Serious Yard Work

It's Monday and I am still really sore from the yard work I did on Saturday. 

Here in Portland we are responsible for maintaining the sidewalks around our house, so every few years I have to remove all the erosion and plant life that has covered it up and cut it down to one lane.

Hopefully you can see in these pictures a little of the before and after. My neighbor who doesn't do much to maintain his yard actually cleared up his area, I suspect he got a warning from the city, so that started the chain reaction of everyone else needing to clean up.

I went the extra mile and edged the grass around the curb too. It's the little things that make a difference.

Kauai Vacation

For Barbara's 50th birthday we spent 10 days on the beautiful Garden Island of Kauai. This was our third trip to the Island, and the first time we were there in the summer. We were expecting a lot of sun and surf, but we did have to put up with a little rain as they are having a pretty wet summer.

The other two times we were in Kauai, we stayed in Princeville. This time we rented a great little cottage between Hanalei and Ke'e Beach. The Hale Makai Cottages are three one bedroom and two two bedroom cottages on a beautiful, secluded area only a few steps from the beach. They are a little expensive, but worth it.

The beach was great, it had a reef that made for great swimming and snorkeling. There was also a trade wind breeze that made the hot sun very bearable. We saw a kite boarder and some fisherman out there as well as the folks staying around us, but it was never crowded.

 

After a few days we decided to challenge oursleves a little and hike the Kalalau Trail from Ke'e Beach to the first waterfall along the Nā Pali Coast. The trail is 11 miles; we did the first two miles then broke off and hiked two more miles to the waterfall. The larger trial is ranked one of the 10 most dangerous in the US by Backpacker Magazine and the first two miles are pretty challenging. The beach at the two mile mark is also very dangerous, with a terrible undertow, so don't think about cooling off in the water. Speaking of water, we should have packed a lot more and a few energy bars. We were pretty tired when we got to waterfall, but the water was freezing and very invigorating. It gave us some energy to head back but we ran out of gas and limped in the last of the eight miles.

The highlight of the trip was the helicopter trip we took over the Island. The helicopter did not have doors so we had a great view, but it was pretty scary when it banked to the side I was sitting on. The helicopter ride is pretty expensive, but it is well worth it. It is a great way to get an overview of the Island and see stuff you can't see by car as the road only goes half way around the Island.

I highly recommend visiting Kauai if you are thinking about going to Hawaii. It is still a very laid back place that is not was built up as the other Islands. There are a few big resorts if you are into that, but there are many more great small places and all the beaches are state parks. There are also lots of great restaurants and plenty of amazing activities.

If you want to see more pictures check out my flickr page.

The Parish - Pearl District

Why Don't Cajuns Work at NASA? Because when they say launch, they go out to eat.

And now the transition, I had a great lunch at a Cajun/Creole place in the Pearl by my office today. They have all your New Orleans favorites on the menu: seafood gumbo, turtle soup, jambalaya, BBQ shrimp, oysters, ettouffee, and several choices of po'boy. I had the Debris Po'Boy, which was amazing roast beef, with a rimoulad sauce (or comeback sauce as they call it) fully dressed with fries, which were a little soggy. My colleague also enjoyed his oyster po'boy.

The service was great and the prices were very reasonable, so I will be coming back for dinner.

The Parish

231 NW 11th Ave
Portland, OR 97209  
(503) 227-2421


Mon-Thurs: 11:00am - 10:00pm 
Fri: 11:00am - 12:00am 
Sat: 2:00pm - 12:00am 
Sun: 2:00pm - 10:00pm 
Sat-Sun Brunch: 9:00am - 2:00pm

The Woodsman Tavern

We got back to the tradition of trying new places this weekend and did not have to travel too far from home to get to the Woodsman Tavern on upper SE Division. Opened in the fall of 2011, this is one of several neighborhood taverns that are offering non-typical bar food. In fact these places are competing with any of the best restaurants in town on cuisine, while offering a friendly, casual atmosphere to eat or just meet for drinks.

We started with a couple of cocktails from an impressive, somewhat expensive list. I can highly recommend the Gold Rush, a great mix of bourbon and lemon juice. This was coupled with an order of deviled eggs, which was small, but delicious and the Country Ham plate, which had three different hams to taste with pickled green and bread. It was much like a charcuterie plate, very flavorful and thoroughly enjoyable. As an entree we decided to go with two small dishes and on large dish to share. The small dishes we choose were the smoked trout with lentils and the rock shrimp with avocado and radish. Of the two the smoked trout was the one that really shined here. The large dish was a roasted boar shank, which was tender in the middle with a nice crispy outside, accompanied with white beans.

By this time we were both nearing capacity, but could not resist looking at the desert menu. Because we are weak we had to try the key line pie and a berry trifle. I thought the trifle was amazing, and the key lime pie too sweet, but they came with a great after dinner drink pairing that put them over the top.

The Huntsman Tavern is not going to be a cheap night out if you want to take advantage of the menu, but it is rewarding. I want to come back and try a few more of the small dishes and get the whole roasted trout as an entree. The waitstaff is also very helpful and timely which adds to a fun dining experience.

The Woodsman Tavern
4537 SE Division St. 
Portland, OR 97206

(971) 373-8264 Mon-Sun  5–10 PM

Ted

A movie about a talking teddy bear that lives with Mark Walhberg and does nothing but party and talk sass, who wouldn't love this?  Add to the mix that it's written by Seth Macfarlane of Family Guy fame and that he is the voice-over for the bear, and now we are getting into possible Borat funny range.

Unfortunately I over-hyped it in my mind and watched too many of the trailers and extras, so I had seen most of the good stuff before the movie even began. That said, it's still a funny movie, that is well played by Whalberg and Mila Kunis.

The fun twist is that the bear is real, not treated like an imaginary character, so outsiders interact with him and he becomes a celebrity, with an appearance on Johnny Carson. When we get to the meat of the film he is more like a former child star than an animated child's toy. This is what makes the film work, because everything else about the film is cliche: best friend vs. girlfriend, dumb guy with hot girl, loveable slacker wins in the end, etc.

Bottom line: this would be a excellent rental or DVD purchase as it is funny and the kind of thing you could watch a few times, but not necessarily a must for in-theater viewing.

A Little Deck Work

When we first bought our house, there was only one small deck off the living room and master bedroom and it had a gross awning that was more mold than awning. When we replaced the awning it brightened the deck up a lot, but it was still a little scary as it is cantilevered out from the house, with a three story drop to the ground.

After a few years of living in the house we added a lot more deck space, with a larger deck below the existing one and another running the entire length of the ground floor of the house. This spring I was cleaning up those decks when I decided it was finally time to give the upper deck a facelift.

I measured everything and went over to the local lumberyard to order the wood, under the delusion I would be able to take on this project myself. Unfortunately, or fortunately, I soon realized I was in over my head and called my friend Mark, who is a contractor, to take over.

I knew I had some rot on the face boards that are exposed to the weather, but I didn't expect to find problems on the joists. Mark was able to cut away all the rot and shore up all the joists with pressure treated wood, so we won't have any more problems.

The end result looks great, and it is so much sturdier I think we could have a dance party out there now. Can't wait to get the new awning up.

Americana by Neil Young

Neil Young has gotten together with his band Crazy Horse and delivered us very interesting new record, Americana, only it isn't new. It's a bunch of old songs, most of which you will know from childhood sing-a-longs. These are songs that Young has known for most of his life, but he has made them new by changing major cords to minors and giving them the Crazy Horse treatment.

One of the more interesting songs on thee record is "God Save the Queen." As a Canadian, Young grew up a subject of the crown, singing this song at the start of every school day. Something I didn't know was that we turned the tune into "My Country 'Tis of Thee."

There are a couple of really old songs, "Oh Susanna" and "Tom Dula" which were written in the 1800's that sound great. In high school we used to sing "Tom Dula," but substitute the names of our friends, which the teacher never liked. "Jesus' Chariot" is a song I see in a whole new light. I thought it was called "Coming Round the Mountain," turns out it's about really about driving Jesus' chariot and is one of the best songs on the record. The only dud on the record is "Get a Job." This mid-century do-wop song by the Silhouettes, has never been a favorite, but I thought Young might rework it because the lyrics are cool. He didn't and that is a shame.

Ideally we'd have a new Neil Young and Crazy Horse record, but this is the next best thing.