The Portland Hat

I will grant you it has been a little cold here lately, probably in the mid-40s. But temperature is irrelevant when it comes to head wear in Portland. It can be in the mid-60s and people will still wear their wool head covering. In fact you can see guys in shorts and T-shirts with a wool hat on. For women you need to have interesting colors or patterns and something hanging off it. For men it can also be colorful, but more likely you are going for the WW II GI issue wool cap with the visor or a Navy issue blue stocking cap to go with the pea coat.

The Wrestler

This movie has been billed as the resurrection on Mickey Rourke, and I think that is fair. This is an actor who has brought us some good performances over the years and some truly awful ones; this is his best. That said, it's not perfect. There are times the movie gets overly sentimental and looses touch with its gritty nature.

The Wrestler is the story of Randy "the Ram" Robinson, a professional wrestler who's best days are behind him. His body is severely damaged from years of applying the Ram Slam and metal folding chairs to his head. Yet he continues to put on shows: pumping iron, popping pain pills, dying his long blond hair, tanning and injecting steroids. After one particularly gruesome show, he collapses from heart failure. As he tries to come to terms with retiring he pursues a relationship with a stripper (Marisa Tomei) and tries to repair the relationship with his estranged daughter. Ultimately working menial jobs and the real world can not replace the desire to perform.

This is not the feel good movie of the year, and its also not the best movie of the year. It is a small interesting character study with a couple of actors doing some of their best work. The reviews for this film are great and I don't disagree with them, I just wonder if people were so pleasantly surprised by Rourke that they gushed a little too much. I know the genie is out of the bottle, but I wish we all could have found this movie without the hype.

Navarre Resturant

Usually having dinner with a group of friends allows me the freedom to enjoy a resturant more than just going with Barbara; the pressure of choosing a bad place is off your sholders. Unfortunatley that was not the case with Navarre. I liked the look of the place and the wait staff were very nice, but the food was not great. I can say the wine was excellent thanks to one of the party being a huge wine conissoure. The service was also attentive without being pushy. Another thing that sounded great was the choice to let them choose the menu. They serve small family style mediteranian dishes, almost like tapas. Again this would have been great but nothing really jumped off the plate for me. As we left we said this is probably not a place we'd come back to, however I just got a $100 gift certificate to Navarre so we'll give them a second chance.

Navarre
10 NE 28th street, #503
Portland, OR 97232

How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found

Charlie (Cody Nickel) is a 28 year-old, stressed-out ad guy on the verge of a major breakdown. The play opens on Charlie in the London Underground lost and found, he has just awoken from a black-out and is trying to piece together what has happened to him. As the story unfolds we find out his mother has just died, he owes his drug dealer a lot of money and he is about to get done for embezzlement by the company he works for. All of this sets us up nicely for the title of the play, How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found.

As a substantially older ad guy who has sometimes fantasized about getting away from it all, this show seemed like a possible how-to guide. In a way it is, but in a much larger way it is a warning that there are no easy answers. It also raises interesting questions about identity and how easily we could loose or change it. I couldn't help thinking about all those folks in New Orleans. If your house was washed away and all the government offices full of birth certificates and drivers licences were washed away, how would you prove who you are?

If you go see this play, get there early and sit up close. Also be prepared to forgive some lapses in the British accents.

How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found is playing January 27-March 22 in the Ellyn Bye Studio at Portland Center Stage. It was written by Fin Kennedy and directed by Rose Riordan. It runs about 2 hours with one intermission.

Kashmere Stage Band

In a continuing effort to bring you records you may have missed, I present the Kashmere Stage Band, Texas Thunder Soul 1968-1974. Kashmere High School is a predominantly black high school in a Houston neighborhood called Kashmere Gardens. Their now famous music teacher, Conrad O. Johnson, attended an Otis Redding concert in 1967 decided to bring this style of music to his classes and developed one of the best high school bands there has ever been. The stage band should not be confused with the equally famous high stepping marching band you see perform at half time of football games. These guys, many who went on to be professional musicians, were a concert band that played in and won just about every competition they ever entered. While most of their albums came out before my time, they are now a favorite of djs and hip hop artists who sample freely from the work of KSB.

Can you have too many chains?

This may be hard to see as taking a picture at night on a bus is pushing the capabilities of the iPhone camera, but this guy has at least 20 chains hanging off his pants. It's like he got into some kind of competition with his friends and was so determined to win that he lost all sense of reality and most of his ability to walk. Or maybe he has to carry a lot of money and wanted to chain each wallet to his pants, which seems like a bad idea because I don't think you'd want to draw this much attention to yourself if you were carrying a lot of money.

Pandora Radio

OK, I know Pandora Radio has been around for a while, but I just found it. If you haven't checked it out yet, I would highly recommend it. The principle is pretty simple and elegant. You type in the name of your favorite band and you get a virtual radio station that plays songs from that band and other bands like it. So of course I typed in the Sex Pistols and I got a stream of old and new school punk rock from the Ramones to Bad Religion to Green Day. You also get the chance to give songs the thumbs up or down, so it will start feeding you more of what you like and less of what you don't like. Another great feature is the artist histories which are too long to read when you are listening to three minute punk rock songs, but you could probably finish if you were listening to the Phish or Yes. I would recommend putting in a few very different artists so you have a wider spectrum of music to listen to based on your mood. Putting in the Clash and the Sex Pistols pretty much gets you the same stuff. Another great thing, it works on all your portable devises. If you have an iPhone or iTouch you should of course download the app from the iTunes store for free.