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CANCER STORIES: FEEDING PUBLIC FEAR AND PRIVATE WOE

Things you’ll never know until you get cancer, any cancer:   You’ll either be an object of sympathy, or an antenna of sympathy. Or both.   “Keep up the fight,” or, “You’re a fighter,” or “You look like you’ve got this thing whipped.”   That’s what I heard after running Hood To Coast at 49 […]

PORTLAND BLOGS: TOP TEN ACCORDING TO RANKER.COM

    What’s it take to make the top ten list of Portland blogs. If you read ranker.com, the answer is be a newspaper since Willamette Week and The Portland Mercury top the the list at #1 and #2.   I’m not complaining that newspapers and blogs shouldn’t be compared but if it was my […]

AUTUMN LEAVES, AUTUMN DOGS, BEST TIME OF YEAR

    How often do dogs change my day? Every day.   And it’s not always my dog.   A walk on a trail, a lady with two frisky hounds, and it’s a lively moment.   Just two middle aged people on a hillside in the wilderness. Sharing the wonder of it all.   Autumn […]

Fighting Chuck Palahniuk, And Portland Inertia

    I didn’t have anything to prove by fighting Chuck Palaniuk, but I did with the fight against inertia on a Sunday where the NFL was on TV and Wordstock was happening on the park blocks. It was a good day to do nothing and there was plenty to back up doing it.   […]

Walking Portland Memory Lane One Alley At A Time

As much as you hear about people moving to Portland, loving Portland once they get here, it’ll never be their home until they’re walking Portland on memory lane.   Like, “This is where I used to play basketball, where I got beat by a five foot six opponent,” didn’t ring up the oooos and ahs […]

Way Back When Turning Thirty Was Old Age

    I asked a fifty year old man what turning thirty really meant. I was twenty nine at the time.   He said, “It’s easier wearing a shirt and tie without feeling like a fraud.”   Fraud? That’s it? Shirt and tie?   Way back when turning thirty was old age I asked old […]

Theater In Portland And Tigard, How To Dress

    At some point I’ll probably get used to going to live theater, but it hasn’t happened yet. Actors and clowns still feel a little suspicious. So do writers, but what’re you gonna do.   No one dresses to write, everyone dresses for the theater, at least everyone with gray hair and I’ve got […]

Smart Boston Loves Boomerpdx Portland But It’s Not Enough

    Smart Boston got it’s name by being smart. No news there, not when the Wall Street Journal and Times Higher Education list of top colleges came out Wednesday, September 27th, 2017.   Do we all agree that the WSJ/THE poll helps smart Boston? With two of the top three colleges in town, there’s […]

John Grisham Novel Camino Island Includes Portland State And A Portland Story Idea

I was cruising Costco and in between food samples of tangy chicken, yogurt drinks, and a new pasta, rolled through the book aisle.   There’s something magic about stacks of books in a big box store. If you’ve got a book on the table you’re a real writer? You’ve arrived? Or is it something worse? […]

Japanese Exchange Student A Perfect Portland Fit

    What’s better than traveling to new places and meeting the locals? Being the locals and meeting travelers. A Japanese exchange student proved the rule this summer.   With kids out of high school and college you’d think a couple of empty nest boomers would enjoy themselves with the usual things baby boomers get […]