JUPITER HOTEL ON PORTLAND’S EAST SIDE: THE NEXT LEVEL

The Jupiter Hotel on Saturday felt like travel.

A time before the meth epidemic, the opioid epidemic, the covid epidemic, the homeless epidemic, and every other epidemic.

Why? Because of the fun sense of humor.

“Make mine a fir burger?” I’m still laughing.

A hotel that asks if you need a room?

And it sits next to a famous music venue, The Doug Fir.

Who doesn’t need a room after a show?

The Other Portland

I parked the car in front of KBOO after some ace-level city driving.

You know it’s ace-level when you hear, “Dave, you don’t have to prove you can city drive with the best of them.”

And they’re right.

What’s worse than some old boomer reliving their days of speeding around Portland in a courier van, blasting around town in the Suburban of History, and biking until they had body builder thighs?

I had a small flashback, but I wasn’t speeding.

Hey Love?

We walked up through the Jupiter Hotel parking lot, past the Doug Fir, and across the next street.

We had a plan. I made my usual contribution.

Then we found our way to the table so I could run back to the car for my glasses.

You know how it is.

It was a lively place with good food.

I’d go back for salmon hash and a side salad.

I’d go back for the shrimp ‘n grits.

It was modern and lively in the smart phone era.

And Life Goes On Outside Jupiter Hotel

The life part:

For the sake of true transparency I’ll confess to going off on tangents related to material culture.

It helps that I spent two decades managing museum collections along with regular updates on what things are made of.

Intriguing, right? If the answer is yes:

When you have something made from wood the first question is whether it’s hardwood or softwood.

Made from metal? The first question is ferrous, or non-ferrous. Or, does a magnet stick to it or not?

The best way of keeping track is writing it all down at your work station.

So break out the old Royal and White-Out, crack a cold Fresca, and start looking around.

Useful boomers like lists. 

Start cataloguing the material culture surrounding you.

You may deny this, but the stuff in your life is the story you’re leaving behind.

Why not make it a better story starting today?

If you wait too long someone else will tell your story, beginning with the same words you said while sorting through your parents’ stuff:

“Why, just why? Wtf, why?”

For all the times you’ve been up and down Burnside and drove past the Jupiter Hotel?

Don’t make that mistake again.