Fall Series Part Two: Pedestrian Bridgeviews.

A very brief panorama on the pedestrian bridge going over the train tracks. Of note: the colors, a few buildings downtown, Oregon Health and Science University (aka OHSU, aka Pill Hill, which I visited for the first time yesterday riding the Aerial Tram) and of course mode of transportation.

The copper building is the Koin Center, the white one is the tallest building in Portland/Oregon and sports the name of a stupid bank.

Trees, OHSU, and the tower up at Council Crest

View from pedestrian footbridge at PSU, south toward hills

same, north toward downtown

A gorgeous autumnal tree masking a not-so-much parking structure.

An October Hodgepodge

Opa und seine Enkelin

A VERY delicious meal. Yet one of many things I am thankful for...

Those cupcakes happened to be very delicious as well. Danke Susan für das Geburtstagslied.

Some of the last sunflowers of the season from the garden. There *may* be a few more this week, we shall see. We actually have some carrots left and will be planting some garlic, shallots, and onions which can grow through the winter. The fava beans are taking off like crazy.

Some delicious figs courtesy of Mike Meyers and of course the Lord of the Harvest

Casey would waltz with a strawberry blonde (Can you complete the phrase?! <-- Well, that is what happened.)

Zero Emissions Race Comes to the Choates! (oh, and Portland)

The team arrives

zero-race.com
http://zero-race.com/en/teams/ (there is a team from Adelaide! I met a guy named Nick who talked about living in The City of Churches.)

Sven charging the Team Vectrix Elektroroller in our garage last night.




Here I am less than an hour ago with Louis Palmer, the first man to circumnavigate the world using 100% solar power (2008). Now he's at it again with a different tactic, the Zero Emissions Race teams, and has a bigger, fascinating plan for next year as well. Shaking his hand last night and hearing him speak to a(n embarrassingly) small group of about 15 EV enthusiasts and others in downtown Portland, I learned that I am now one degree separated from the likes of James Cameron, Ban Ki-moon, Jay Leno, and, among others, various princes, kings, & emirs from the Middle East.
http://www.zero-race.com/en/louis/
http://www.solartaxi.com/

The Transportwagen in front of our place. Meendert, who also stayed with us, can be seen to the right.

Same, but with my excited mug in the shot.

Fall Series Part One

Mine and others' favorite stretch of canopy down ol' 99. Beatiful year round, including this time of year. Well planned planting, now forms huge mature trees and excellent leafy tunnel!

Frenbone Taurecord

From an on-campus display. Cream of the crop meiner Meinung nach.
The Frenbone Taurecord:

Die Meistersinger, (Master Singer) by Victor Talking Machine Co. I'm not sure if "Prize Song" is a translation of "Die Meistersinger" or the name of the track.

I guess you could also just call it "Horn".

The "His Master's Voice" logo and the original painting by Francis Barraud has a very interesting backstory which I learned while teaching high school about 2 years ago now.

In the Treepot...

...it is fall.

hopefully someday
a mighty tree
will you be

Autumnal Night Shot!

Snapped this beauty on the 31st and loved how it turned out. Enjoy, world!

Late Season Produce

Midweek harvest

Entwined carrots perspective I

Entwined carrots perspective II

Entwined carrots vertical view. Before:

After:

VOTE! (part II)

The Ballot

The Delivery

The ballot box + mode of transportation

The scene plus "that lit'le flagger on it" (pronounced à la Nigel Tufnel). The Pioneer Courthouse stands in the background, yet another piece of the system. The courthouse is part of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals headquartered in SF, and, as one can learn on a walking tour of Portland, it is the most overturned appeals court by the Supreme Court of these United States.

The time-stamp on my camera for the delivery snapshot reads November 2, 2010, 7:16:30pm (the 30 = seconds). Better late than never, they say. The deadline was 8 pm! A friend of mine said he loves to wait till the last minute to vote "to keep 'em guessing" (love it!). Another friend of mine said, "Ich liebe das System hier in Oregon. Es ist sehr benutzerfreundlich" (user-friendly). Definitely a true statement, but somehow much funnier in German. I suppose part of the hilarity is due to the personality who said it.

All in all, I would have to say that this has been my most pleasant and informed election experience thus far in my voting career. I also heard that a few local races are very close and that we may not know the results until late tonight since so many people voted late! Hooray democracy!

During the pre-election period, we got an enormous "VOTE!" note on our doorknob, which was generally annoying except that someone had handwritten in the blank: "_____ percent of voters in your neighborhood voted in the previous election cycle." Our neighborhood was 90.7%! Wow! Imagine how very differently things would turn out if the rest of the country voted like that. And if those who don't typically vote did.

Fahrrad fahren?!

One of Sierra's favorite phrases is "Fahrrad fahren?!", which she says with vigor and a slight bit of nervousness, hoping each time she asks that we will go for a ride ASAP.

Here we are after our ride to Imago Dei yesterday:

VOTE!

I went to a political rally for *some candidate* in Portland recently. I would have seen/heard the president speak live had I not had to leave for a tutoring appointment. Two and a half hours waiting is apparently not enough time for them to let you see the president. The discussions going on in various groups around me were quite interesting and I learned some things about the political process. Anyway, I snapped this shot which indicates what you ought to do, and very soon--by next Tuesday, November 2nd, in fact.

Some people from our home community also hosted an informal, open discussion about the local measures & candidates and such, and it was also a very enriching experience and is one major factor in inspiring me to take the vote more seriously than I sometimes have in the past. So there you go, go out, participate in democracy, and try your best to make good decisions for how you think things ought to change and grow.

Peace out!

Got a nice little "hello" from someone, however indirectly. Made me smile and i hope you do too.

Hey wait, lemme just jump up and get this coin here...

The coin and mushroom question mark boxes actually had been rigged to make their respective sounds when you jumped up hit them with your head.
Can anyone say *da-ding!* and also *dudalah-dudalah-dudalah!* ?!?

This guy definitely outdid my Luigi... Granted, he was part of the team and knew about the whole thing beforehand, unlike yours truly, who gleefully happened upon the exhibit/survey/experiment just before class.


I had been planning on taking the stairs back down, but of course took the pipe when I realized that was an option.

After completing a survey they were offering, one of the Marios asked if I wanted to be tested on Nintendo characters. Of course I did! I didn't get them all right, but scored better than anyone else she had tested so far. She was surprised that I got Lakitu (?). To the best of my ability, here are the characters that were quizzed. The 8-bit image was shown, and then I had to guess the exact name. Princess Peach (or Princess Toadstool), Bowzer, Lakitu, one of the Hammer Bros., Blooper (they actually had it as Bloop , i think), Koopa Troopa, Koopa Paratroopa, Cheep-Cheep, Luigi, Mario, Toad, a Goomba, Buzzy Beetle, a Piranha Plant, and Spinny (I contest this one, I said "Spiny", and she marked me wrong :( perhaps she was right though :( ).
I also got some sweet buttons and a few stickers, so let me know if you want some swag and i'll try to send some your way.