We met up with Ali without any problems and Ali and I headed back to her place and then out to Winco to do some grocery shopping. Because I can't go to a city without visiting a Winco. We got all the ingredients for falafel, macaroni and cheese and carrot cake bars, which we cannot wait to make. It wasn't too cold and we wanted to go out and explore so we headed out to the Hawthorne area on the East Side of Portland. There were supposed to be a ton of thrift stores and funky places and bookstores and so we were pretty excited. There were a ton of Halloween stores and we were on a mission to find Ali a Halloween costume. One thing about Hawthorn was that there were some very strange people. It was like London- you could wear anything and say pretty much anything and do pretty much anything and no one would say a thing. One thrift store that we went to was absolutely incredible- it was massive with clothes and knick-knacks and shoes and suitcases and junk and absolutely everything to the point of a little too overwhelming. Everybody knows that I love old antique and thrift stores but this was a little crazy. There was a woman there who was dressed like a gypsy that I am using for inspiration for my Halloween costume. And we did, in the end, find a Cleopatra/goddess dress for Ali at this great Halloween store that had these hot shoes that I totally wanted to buy but they were a tad big big. Dang!
We ended up going to dinner at a group of food trucks- crepes, Mexican, southern, potatoes and pizza. We decided to share a wood--fired spinach and mushroom pizza which was absolutely delicious. There was a family there taking professional pictures for some reason, which was a little bizarre. Of course, we ended the night with frozen yogurt and Redbox. It was strange not watching Redbox with Michael but we certainly picked a doozie. It was called "Vanishing on 7th Avenue" with Hayden Christensen, John Leguizamo, Thandie Newton and a little kid. Basically whenever the place went dark, people vanished. There was discussions about Roanoke and Croatoan which made me say "Supernatural!" It was wretched and Ali wasn't loving it, especially when the light in her room flickered later that night. Such a disaster but bad is such a good way.
The next morning we went to church which reminded me so much of Rock Harbor- it was in an old industrial building, there was a viewing room, ushers brought about the Bibles, even the layout of the room was exactly like Rock Harbor. The band was great and we sang some Phil Wickham and other songs from JAM and the sermon was really good. I liked how they only sang two songs and then jumped right in the sermon and then wrapped up with a few more songs. It was great to go straight into the sermon which was about the Good Samaritan and using compassion and mercy to act in bringing the church to others.
From church we took the MAX (yay public transportation!) down to the Portland Saturday Market (although it was a Sunday.... don't worry about it...). If you take all the weird people from Alive After Five and put them on weird steroids and put them down into a less busy and packed Camden Market, then you get the Portland Saturday Market. My favorite booth was the tie-dye, the jam and the booth owned by a guy named Moon who has a patent on a device that helps you sit up straight. Moon. What a great name. There was also a guy who rapped for us and then messed up when we smiled at him. I bought some red wine jam which is my favorite and can't wait to have some on thin baguette slices with some tea. Maybe while watching Anne of Green Gables which will be waiting for me when I get back to Caldwell. Yay. Anyway, back to Portland....
We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around downtown Portland, stopping in at Buffalo Exchange, walking past an erotica book shop, several sweet little furniture shops and Anthropologie. We have decided that we do not fit in at Anthro. We had no idea how to wear some of the hats they had there. We did fit in at Buffalo Exchange, even though they took our incredible hot chocolate while we shopped. The weather was absolutely gorgeous to the point of pretty hot- I even took off the tights I was wearing because I was burning up.
At 5:00, we headed over to Portland City Grill, which is on the 30th floor of the US Bank Building. The best part of this place was this was the absolutely gorgeous views of Portland which was even more beautiful because of the warm, sunny day. It was pretty busy and we got a seat at the bar but about twenty minutes later a window seat opened up and I pounced. We spent the next two hours sipping delicious drinks- yummy Cosmos!- and eating appetizers while staring at the incredible view of the river and the city. We also had a great view of Voo Doo Donuts and could wait to see if the line was going to go down. Eventually it started to get dark and we headed down to Voo Doo Donuts. We got picked up on the way over, which apparently isn't a usual occurrence for Ali (and certainly not for me) and we were bummed that we ignored the pickup instead of trying to get them to buy us donuts. Speaking of the donuts, I got a regular donut with vanilla frosting and OREO cookies on top. Oh em gee. Frickin' delicious!
That night, when we were back at the house, we got onto Skype and had a two hour conversation with Miss Allie Dufault. It was two hours of nonstop laughter and stories and crack-ups. That is really the only way that you can describe the conversation. We may have had a little bit of sugar in us while the conversation was going on. And as if we couldn't end the night like that, we had to chop up onions and NINE cloves of garlic for the special kick sauce for the macaroni and cheese for Tuesday. The house smelled like onion and garlic all night. I'm surprised we didn't have some crazy dreams....
Monday was just as gorgeous as Sunday was but it took a little while to get that way. Ali had work and so I took the MAX one stop down to Washington Park and took the place by storm. It wasn't very busy at all, which makes sense for a random Monday in the middle of fall. The morning was a little chilly and cloudy but I love the look of fog and mists through tall trees. I went to see the Vietnam Memorial which was laid out in a spiral formation which I thought was very unique. I then hiked (in my Casablanca flats!) all over the park, up and down the forest trails, not really knowing where I was going but just enjoying the trees, the mist, the sweet tuns (Lady A, Switchfoot, NeedtoBreathe and Owl City) while getting some exercise. Eventually the sun started to go out as a made it to the Rose Garden.
I sat down to have some lunch and read my book for class when this couple came down to sit on the bench next to me. They were clearly on a lunch date but through the conversation that I overhead, I surmised that he was married (going to Hawaii on his ten-year anniversary next year) and she was also married (he asked if her husband asked why she had packed such a big lunch and she replied that she had made it at work....) Well, that was the end of of my book reading. I eavesdropped the entire conversation and really wanted to just lay it down and ask them what their relationships was. In the end I didn't because I'm chicken but it was fascinating. Shout-out to Andrea for text conversing with me for a good portion of that....
Eventually I did get up and enjoy the rest of the Rose Garden. There were some beautiful colors and I'm sure it even more beautiful in the spring and summer. I kept wandering past the Holocaust Memorial which had the most concise yet accurate description of the events leading up to and during WWII. I was quite impressed. The memorial was very simple yet effective. There was also a sculpture of Sacagawea and a Lewis and Clark Memorial that overlooked the city, which also afforded me a beautiful view of what I assume is Mount Hood (but don't quote me on that). It was very clear and you could see quite a lot.
It was so warm and I had to roll my jeans up to continue hiking back to find the arboretum which I had kinda missed. I wandered through a few more of the trails, enjoying the sun shining through the trees as well as the warm breezes. At one point, I lay down on the grass and read the next chapter of my book because it was so nice to just bask in the sun. Eventually I headed back to Ali's for the night, picking up some Hornsby's on the way. I made falafel for dinner while Ali made carrot bars and we chatted with Meaux who had come over to watch the Sing-Off. Tomorrow I have some ideas in mind for things to do downtown and I'm hoping the weather is just as nice as these last two days.
Part Deux will come on Wednesday when I'm back in Boise. Til then!
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