevos rancheros waffle, topped with poached eggs, black beans, and salsa. Good stuff.

After breakfast, we left Portland and drove down to Silverton. Along the way, we passed Angel's Table, a German restaurant in Mt. Angel that we'd considered visiting for lunch but that appeared to be closed for good. Mt. Angel was all quaint and looked like an old-timey German village. They had signs up for Oktoberfest. Fun :)

Although it was raining, we drove out to Havenhill Lavender Farm to take a look around. The drive out there was beautiful (green rolling hills and tree-lined gorges), but when we got there it turned out the lavender wasn't really growing yet (makes sense), and there didn't seem to be a store to visit, so we walked around the grounds a little bit in the drizzle and then headed back to Silverton. We'll have to visit again when it's a little later in the year.

Once back in Silverton, we stopped at Rolling Hills Bakery for a quick lunch. I had a cup of silver chili and half a roasted veggie sandwich. I liked the mug that the chili was served in. They had some exciting-looking carrot cake rolls (like cinnamon rolls but with carrots in the dough and cream cheese icing, I think), but we were too full to try one. It was a nice little cafe, and a lot of locals came in for lunch while we were there.

On the way back to our car (which, incidentally, was parked for a very low price--10 cents an hour. The meter wouldn't even take quarters!), I was lured into Stomp by some very cute shoes. The salesgirl there was really nice and easygoing, and I ended up buying a pair of silver flats. They're handmade in Poland by a company called Oleksy, and apparently Stomp is one of two US retailers to carry them. I'm a sucker for hard-to-get items, and the shoes made me happy, so I bought them. Plus, no sales tax!

It was a long but scenic drive over the Cascades to Bend. I was very excited to see little tiny waterfalls right next to the highway as we drove along (I suppose those are the cascades the mountains were named for). Our rental car came with XM radio, and we found a '90s alternative station, which we listened to the rest of the way there, with a brief bluegrass interlude at Patrick's request.

We arrived in Bend a little too early to check into Lara House, so we walked a couple blocks to downtown Bend and got a lemon-marionberry scone at DiLusso Bakery. Bend's downtown is really nice--well-kept historical buildings and lots of good restaurants. It reminded me of Fort Collins.

When it was time, we checked in at the Lara House, which was beautiful and very well-located (near a big park, the river, and downtown). The innkeeper was friendly, and after settling in, we came downstairs for the wine and cheese hour. Unfortunately, I'm bad about introducing myself to people I don't know, so I just grabbed some cheese and crackers and retreated to our room, while Patrick braved the living room for a while longer.

From our room, we had a view of a very nice house across the alley, which had a fence made of skis and a two-story garage. I asked the innkeeper about the garage at breakfast the next day, and she said it was for the family's RV. She also said that the people who own that house owned the Lara House before it was a bed and breakfast.

We walked downtown for dinner at Blacksmith, which was housed in a restored blacksmith's shop. I liked the interior--they had kept the original banged-up and drilled-into beams and brick walls. Our waiters were a little too cheery and fawning, but the food was very good. The only low point in the meal was the Caesar salad, which wasn't very exciting (but I did like the toasted polenta croutons that came with it). Everything else was delicious, and I would love to go there again, because there were tons of things on the menu that sounded good. I had an excellent 24-hour-brined apple cider pork chop with perfect collard greens and smoked cheddar mac and cheese. Patrick had the campfire trout with cowboy caponata ("cowboy" because all of the vegetables were grilled beforehand), beer barley risotto, and a honey nut beurre blanc. He also had the Unami cocktail, which was a savory cocktail with avocado and cucumber (no, that's not a typo--they spell it with an "n" for some reason). Patrick had two, so it must have been good.

Saturday, May 24

Although there were a bunch of good-looking breakfast places in Bend that we wanted to visit, we stayed at Lara House for breakfast on Saturday morning because the innkeeper prepared the whole meal herself, and it was reputed to be delicious. It was delicious indeed, and quite an elaborate spread! We had asparagus-mushroom crepes, roasted potatoes, chicken-apple sausages, fruit, and blueberry-lemon crisp with fresh whipped cream. Wow! The innkeeper makes breakfast every day, keeps the rooms clean (with a little help), buys and arranges flowers, welcomes guests, updates the website, advertises, and plans future breakfasts. I'm impressed! Apparently she was a personal trainer in San Diego, and then she met the owner of the Lara House at a coffee shop, gave him her last business card, and then he called her up a few days later to offer her the job. Life is so unpredictable!

At breakfast, all of the guests sat together, so I had to socialize, and it turned out that we had something in common with everybody there (of course). There was a couple from Portland, two guys from Boise who were there to see the Decemberists, and two cyclists, among others. We spent a long time talking with the couple from Portland about things they like about Portland and whether we should move there.

After gorging ourselves at breakfast (who can resist blueberry crisp with fresh whipped cream for breakfast?), we walked through Drake Park (very expansive and green), over a sweet little footbridge, across the river, past an all-American Little League game, to Hutch's Bikes. I must admit, Bend looks like it would be a great place to raise a family, if only it weren't so isolated and had so few tech employers. It's so tidy and wholesome and outdoorsy!

We both had a little trouble getting used to our rented mountain bikes, as I was used to riding much more upright on my Townie, and Patrick was used to riding more bent over on his road bike. We biked a couple miles on the Deschutes River Trail to see how to get to the Les Schwab Amphitheater for the concert that evening. Next, we biked down to Farewell Bend Park, which was full of informational placards! The trail was a little hard to find in places, but it was a pleasant ride along the river.

Next, we biked to the Victorian Cafe for lunch. They're one of Bend's top restaurants, known for their breakfasts. There was a bit of a wait, so we grabbed a spot on a bench out front, with a good view of a bunch of hipsters (with dogs!). We both ended up having breakfast for lunch, since that's their specialty. Patrick had their almond-biscotti-encrusted French toast, and I had the smoked salmon scramble on asiago-potato pancakes with housemade applesauce and an apple-cinnamon scone. Everything was really good. No wonder all the hipsters go there! I'd definitely want to go there for breakfast a lot if we lived in Bend.

We had spotted a cake shop with a "Grand Opening" sign out front on our ride up to the cafe, so on our way back we stopped in for some cupcakes. It wasn't exactly clear how to get cupcakes (they seemed more like a catering company than a bakery), but we managed to obtain a lemon cupcake with cream cheese frosting, which we took back to the Lara House for our afternoon snack. We took an impromptu nap and then ate our cupcake. What a good way to spend the afternoon.

Our pre-concert dinner was a little stressful, because I realized that the concert started earlier than I'd thought, and our original destination (Deschutes Brewery) had a long wait. So instead we had a quick and unremarkable dinner at Soba Noodle and Rice (I'd actually like a place like that around here, since the food is pretty healthy and affordable, but it didn't make for a very exciting dinner, especially since we were in a rush). After wolfing down our stir-fry, we quickly biked to the amphitheatre. We were able to park our bikes right by the entrance and get right in line. We felt very proud of ourselves when we biked past all the people who had to park their cars far away and walk.

All our rushing was for naught, as the gates weren't even open when we arrived. It was rainy and cold, but we were willing to brave the weather to see the Decemberists. There was an authentic emo kid from Vancouver in line in front of us. He commented that Bend was a little too perfect, like Pleasantville. I can see where he was coming from--it's unusual to have almost everything in town look so nice and well-kept (but there were some areas on the outskirts that were more run-down, so I don't think they built the whole town 5 years ago and fabricated its history).

We hadn't brought an umbrella because we figured they wouldn't be allowed inside, but a bunch of other people had them. People came prepared with tarps, garbage bags, and even a tent! We set down Patrick's waterproof bike jacket, set our picnic blanket on top of that, and then huddled together for warmth. It was pretty miserable for a while. Our pants and socks had gotten wet while we waited in line, so it was hard to warm up. But we were still excited to be there.

The show got started a little late, and Mates of State went on first. We knew a few of their songs, most notably Like U Crazy, because our college friend Drew appears in the music video. It's like he's famous!

And then it was time for the Decemberists! They weren't the main band, so they didn't play for hours, but it was a pretty long set. They played a good mix of songs, including some new stuff from their upcoming album (Valerie Plame is very catchy). It's fun seeing them perform live. At one point, Colin stopped the song and had the crowd do calisthenics to help us warm up, and then later on the Decemberists Family Players re-enacted the founding of Bend (in which Lewis and Clark discovered Bend and gave the Native Americans some blankets, which gave them the chicken pox, and then they died).

The crowd seemed pretty into it, which was good. I had been worried that the majority of people were there for Death Cab for Cutie (the headliner) and wouldn't be very excited about the Decemberists. But it actually seemed like a lot of the people had come specifically for the Decemberists (probably since they haven't been touring, so this was the only chance to see them perform).

I had hoped that they would perform Chimbley Sweep, but we were nearing the end, and no luck. When we got to the last song, Colin told a story about meeting John McCain backstage at the Obama rally the previous weekend, and he said McCain had told him of his hardscrabble childhood. And then he launched into the little prelude that you hear in the video linked above (saying that this was the story John McCain told him about his childhood). And then he started playing Chimbley Sweep, and the crowd went wild. I was happy :)

We stuck around for a few Death Cab songs, but neither of us really knows their music that well, and it continued to be cold and wet, and the sun was setting, so we left. Outside the amphitheatre, we ran into two girls who asked if they could have our tickets. We told them the tickets wouldn't do them any good (no re-entry allowed), but they were going to try to get back in anyway. When we handed over the tickets, Patrick's was soggy and torn in half from all the rain, and the girl who got stuck with that ticket decided she'd say it fell in the toilet. Good plan! I admired their tenacity.

Back at the Lara House, we put on as many warm clothes as possible, and then we walked to the Deschutes Brewery for a second dinner (I was ravenous from all that shivering!). This dinner was much more satisfying. We both had the hamburgers, which are notable because the brewery has a deal with a nearby farmer, in which they feed the cows their spent grain from beermaking, and then they use the cows to make their hamburgers (see this video at 2:20). It's a beautiful circle of life! They were tasty burgers, and the fries were really good. I also had some of their housemade root beer. A very good meal.

Sunday, May 25

Despite my interest in checking out Alpenglow for breakfast, we ended up having breakfast at Lara House again, since it was just too good to pass up. This time, we had a Spanish torta, hashbrowns, fruit, bacon, lemon-ginger scones with lemon curd, and strawberry-rhubarb pie with whipped cream. I had committed to eating less food this time, but I couldn't resist the pie, and I ended up pretty full.

After returning our bikes to Hutch's, it was time to leave Bend. I had wanted to go to Merenda for lunch, but we were too full (and it was only 10:30 in the morning). Next time!

We took a different route back to Portland, via Government Camp. At my request, we drove up to Timberline Lodge for lunch, which ended up being a pretty harrowing drive, as the fog descended and the road became steep and winding. However, we got to the lodge safely, and the views were pretty awesome. It was crazy--all of a sudden the sun came out and we were surrounded by snow and skiers, even though it was the end of May.

We hiked up the driveway to the quaint old lodge, which was apparently used for the exterior shots in The Shining. The interior was all log cabin-y and cozy. It seemed like a nice place to go for a ski weekend, if you're into that kind of thing. We headed over to the Cascade Dining Room and waited an inordinately long time to be seated (it wasn't that they were busy and there was a long wait; the hostess just kept doing other stuff and avoiding eye contact with us for over 5 minutes). If we hadn't just driven 6 miles up a mountain to get there, we probably would've turned around and gone somewhere else to eat.

Once we were seated, the experience got better. Our waitress was nice, and we got to sit next to a window with a good view of the snow and trees. I ordered the hot cocoa, which turned out to be the most over-the-top hot chocolate I've ever had. It was in a giant glass mug, topped with whipped cream and toffee bits and chocolate syrup, if I recall correctly. It was very good, and I would definitely drink hot cocoa by the fireplace every afternoon if I were on vacation at the Timberline Lodge. Our entrees were pretty good. I had a polenta pulled pork strata. I'd say the meal wasn't quite worth the stress of the drive up, but I'm glad we had the experience.

The sun was out for our drive back down, which was nice. We continued on into Portland. The iPhone took us on a rather circuitous route, through depressingly run-down parts of the suburbs skirting Portland. We got to the Ace Hotel a little early, but they let us check in. I was very excited to stay there, but I was a little worried that they would be mean to me because I'm not a hipster. But everybody was pleasant, and I very much enjoyed our stay.

The Ace Hotel isn't for everybody, as the TripAdvisor reviews suggest. I liked it though. The art is different in each room, and our room had a cute wall mural by Trish Grantham painted on top of wallpaper made from pages out of an old history book. There was a clawfoot tub with quality bath products and a very nice soap dish.

The bed had a custom Pendleton blanket with the Ace Hotel deer on it, and the laundry bag was an old mail bag. There was even a hipster mini bar with Dagoba chocolate, Lara bars, stroopwaffles, and Coke with real sugar. The guest book was an old library card catalog filled with notes on index cards. There was a photo booth in the lobby. The public bathroom was papered in player piano reels. So many great details! And I was really happy with the location near the Pearl District and Downtown. My only regret is that we didn't have time to rent the Jorg and Olif bikes (with generator headlights!) at the front desk and bike around the waterfront. If we were looking for a place to stay downtown, I'd happily stay at Ace again.

The parking situation at Ace wasn't ideal (street parking required moving the car every day, and the paid parking lot nearby was pretty pricy), so we decided to return our rental car to the airport and just take public transit around for the few days we would be in Portland. We dropped the car off at the airport and then took the MAX and a bus back into town. The bus we were on took us through some of the seedier parts of town, on Sandy Blvd. We passed a business named the Pirate's Cove, which is a pirate-themed strip club (but it does not have the best strippers in town, apparently). Cool!

We headed straight to Burnside, for dinner at Screen Door. I was so excited to be there, since our attempt to eat there on a previous visit had failed. I was not disappointed. This was one of my favorite Portland meals to date. Part of the charm was the laid-back waitresses (one of whom had a tattoo on her back of The Creation of Adam, but with a naked lady instead of Adam--Eve, I suppose) and the diverse clientele. It just felt like a nice neighborhood restaurant.

And the menu was so exciting! I had trouble deciding what to get, but I finally went with the Screen Door plate (a combo plate--my favorite!) with a yummy salad, kale with white beans, mac and cheese (all browned and delicious on top), and cornbread with honey. The salad and kale both came from their special local/organic menu. This place has all my favorite things! Oh, and I had sweet tea, which was awesome and came with free refills. We split a piece of pineapple-upside-down skillet cake for dessert. I love you, Screen Door!

After dinner, we decided to see a movie (Be Kind Rewind) at the Laurelhurst Theater (only $3/ticket, comfy seats, and beer and donuts for sale--if only every movie theater were like that!). The movie was fun, and the bus came right after we got out of the theater. Back downtown, we made a quick stop at Powells and then walked back to the hotel.

Monday, May 26

On Monday morning, we walked to Bijou Cafe for breakfast. We managed to beat the morning rush just barely (I guess that's the risk you take going to a popular brunch place on Memorial Day). Patrick had the French toast and a small pecan sticky bun (more sticky buns should be that size; if it had been Cinnabon-sized, we would've felt sick after breakfast). I had the most perfectly made omelet ever, with green onions, bacon, and goat cheddar (which was indeed goaty). I don't know how they did it, but the egg blanket was really tender and fluffy. Definitely get an omelet if you go there.

Next, we took the bus up to N. Mississippi, one of my favorite streets in Portland. The bus ride there wasn't that great. As we were pulling away from one of the stops, everybody on the right side of the bus gasped and yelled at the bus driver to stop. It turned out that there was a very drunk man hanging onto the side of the bus, and he almost got run over as it pulled away. But he apparently wasn't too hurt, as he boarded the bus after we stopped and shook off the people who tried to help him. And then he sat there and looked very close to puking (I guess I would be too, if I'd almost been run over by a bus). It was an uncomfortable situation, so Patrick and I got off a little early and walked the rest of the way.

Most of the stores on Mississippi were open despite the holiday, so I stopped at Flutter, Pistils (they had baby chicks!), and The Meadow. This was my first visit to The Meadow, which was a small store full of gourmet salt, chocolate, and flowers. An interesting combination. Patrick had no interest in gourmet salt, so he went to the comic book store instead. The people working there seemed really nice and knowledgeable. I bought some sort of corn nut chocolate bar made by Sahagun. It was pretty tasty, though it took us a while to figure out why the crunchy bits tasted so familiar.

Among the many exciting flowers for sale at The Meadow were gigantic poppies. We'd seen similarly huge poppies in yards around the city that weekend. I had never seen poppies that big! The lady I asked didn't know what kind of poppies they were; she said she bought them at the farmers' market.

Sadly, Gravy was just closing for the day when we got around to thinking about lunch (plus we were still pretty full from breakfast), so instead we grabbed some tasty little tacos and an horchata at Por Que No. I may have committed a breach of Portland etiquette by claiming a table before Patrick placed our order. This is common practice in California (especially at Cafe Borrone during the lunch rush!), but I heard two different women debating with their friends over whether it was morally acceptable to take a table before one's order was placed (I don't think these conversations were directed at me; I just happened to overhear them). Of course, a bunch of other people did the same thing I did, so I don't think my premature table-grabbing was too out of line.

The outside tables were full of hip, young Portland types, including a pale and overly-talkative girl with a large red balloon tied to her chair. Apparently she stole it from a sale display at Mattress World. It attracted a lot of attention from passers by.

After lunch, we decided to go spend some time in Washington Park (a forest right inside the city--I still can't get over how cool that is!). We took the MAX there and then spent a long time trying to find a bathroom at the Washington Park MAX station. The station maps said there was one, but we couldn't figure out how to interpret the maps or how to get into the doors that looked most like they could be bathroom doors. Eventually we gave up and paid $7 each for tickets to the World Forestry Center Discovery Museum, since their bathrooms were for paying customers only. We decided we might as well look around the museum for that much money. It was a pretty lame museum--all about logging. We were dissatisfied. I'd thought it might be worth the money, because the nice old lady at the front desk was telling some other customers (a group of four 30-something men, who probably also just needed to use the bathroom) how much they'd enjoy the museum. Bah! To defray the cost of our tickets, we each used the bathroom twice.

We spent a good amount of time walking around Washington Park, first through the Oregon Vietnam Veterans Memorial. There were quite a few people there, since it was Memorial Day. It was a nice memorial, with the names of the men who died displayed alongside local news items from each year of the war. We walked about 3 miles on the Wildwood trail (not too crowded, but pretty muddy). When we were tired of the forest, we caught the bus downtown (there are a couple of bus stops along the trail). It was so weird--we were in the forest, and then a few minutes later, we were in downtown Portland!

It felt like a good time to go have pearl milk tea at Tea Chai Te on NW 23rd Ave, so we hopped on the streetcar to NW. I had pink grapefruit pearl milk tea, which was pretty good (and unusual!). Then it was back on the streetcar to the Pearl District, where we had dinner at Clyde Common (located on the ground floor of our hotel).

At Clyde Common, we were seated at a long table, facing the street, which made for good people-watching. I had a house-made rosemary-thyme soda, which tasted just like you might imagine. It was a little too herby for me. We started with some awesome focaccia with olive oil and pepper, and then split a salad involving smoked rock fish. We both had delicious pasta dishes for our entrees--mine was bucatini with butter, herbs, and a poached egg on top. I suppose it was just glorified buttered noodles, but it was awesome. We got some tasty spiced chickpeas on the side, and then we split the rhubarb sorbet with rosewater cream and shortbread for dessert. It was all very good, but the focaccia and pasta were outstanding. Best hotel restaurant ever! I'd definitely go there again.

Tuesday, May 27

On Tuesday morning, we took the bus (sitting behind a man who reeked heavily of cigarette smoke and was listening to music on his headphones way too loud; I guess the bus is never all that pleasant) to SE Portland for breakfast at Broder. As we approached, we realized that it was where Henry's used to be. It's sad that Henry's closed. But at least Broder serves breakfast too, and it's just as cute and inviting.

The breakfast menu had all sorts of exciting options. We ended up splitting a plate of abelskiver and a breakfast bord (salami, cheese, hearty bread, rye crisp, lingonberry jam, half a grapefruit, and yogurt with honey and strawberries). The concept of a breakfast bord is very appealing to me--you get a little bit of everything! The abelskiver were tasty, but I had been expecting some sort of delicious puffy cinnamon-sugar donut hole (like we had at Gravy!), and they weren't quite that awesome. Just a case of unreasonable expectations. The breakfast bord was enjoyable though. I'd happily go there again.

We walked around Hosford-Abernethy, idly looking for homes for sale. We stopped in at Seven Corners Cycles, and I was amused to realize that a bike frame (their logo) does indeed have seven corners (Seven Corners is also the name of that part of Hosford-Abernethy). Very clever.

On our walk, we passed a great-looking house for sale for under $500,000 (so cheap compared to the Bay Area!). We sighed because it looked so perfect--great neighborhood, nice Craftsman details, 4 bedrooms, and a big garage workshop! Ah, Portland.

After heading back downtown and checking out of our hotel, we had a little time to kill, so Patrick humored me, and we spent an hour or so looking at some stores I'd wanted to visit. Two of the stores were closed, even though they were supposed to be open (I'm looking at you, English Department and Hunt and Gather), and Cargo wasn't really my style, but I liked Flora. Patrick talked me out of buying a print of a little girl with some garden gnomes, but I did buy the Lotta Jansdotter tote bag I'd had my eye on for a while, on sale no less!

We stopped for lunch at Park Kitchen. I liked it there--the people were friendly, and the food was unique. I had a bottle of Dry rhubarb soda, a bowl of excellent nettle soup with saffron clams and pickled onions, and a so-so pistachio-raisin-pheasant terrine (the roast beef salad would've been better in retrospect, as I heard people at the neighboring table raving about it). Maybe I'm just not a terrine person. The desserts were the best part--I wanted to try every single thing on the dessert menu! Patrick had the violet meringue (more like a big fluffy marshmallow) with a secret truffle center and a side of chocolate mousse. I had the pistachio-black sesame turnover with rosewater ice cream and strawberries. Yum!

Once we were done with lunch, it was time to head for the airport. Sigh. It was a good Oregon visit.

So much to write about (we went to Oregon last weekend to see a concert!), but first a few tidbits from before our Oregon trip.

A couple weeks ago, we had a farmers' market dinner of grilled halibut topped with avocado, grilled asparagus, and jasmine rice. We had a bunch of ginger to use up, so I tried making ginger ale. It was easy to make, but it turned out too gingery for me (and I normally like ginger-flavored things).

For dessert, I used the fortuitously acquired rhubarb I told you about in my last entry to make the strawberry rhubarb crumble pie that Stef recommended. The crust was super easy to make, and it tasted very good (although the texture was not that of your typical pie crust; more like a crisp cookie). The filling turned out a little floury; I might try using arrowroot or tapioca instead of flour next time. I liked the addition of rosewater and spices, and it turned a pretty Barbie pink inside. Good pie!

And finally, totally unrelated to food--a couple weeks ago, Patrick and I were loading bags of Goodwill stuff into the trunk of my car. I heard a buzzing sound, looked up, and discovered that there were three paper wasp nests (still inhabited by wasps) on the underside of my trunk lid (they weren't able to get into the trunk itself, luckily, thanks to the rubber gasket used to seal the trunk). Further investigation revealed another nest in my side-view mirror, behind the mirror glass (Patrick found that one; he's a good detective).

I have been using my car very infrequently (train or bike to work every day), so I guess the wasps thought it would make a good place to live. Patrick and I were not happy with this turn of events. We contemplated a variety of solutions, some rather foolhardy, but we eventually agreed to just call an exterminator and let them deal with it.

Patrick was awesome--he found an exterminator (who had excellent business cards, by the way), scheduled an appointment, and stayed home from work in the morning to meet the guy. Apparently the exterminator just put on gloves, sprayed poison on the nests, and then knocked them off with a stick. Nothing too specialized, but I'm still glad somebody else took care of it for us.

Inspired by this unpleasantness, we're probably going to sell my car, since I hardly ever use it. We can definitely be a one-car household as long as we continue to live near a Caltrain station. I think we'll do just fine with only the Matrix. Exciting!