Cacti and Wanderings

About two weeks ago, Dan and I went to Northwest Cactus and Succulents (this husband and wife duo with huge cactus greenhouses in their backyard) and picked out a few cacti to replace the one we inadvertently killed.

Unfortunately, it appears we are already on the path to killing one of the new guys too, our "Old Man of Mexico" (below)












But these guys are doing just fine! They are mesem lithop from South Africa:









And here is the one I picked (left) and the last one Dan picked (right). They are from Mexico and Bolivia respectively.









I had a very frustrating mail experience this weekend. See if you can read what it says on the "Return to Sender" sticker, and I think you'll know what I mean.









This Saturday afternoon, after Dan went to a solar energy lecture and I did my sign language homework, we jogged down to the new Portland Tram. It was the grand public opening, and they had free rides, music, cookies, and hot beverages. The tram looks like a bullet, and it is basically like a ski lift that operates between the end of the streetcar line and the 9th floor of Oregon Health Sciences University (OHSU) Hospital. They are going to charge $4 for a round trip, so we are getting our free rides in when we can. They will have free rides every weekend in February, including Friday nights for the city lights. The view from up top is really spectacular! You can see the whole city, the Wilamette River, and Mount Hood, a sliver of Mount Rainier, Mount Saint Helens, and sort of a jumble grab bag around Mount Adams.

Here is my tram cookie!









I will close with a brief pictoral journey of our bike ride up in to the west hills today..we biked from NW 23rd up Thurman St. to Leif Erickson Drive, which is this old carriage road that is now a multi-use trail within Forest Park, the largest urban park in the world (I think.)

n.b. Leif Erickson was a viking.

Dan watching unicyclists (4) from the streetcar stop. I really like the intent interest on his face. He aspires to ride a unicycle someday. I tried to get a picture of the cyclists, but no dice.









Some cool sights on Thurman along the way to Forest Park:

Mt St Helens



























Trailhead at Leif Erickson Drive












It was steep on the way up--we went about 5 1/2 miles from the trailhead, and it was a lot more downhill on the way down, but it is considered a "beginner mountain biking" trail, and those rocks and sticks were very bumpy, especially at the higher speeds coming back down!!! I'm afraid I was quite sore sitting on a pillow at this Tibetan spiritual dance presentation we went to tonight, and tomorrow will surely bring more soreness. But well worth it!

What a Weekend!!

This weekend we kept very, very busy. I'm sad now that I didn't have my camera for all of it:

Friday night I worked at PCS.

Saturday morning we got up early and went to a Meet in Portland event..ice carving demonstration on Pioneer Courthouse Square! It was a really neat idea, but it wasn't quite as spectacular as I had imagined it would be because the carver carved with a chainsaw and other power tools. I guess I was thinking it would be a fine-tuned artistic craft with little ice picks. oh well!

Then we walked around town for a while and went to a cool restaurant/bar called Jax.

That night we went to ASL comedy night at Embers, one of my co-workers was performing in it!

Then we wandered around the NW 23rd area and got gelato and a Beatles CD.

Today we went to the Rose City Classic dog show!!!!! Kim came with us and it turned out to be really fun. The best part was the big dog agility trials--they had these bars to jump over just like in horse shows, and they ran through these tunnels. They also had agility for smaller dogs, including a bona fide hoop to jump through, and we saw all the vendors with their crazy "i love dogs" paraphrenalia (kim was especially taken with an enormous, stuffed, noise-making hedgehog dog toy), and we even snuck to the back room to see the behind the scenes action (including dog washing, grooming, brushing, primping, and other things I wasn't sure about).

Then we came home to watch the Colts beat the Patriots..a very exciting game!~

Altogether a fun weekend...now back to work!

It's snowing in Portland!!

Today we had our first snowfall since we've moved in the city of Portland. In celebration, I created a tiny snowman on our balcony:

McMenimens

Tonight we went to see Little Miss Sunshine at the Kennedy School. It is one of these buildings that a company called McMenimens renovates into cool entertainment-ish venues. The Kennedy School is an old elementary school, but now it is a combination movie theater, restaurant, bar, bed and breakfast, and party venue. Very hard to conceptualize, but very cool!!

Little Miss Sunshine was horribly sickly hilariously funny. I was thoroughly entertained.

Home for the Holidays!

Hello! Your faithful blogger Julia here! Freshly back from a trip home to Maryland. Being there made me really appreciate some of the things I had been missing about home, but also made me realize how great a city Portland is too!

Suburban Maryland is all about driving, driving, driving. You have to drive everywhere. In Portland, I walk everywhere. Or take the bus or the streetcar. However, D.C. is truly a more happenin' city than Portland. In Portland, you can walk for blocks and not see anyone, but in D.C., there seems to be an adventure around every corner. There is pretty delicious food in both MD/D.C. and in Portland, but the best food is in NYC and Vancouver, BC. (and at Trader Joes.) (And of course my parents' kitchen :))

I could go on and on. I love thinking and talking about the similarities and differences between cities and towns. If you do too, we should chat.

But now is not the time for rambling; now is the time for a pictorial journey of my visit to MD and D.C.!

First stop was home. Luke and Nuffy were cuddling quite frequently:









Luke and I worked very hard wrapping the gifts in the background of this next photo. They were our Christmas masterpieces:












Last Friday, Rebecca and I went touring around D.C. for the day. On our way to the U.S. Botannical Garden, we saw a sign for tours of the radio program "Voice of America." We went to the noon tour and we had headsets and got to see a live TV and a live radio broadcast. It was very fun, although I'm sure they didn't tell us the whole story. The tour information was pretty watered down, and afterwards Rebecca was explaining the distinctions between government owned and privately owned media outlets. We can't hear Voice of America in the U.S. because it is owned by the government. While I'm sure that is a good thing in some ways (our news isn't spoon-fed us by our government) another part of me is curious what our government is telling everyone overseas...

The Botannical Garden had the coolest exhibit. A company in Alexandria, KY created these scale models of the buildings on the national mall. They are made out of plant material like cinnamon sticks and moss and even a gourd for the top of the Jefferson memorial!!!

U.S. Capitol:









Jefferson Memorial:









After a tasty vegetarian lunch at Java Green, we made a wonderful stop to the National Zoo! Tai Shan was our first destination:









But we were most captivated by the Asian Short Clawed Otters:









There were 6 of them, and they followed each other around their enclosure, making little squeeky sounds and being generally adorable. The next day, they were on the front page of the Washington Post Metro section, and there was a feature about how they wanted a double decker slide for Christmas. Rebecca says she's on the job.









It seemed way too soon for us to head back to Portland, but I had a fabulous New Years Eve, first at Rebecca's awesome party, then playing trivia at Dan's friend's house in Columbia. Here's me and mommy before the evening's festivities:









Happy New Year to all, and to all a goodnight!