Old Things in an Old Light

Anyone who reads "Basementing" (Anyone? Anyone?) knows the decor is pre-contemporary. A feverish night stumble to the bathroom could easily result in a Serlingesque breakdown: I'm in Don Draper's apartment via The Twilight Zone. Picture if you can a trembling man flipping through a May 1953 issue of Woman's Home Companion in dire need of a home remedy for possible malaria. Deep breaths, Mike. How about a round of Winner Spinner to take your mind off your musty-triggered psychotic episode?

With the lights on (and a good night's sleep), the mid-fifties mirage is betrayed by... well, sonofagun, not much. Oh, wait! The microwave. And the TV, which, true, is the same size as Ozzy & Harriet's, except it's all screen. The decor is pretty seamless. But through the filters of Instagram (a name that recalls that era), the authenticity of the basement's design (life's work of Adam) could fool Mrs. Cleaver (did she ever leave that goddamn house?).

I present you with "The Instagram Basement" (one of the few examples of the camera app free from inappropriate expanses of flesh).

Thanks to Adam and Josh, I think our next residence will have to be a Googie structure, or Luna Schlosser's pad. (Erin glares at me from 2012.)

I feel dizzy. I hear breaking glass. I see a giant unrealistic floating eye! Open that door, Rod, I'm coming through!

The Rain in Spain Falls Mainly on Portland

I used to say, "No, it doesn't really rain that much, but let the bozos in the rest of the country think so, to keep them away." Of course, I used to be one of them bozos and I'm here. And I'm soaking wet, because it really does rain that much.

I think the rain's a necessity for the people of the Pacific Northwest. The mind of a Portlander, affected as it is by copious amounts of coffee, tofu, sushi, Thai dishes I can't pronounce, and quinoa, functions clearest in the rain (or at least the near-rain). I reach this notion based on my observations of the opposite. When the sun peeks its white-hot head out of a deep-gray cloud (our state mascot), people lose their minds.

Friend and author Sarah Royal remarked on the propensity for all sun-lit conversations to turn to the sun, no matter the current topic nor the gravitas of the moment. For example:

Skinny Jeans: I was kayaking yesterday in the Willamette and, long story short, my thumb is infected.

Skirt w/Leggings: I know! God, the sun feels so good!

Me: The Shins? Meh.

That sort of thing. In Portland, the Cloud is the Warden and the Sun is the ACLU nudging him, saying, "C'mon, how 'bout a little yard time?"

It's "Blade Runner" all the time here, and then...a few frames of "Blame it on Rio."

I love the rain. I moved here daydreaming of the dark wet woods, poncho'd on the waterfall trails. And I've loved it. But when my emotional poncho springs a leak, I'm as peppy as Thornton Wilder's Stage Manager.

Yes, it really does rain that much, but we've got the biggest used book store in the country, a blessing of independent record stores, and the Reggie Deluxe, for starters.

You want the sun? Move to California.