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Yes, you read right. The Irvine Welsh (that’s the guy who wrote Trainspotting, to put it in layman’s terms). He was at Powell’s for a reading promoting his new book, Crime, which I have not yet started. My life right now consists of work, sleeping, washing dishes, and reading trashy teenage novels instead of actual literature. My brain needs the respite from actual thought. Any hoo. The reading actual reading was good, but the Q&A time after was the best for me. Irvine Welsh was funny, thoughtful, candid and more gracious with very pretentious questions than I could ever hope to be. I love hearing writers talk about their own work and their process in a very real way, as in what inspired them, what motivates them and how they found their style. I read Trainspotting way back in the day, and the style and language had a large influence on how I think of language, vernacular and writing as a whole, so this was a big night for me.
So here’s the geeking out part. I decided that since I had missed out on my photo op with Craig Finn back in July, I wasn’t letting this one pass me by. The problem is, I’m both really shy and a total nerd when it comes to anybody of notice. I could stumble over my words while talking to the weatherman, I’m serious. So while standing in line, I wasn’t sure if I would be able to get up the balls to ask for a picture, and decided that I wasn’t going away empty handed.
(Sorry for taking a picture of half your ass, dude. And then posting it on Flickr. And my blog.) Not so thrilling, right? It took a little bit of convincing from the inner monologue (“You can do it, Stacey!”) and C, who was my partner in crime and just as freaked out as I was, but we managed to work up the nerve and here is the result:
Like old pals, right? Again, he was incredibly sweet to me and C, posing for pictures and signing our books. All was going well. I should have walked away, but no. Up bubbled the geek voice, and I decided to babble about how his work had influenced me and that I wanted to say thank you, blah blah blah. Do you ever hear words coming out and want to stop them, but somehow can’t? Yup. Right there. At least I didn’t squeal or exclaim, “I’m your biggest fan! OMG, Irvine Welsh is ttly cool 4eva.” But it came close. And again, the ever wonderful Mr. Welsh took my geeking out with the utmost graciousness, said thank you, and we escaped the scene of the crime.
(The ‘God is Dead’ thing? Some pop art exhibit Powell’s has displayed in the Pearl Room where the reading was held.)
And Redlight has Obama socks. Get yer Obama socks here!
So I used to be a rock show kind of girl. All through high school and the first years of college I would save up baby-sitting money (high school) or paltry paychecks from crappy jobs (college) and give my hard earned funds over to nearly any band in town for the night. And it was great times. There were crowds and pits and sweaty boys and shout along choruses, missing shoes and boys, punk kids with their fingers on the trigger to brand everyone but themselves “poser” and did I mention the boys? I used to keep my ticket stubs in journals and on cork boards, and proudly display my hand stamps the next day at school. My ears rang and every night at a show had to end with a Slushee and shouting to each other in the 7-11 just to irritate the guy behind the counter.
I couldn’t tell you what happened, but I stopped going to every concert big and small sometime in college. Maybe the worries of trying to graduate sometime before I turned 30 or trying to pay the rent in an overpriced suburban southern California apartment took priority over staying up late and ruining my hearing, but I tell you I missed it. Then I moved back to Las Vegas, which is a stop on arena tours for the Black Eyed Peas and Christina Aguilera and not so much the people I actually wanted to see. I don’t think I went to a single show the entire time I was there, unless you count the crappy dive bars I wandered into that happened to have some bartender’s brother’s band assaulting the ears of the patrons. No, that doesn’t count.
What does all this mean? Why am I waxing nostalgic over late nights and ringing in my ears? Because it was something I loved, and something I stopped doing for no real reason. One of many things I loved and gave up and didn’t bother with because it was not essential. I was in a place where I was living for others and not myself. Moving up to Portland has been an exercise in getting back to who I am, what makes me happy and finding out where that’s taking me in the future. And as for this week, that includes rock shows.
When I found out the Hold Steady was coming to Portland, I knew I had to go. Separation Sunday kept me awake and prevented me from driving off the road on my 24 hour drive to Oregon, while I was operating on a month of stress induced insomnia (which has since disappeared) and anxiety. It was only fitting that my new life, my first rock show in Portland, be the Hold Steady at the Crystal Ballroom.
Let me tell you, friends, it was amazing. The rock show gods smiled upon me and I found myself at the stage. The distance between me and Craig Finn could be measured in inches. I heard every note from Tad Kubler’s guitar, felt every drum beat in my gut and the bass made the little hairs on my arm vibrate and I felt awesome. It was a mixed crowd, which is the best kind of crowd, and everyone was mad into it and having an amazing time. And there were shout along choruses and sweaty boys, clapping and fist pumping, but no missing footwear or bad vibes from the cool kids. It was all about a piece of music meaning more than background noise and sharing an experience with your closest stranger-friends.
Craig Finn and Tad Kubler
And my ears are stilling ringing.
Sometimes leaving the blog unattended for a week is better than the whining and complaining that would go on if I did post. I’ve had a week of sliced up fingers*, road kill, and waking up 5 minutes past the time I’m supposed to be on the road to work. Any immediate discussion would have involved irritating self pity followed by “looking on the bright side”, which is somehow even more obnoxious than the self pity. I will say that I am in dire need of the Fat Fancy! sale this weekend and the Hold Steady show on Sunday. (Of course, the new album is fantastic as expected. I’m particularly loving “Slapped Actress”, “Constructive Summer” and “Magazines”.) I also can’t complain too much, since I did get to talk to a pretty famous singer who called up my work yesterday. My lips are sealed, though.**
I’ll leave you with another entirely unrelated photo. This one was taken on NW Kearny and 13th Ave, outside one of the Pacific Northwest College of Art buildings. It’s about the size of a 6 or 7 year old kid. A little disturbing, no? Which is, of course, the point.
*Is it pathetic that my first thought after surveying the damage was, “Thank God I can still knit”?
** It was Carly Simon!!! She was so sweet for the whole minute and a half I spoke to her. I know I just broke the internet rule of cagey-ness, but dude! Carly Simon! She’s amazing. End of story.
No, no. Don’t disagree. I’ll know you’re lying. I’ve been such a slacker lately, but that’s what happens when one gets a job and boxes up the stash.
The Bayerische Socks are coming along nicely. The heel has been turned and I’m in the decreasing the gusset not-really-looking-like-a-sock stage, and a good time is being had by all. Except the major fudging I had to do to get the heel flap to match up to the stitch pattern, and then even more fudging to get the stitch pattern to match up with the gusset. Am I the only person who had this problem, with the stitch count not matching up to the pattern? I didn’t think I saw any comments on Ravelry, so maybe it’s my own dysfunction. As long as it looks okay, and it does, I’m not too worried about it.
I had a great weekend of sleeping in late (a novelty now that I start working at 6 am) and reliving junior high at Oaks Park, a rickety old amusement park in Sellwood. The tilt-o-whirl almost killed me and the ferris wheel had me asking when the last inspection was, but the carousel was great fun (I had the prettiest horsie!) and the battery in my ever-faithful camera decided it was a good time to die, so alas, no photographic evidence. And H will feel me on this: there were no churros or elephant ears or funnel cakes to be had. No fried cinnamon-y goodness anywhere. What kind of communist run park is that?
And because a photo-less post bugs me:
Only in Portland will you find a rubber fish attached to a truck cab window. I’m just sayin’. Outside Powell’s on Burnside and NW 11th Ave.
Hell yes, it is.
Jamison Square, NW 11th Ave and Johnson, Portland, OR.
At the risk of this becoming the “look what I bought!” blog, I really do have some cool things to share.
An extremely awesome co-worker is the brains behind Fat Fancy, a plus-sized vintage clothing shop that’s just getting off the ground, and me and a buddy went to their monthly sale on Saturday. Let me tell you, I had the best time. Being a chubby girl, I have a hard time finding clothes in regular stores to fit, let alone in vintage stores, where it would seem that everybody back in the day was twig thin. Not so. There were fat people back in the day, it’s just that vintage stores don’t chose to resell plus-sized items. I’m not a business owner, but that seems…. idiotic, to me. Moving on. I tore through the racks, found some great items, including a tangerine colored vintage dress and ruffled bloomers. When presented with ruffled bloomers, why would I not buy them? And it was rather euphoric digging through great clothes and knowing that I had a chance in hell of fitting into them, and concentrating on the look and if I liked the item or not, rather than buying what fits on my body. I’ll be a regular customer.
After the thrilling clothing experience, C and I went down NE Alberta Ave. and hit up Bolt and Close Knit. Bolt was fanfreakingtastic. I think I wanted three yards of each fabric in the store. Bolts and bolts of graphic prints in my favorite colors (greens, browns, blues and pinks), and prints with bunny rabbits and foxes, and organic linens, woolens and cottons. Be still my beating heart. (Just an aside, I didn’t see a prince tag on anything. If you have to ask… you finish the cliché.) When it’s time to decorate my now non-existent apartment, I’ll coming back. They also stock Sublime Stitching embroidery transfers and although I’m supposed to be saving my money for said non-existent apartment, I couldn’t resist this
A Decemberists themed embroidery transfer! Who could resist?
Right next door to Bolt is Close Knit, which was nicely stocked with high end yarns, and the owner (I assume) was friendly, and I’ll also be going back there. Mostly when I walk into a new yarn store I like to just see what they have and mentally compare it to the inventory of other stores, so I know where to go when I need what. For instance, if I want any color of Cascade 220, Abundant Yarn is my place. For Koigu, it’s Yarn Garden. For tapestry yarn, Dublin Bay. And if I want so-soft-you-can-hardly-feel-it cashmere, I’ll be visiting Close Knit. I love that Portland has so many yarn stores that I’ve virtually eliminated the need to shop online for yarn. I needed to in Las Vegas, since the two stores there could not possibly carry everything I wanted, but I like to support independent businesses, so I’ll be happy to do that now and get everything I want.
Apparently I have a Sunday ritual now. I’ve been going down to my favorite little coffee shop, Singer Hill Coffee, each Sunday and knitting on the Hidcote Garden Shawl and drinking a bottomless cup of Stumptown Coffee for $2. The waitress there knits and we chat about yarn while her boss gives her dirty looks to get to work and stop blathering about string. A few customers have asked me what I’m making, queries ranging from “Is that a sweater?” to “Is that a scarf?”. Today a knitter walked in and asked…. wait for it… prepare yourself… “What pattern is that?” (!!!!!) We talked yarn and she showed me her socks and new Knit Picks Harmony needles, until her husband came in and said, “Can’t you go anywhere without talking shop?” Portland is filthy with knitters and vegetarians. I think I landed in the right spot.
And to end on a cute note, I’ll leave you with the Spaceman, aka Baby D.
I took a photo of the Morrison Bridge from Willamette Park last October, when I came to Portland on vacation, months before I got up the intestinal fortitude to actually move here. I posted it on Flickr, didn’t send it to any groups, no one looked at it, and I forgot about it. Then I got an email from Flickr’s Schmap Northwest site, saying they had shortlisted the photo to publish on the site. Cool. I got another email today, saying my photo has been published on the Schmap site. Go look now. I’m the Willamette Park photo.
Awesome.
After the insane heat of last weekend (well, relatively insane), there were four days of rain and today was sunny and warm. The Oregonians were pleased and did what Oregonians do on such weekends:
They went to play outside.
And I joined them. I’m an indoor girl, if you can’t tell by all the crafting and other sedentary activities I mention here. But today I felt like going outside and staying out, so I took advantage of that. (I’ll pause to allow anyone who knows me to recover from their heart attacks.) I drove up to Sellwood Park, which I had never been to, got lost along the way and ended up with my PDX brethren enjoying the sun and cool breeze.
I took a walk along the Willamette River to the Sellwood Bridge, which is sadly crumbling, and took a few photos, which are on my flickr account, for those who are interested in such things.
Lots of people were out on rental boats and kayaks in the river, dogs were swimming from boat launches and tons of little kids running on the grass, all living in the spirit of harmony. I missed my dearly departed Australian Shepard, Shiloh, who would have loved fetching tennis balls and sticks thrown out in the river with the other dogs. He loved to swim out at Lake Meade in Nevada, but hated the ocean when he lived with me in San Diego, so I think the river would have been his speed. Le sigh.
A French or Moroccan guy (hard for me to tell, pardon) saw me taking pictures and told me that downtown could be seen from the floating dock, so I took a few pictures from the river. Some people say that Portland has the ugliest skyline in the Northwest, and I say that some people are full of crap. I heart the KOIN tower, so there.
I got lost again going home after a few hours in the park, which is fine since that’s the way to learn to get around a new city, but I found my way quite by accident. After uploading the Sellwood Park batch of photos, I still craved the outdoors. Am I really me? Have I been body snatched? So I picked up my knitting bag and headed off to the cliff top park in Oregon City I found last week, and have since found out is called McLaughlin Promenade.
I found a nice little nook under the trees on a flat rock and settled in to work on my Hidcote Garden Shawl and realized… I had forgotten the pattern! Doh! It’s not a shawl that you can wing it on, so I worked a little in my writing journal (yes, despite the lackluster content of this blog, I do aspire to write).
I very much looked like one of “those girls” sitting on a rock writing in a journal, but it didn’t stop me.
I felt like walking a little further, and of course, this is Oregon, so it started to sprinkle just as I got to the Elevator.
I had heard about the Elevator (officially the Oregon City Municipal Elevator) before, but had apparently never looked up. I’d never seen this spaceship looking thing before. It was opened in the 1950′s, which explains the Starship Enterprise construction, and was made to bring people up and down the cliff without having to climb up the hill from… I think it’s 10th St. Don’t quote me. It kept raining and I kept walking. The light rain didn’t seem to bother anyone else, so I resolved to get my inner Oregonian back and tough it out.
I love this. I live in a town with an actual barber shop, complete with rotating pole. How retro is that?
It started pouring soon after I took this photo, so I ducked into a coffee shop and had a cup of Stumptown coffee (yum!) while waiting out the rain. I read Sartre while I sipped and looked like one of those girls again. Still didn’t stop me.
There it is. My Saturday.
