Keeping with the theme of listing things… on the approach of my birthday (hint, it’s July 30) I’m thinking about aging. Insightful, I know. So I felt it’d be justified to express my little list of aging observations. Without further ado—here’s my version of:
You know you’re getting older when…
As I’ve established, we’re missing our dog, but that’s not stopping the immaculate, Oregon-summer sun from producing some immaculate summer berries. So it’s not stopping us from pickin’ ‘em.
Casey taught me the way of berry picking eons ago, and over the many years, in many a berry fields, I’ve learned a few things.
Here are my well-practiced tips for berry picking success: Read the rest of this entry »
It’s a day away from our second-week sadiversary. That’s anniversary, except since we have nothing to celebrate, it’s sad.
What’s the lost-dog update? Yeah, she’s still gone. We’ve received a variety of heartfelt calls and emails, and a variety of ill-intentioned calls. I’ll start with the bad.
We had a legitimate report that a homeless-looking dude tried to sell her for $30. A woman close by said the guy was going door-to-door asking people to buy a dog with the exact same description as ours. A different young girl said her friend just got our dog off the street but that “they’ve already fallen in love with her. I know how it feels to have your dog stoled (sic) so I’ll try and convince him to take her to the vet.” A few days ago a guy called saying, “I’ve got your dog. He’s tied up in my yard all frightened like.” When it got down to the details of getting her back he said he wanted $500, then said, “I’ve gotta go. I’ve got another call (click).” No response when we left him a message.
The worst, though, was yesterday. Read the rest of this entry »
3990 N Interstate Ave.,
Portland OR., 97227
(503) 954-2200
Seriously? More coffee in this neighborhood? Yes. A few times.
Krakow Koffee House and Market is barely a month old and sits just south of Alibi Tiki Lounge on North Interstate. They don’t even have their for-here cups yet, but it doesn’t matter—this place is filling a pretty big hole in the coffee-shopping scene, if you ask me. They’re part grocery store! Well, they have two aisles of various things like chips, wine, dairy, bread, etc… it’s kind of like a local/organic-friendly mini mart inside a coffee shop. But that’s far from all. They have a giant sandwich menu, calzones, milkshakes (!), and free WiFi. And they’re open past 4pm (until 8:30p M-F; 8p Sat; 7p Sun)! Wow—this is just getting better by the detail.
Let’s not forget the other shops on approach: Coffeehouse 5, Ristretto, Caffe Vita, and I just noticed The Creamery (on N Killingsworth and N Minnesota) has papered up their windows for a remodel.
Moving on to the hilarious Pix Newsletter that went out last week… Read the rest of this entry »
Since the loss of our animal 72 hours ago, it feels like that’s the only thing I can think about, but here’s an attempt to change the subject towards something exciting: I’m writing music reviews for Venus Zine! I love it. Click the image to check some of ‘em out. Right now they’re just online, but I think I’ll have one out in print sometime soon. Speaking of print-clips, here’s my profile of the incredible Laura Calvo. It ran in The Mercury’s Pride Issue last month. Obviously neither of those two things have anything to do with food topics… but… well… I’ve been distracted with other elements of our culture lately. More foodie-talk is on the way though. Hint, hint: infusions gone very wrong. Stay tuned.
–Catherine
The sun has set on another day without her. The last time I was with my little furry creature was two nights ago when I squatted calmly next to her, quietly petting her within her hot, little room, outside her hot little bed-box. Now the box remains empty, the food untouched, the water bowl full and our hearts filled with sadness or madness depending on the hour.
She’s been gone over a day. Our little black, Pug dog named Morning escaped out of the front door of our house yesterday morning and has not returned. Her collar always falls off, as it had that morning. Casey was talking to a friend, while the front door remained ajar. She frequently scurries out open doors, but quickly runs back in the house. She’s a pug, for crying out loud, and doesn’t have a pinch of independence in her body. She’ll often take the off-leach opportunities we give her on her walks to sniff a bush for a few extra minutes, but will always come running after you, once she realizes you’re not in arm’s reach.
Notice how I use the present tense in that last sentence. We still have hope that she’s coming back, but I’ll admit it’s fading more with each passing hour. We absolutely SCOURED the entire neighborhood all day yesterday and last night. We hung roughly 300 flyers, posted every internet post about her possible, called every shelter, and talked to dozens upon dozens of neighbors. Most were friendly and sympathetic, a few asked if there was a reward involved (those that did were mostly young), and two construction workers offered a detail sighting.
Casey was flyering in the park that is a block away from our house. She said the two construction workers appeared to be Mexican and didn’t speak in fluent English. The two men were working on a part of the park that’s under construction when they stopped what they were doing and studied the image on the poster.
They approached her and said, “We saw your dog.”
“No leash… no collar,” one said as he imitated holding a small dog under his arm.
“What did the person look like?” she asked.
“Black man… medium… not too fat…” he said and motioned to going into the rose garden of the park. The time they thought they spotted her was around the time she ran out the door.
This is the part of the story that starts to get me crazy. We have information that can only lead us to believe that someone–some guy, has our animal and has been choosing to make z e r o effort to bring her back. Let’s give him the benefit of the doubt and say she ran down the block to the park alone. This is already highly unlikely, but in the name of love-for-humanity, let’s just say she really was alone and he picked her up with the good intention of finding her owner. That time is long over. It’s been a day and a half, and if that guy lives within three miles in any direction of our house—he’ll see a sign. If he knows how to use the internet—he’ll see sign. If he turns her in to any kind of animal shelter or hospital—we’ll get a phone call (and yes, she has the microchip).
So what do we do now? Hope, pray and miss… miss her waggle when you get home, her rancid breath (that I actually enjoy in an odd, mammalian way), her softness and funny habits of running like a maniac around the house after a walk. I won’t be too good to admit that I don’t miss her incessant bark, although I’d take it over this odd feeling I’ve had in my stomach since she’s been gone.
The gaggles of emails, calls, assistance with flyers, and hugs have been wonderful. Seeing how much other folks care about our little-legged friend has made such a difference. And this blog post is for those who know Morning and who we know wish her safe return as well. And on that note, here’s the other thing I’ve been doing when life gets lonely and sad… make a video and play the guitar:
Miss Morning from Catherine Cole on Vimeo.
… we’ll keep you posted on any developments.
–Catherine
“Yah, you really missed out. I just had a party in my mouth.”
–young hipster girl on a cell phone after finishing her free waffle.
This may not be my timeliest event-review, but it was such a blast, I’m allowing myself to post it.
A few Saturdays ago marked The Flavourspot’s Free Waffle Day, and damn—North Portland soaked up every gooey crumb David (the owner) and company had to offer.
I rolled up at about 12pm to a gaggle of about 60 people milling around the beloved waffle cart. About 30 people were in line, while the rest were either waiting or eating one of his free waffle sandwiches.
These were the rules: one free waffle sandwich per person at a time, and every sandwich was free—even his tiramisu special. If you seriously had an appetite, you could totally get right back in line, and get a second one. Yes; people did exactly that.
I met up with my free-waffle-needing friend and we waited in line for about 15 minutes. Then she remembered she had a gift certificate for the coffee shop down the street. The morning just got even more perfect. She let me get in on her gift certificate, which meant the breakfast of freeness spread to my latte too. Amazing.
Then trouble struck. Read the rest of this entry »
I vaguely remember a time when speaking about websites—especially of the social-networking variety—was culturally considered, in poor taste. Whenever the word MySpace or Friendster came up, I could hear a collective groan amongst my friends. And meeting people from the internet? No way. That was still mega lame. Oh, how 2002 that was.
Now it seems like the virtual world has nuzzled itself into reality like toast crumbs in the corners of a corduroy couch—a sign of simple comfort. As I type this a friend is going on a date with a girl she just met on Craigslist. And a different friend has a similar date set up in the future. I was on a walk a few days ago and I heard an old grandma talking on her cellphone in her car about FaceBook. I eavesdropped on a conversation between two dudes at the gym about the random MySpace messages they’ve been getting lately. And I’ve sat around computers with friends multiple times—watching videos, browsing friends’ profile pages together, that it feels pretty close to natural to pull out one’s “personal” computer and share it with an audience.
But two things happened recently that have me really chewing on my relationship to the internet (and let’s face it; we’re pretty tight).
Read the rest of this entry »
Living the environmentally-responsible life is easy: don’t spend a lot of money, which in turn will reduce your consumption, which in turn will reduce that horrific demon called a carbon footprint. But then all these elements of life periodically get in the way, which in turn, transforms the easy-living task into a guilt-ridden challenge.
Such is the story of my dinner.
I had done all the right things: biked to the farmers’ market over the weekend, purchased local foods, and planned out my meals. Part of that plan slated a frozen pizza for dinner that had been in my freezer for a few months (remember the part about saving money?).
So my partner’s in Thailand… for a month. Chances are if you’re reading this right now, you likely know this fact of life, and since you’re reading this on my food-focused blog, let’s talk about the art of being a party of one.
It’s crazy! And fun! And, AHHH; I’ve been running around like I’m 19 all over again! But I’m not. I still have the job to clock in-and-out of and my dog who demands (almost) every ounce of attention I have when I’m inside my home’s doors.
Since she’s been gone for a few weeks, I’ve noticed a glaring theme throughout her absence. Routine has taken a vacation along with her. Have I gone for one of my ‘after-work jogs’? Maybe once, if that. Have I gone grocery shopping? Only when I ran out of toilet paper and I couldn’t hold it any longer. Do I even eat dinner before 10pm? Rarely—unless one of my pals has mercy on my empty house and invites me to go somewhere.
Missing someone as important as your love, roommate and best friend has a long list of effects. The benefits of consistency is just one of them.
-Catherine
