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HOME COOKING CONVERSATION: PORK BUTT

Home cooking usually means there’s a cook involved. You know, a chef. With no cook or chef around you do what everyone else does: Get into that kitchen and rattle those pots and pans.

LIVE BETTER? IT STARTS AT HOME

I want to live better. So do you. We just don’t say it out loud. Why? Because everyone wants to live better, they just don’t want to do the work. And if they do the work, they get it wrong. For example:

‘BACK HOME’ IS THE SADDEST PLACE

“Back home we don’t call it that.” Those are the words I overheard at Tapphoria. Two people at another table were going over things. They weren’t from here and the more they talked the more each mentioned their own ‘back home.’ I know homesick when I hear it.

SUMMER PARTY SATURDAY, AND SUNDAY

A summer party in a party house? That’s what it’s made for, both season and house. After twenty years, it finally felt right.

HOME STATE HIP REPORT THREE WEEKS OUT

  My home state is Oregon, the block that separates Washington from California over there on the left coast map of America. If it was South America we’d all be Chile, but that’s not how it worked out. Oregon has been good to me, which I suppose everyone says about where they live. Portland, Oregon […]

GOING HOME THE LONG WAY

If going home doesn’t bring the warm and fuzzies, you need to review. Are bad memories of a bad home town a problem? You should check your map for the best way to get there. If current times are any measure, being homeward bound is not getting any easier.

WHY TRAVEL? SOME ANSWERS FROM THE FIELD

Why travel when you’ve got all the comforts at home? Who doesn’t like comforts? Aw, those slippers, that coffee mug. Oh that recliner. You won’t find those anywhere else, and that’s the problem. Some people are afraid to find out there is a different world than the one they currently live in. Why travel when […]

HOMEWARD: THE DREAM AND THE REALITY

Homeward bound isn’t so much a destination as it is a memory. Sure you can go home, but is it really home if you’re gone a while? Yes it is, and it’s the memory that defines your relationship to where you are. Are you home? Close to home? Check your look in the mirror to […]

TEMPORARY LIFE: WHEN YOU KNOW IT WON’T LAST

How do temporary life fixes turn into something permanent? First, something breaks, and it’s complicated, expensive, so call in a pro. Then, in this case, the pro wants to re-pipe under a sink, tear out the wall, change the height of the drain. They wouldn’t agree to fix it back the way it was because […]

ONE HOMETOWN VS ALL OTHER HOMETOWNS

One hometown is like any other town they say. Whoever ‘they’ are, they’re wrong. “A hometown is where young people bide their time before their real life begins,” goes the standard line. “It’s where kids first learn about the real world without bearing the consequences.” Not the case when the hometown is North Bend, Oregon. […]