I need a new suitcase...
Yesterday we woke up early, packed and drove to Portland, OR. Our partners and travel and crime were letters_to_ed and C. Of course, there was A Show, but we arrived around noon and had all afternoon to do stuff.
On the drive down, I started knitting a scarf for owlmoose. The day before, knowing we'd be waiting in the cold by the buses, I quizzed her on her cold weather gear. She confessed that she hadn't brought one. So before Tea, we shopped the cute yarn store next door and I made her buy some yarn so I could knit for her. She got some very soft baby alpaca. OMG, what fun to knit.
First we went to Powell's. For those who don't know, it's just about the biggest bookstore on the planet. They have both new and used books so I found a book for my mom that's out of print that she's been wanting. I also bought the 5 Crowns game (finally!). I got a couple of reading books because I finished the one I flew out here with. But mindful of my luggage situation, I controlled myself.
Here's Bob and Jeff's Boston Pops tickets with Powells:
After Powells walked around looking for food and slowly made our way across downtown Portland. At one point, we passed a fur store complete with a protest outside. It was very orderly. The punk kids had their signs, a few animal costumes, and sidewalk chalk. A couple of police officers stood across the street watching. A kid with a mohawk rode a bike in circles around the block leading anti-fur cheers and using proper hand signals for turning.
Here's Bob and Jeff's Boston Pops tickets with the protest:
On the way back to the hotel, we stopped at the Portland Saturday Market. A bunch of booths with local artisans selling their wares. The usual art fair merchandise: pottery, jewelry, knit items, carved items, and funnel cakes. The 6th or 7th booth we hit was a very talented glass bead maker. And I gave up any pretext of not shipping stuff home. I bought some lovely purple earrings with matching necklace for myself. I bought some other stuff for x-mas for my sister. And I also bought a neat copper and blue goldstone spiral wind thingy for another sister present. Tomorrow, I have to find USPS before the airport.
We crashed at the hotel for a bit and after I disconnected the TV from LodgeNet, we watched High Fidelity on C's iPod. Then it was dinner and the show.
Setlist was great. Just A Toy is always fantastic live. When You Dream acoustic was delightful. There was an adlib about Ed's new tattoos and Steve's wine tasting activities on their 2 days off in Portland. There was also an adlib about Wallace Shawn that ended with "No more rhymes and I mean it; anybody want a peanut?". I got lots of stage love from both Steve and Ed. At the Boston show, I got picks from Mike Dougty and from Ed. R. drilled holes and put jump rings in them, but she was out of leather cord for necklaces, so she gave them to me unmounted. I spent some time before the trip fashioning my own jewelry out of them. The Doughy pick now lives on a satin cord choker. And the Ed pick became an earring. After tonight's show, when Ed was tossing picks, he came over and pointed me out and tossed me one. But it fell short of the barrier and landed out of reach. He threw up his hands and pointed at his ear, clearly intending for me to have a pair of earrings. Fortunately, we convinced the security guard that the pick was meant for me. So R, I need your drilling services once again.
After the show we waited in the cold for a long time. owlmoose was glad for her scarf. The guys finally came out. Tyler was shocked to see letters_to_ed and I because he didn't notice us during the show. He said the 8-track has a special home on the bus and that when they get back to Toronto, he's going to find a player. He also asked if we'd actually recorded BLAM on it. Sadly, no such luck.
Ed told us about his new tattoo, explained the change from Fun and Games to Ink, and I thanked him for my pick and he thanked me for dancing (during the show, he gave me a great grin after the first Brian Wilson jump that we shared). We made some requests. And then we discovered that Ed's Sharpie is a special BLAM sharpie!!! If he hadn't given me a pick last night, I think I would have grabbed it from him, because he was all done signing when he showed us.
Steve came along and AM made requests. He blanched because they were all Ed songs. So I asked for Powder Blue sometime in California. During the show, I'd called Bob during When You Dream and I got a text message in response saying "Seriously. When you dream? F them. :)". I showed it to Steve who laughed and said "He never asks for it, it's always Crazy or something else". But there's no hard feelings, because he posed with the Pops tickets (and I didn't use a flash but it kind of works with his expression):
Okay, that's all. Back on the road in a bit for the trip back to Seattle and the next show.
On the drive down, I started knitting a scarf for owlmoose. The day before, knowing we'd be waiting in the cold by the buses, I quizzed her on her cold weather gear. She confessed that she hadn't brought one. So before Tea, we shopped the cute yarn store next door and I made her buy some yarn so I could knit for her. She got some very soft baby alpaca. OMG, what fun to knit.
First we went to Powell's. For those who don't know, it's just about the biggest bookstore on the planet. They have both new and used books so I found a book for my mom that's out of print that she's been wanting. I also bought the 5 Crowns game (finally!). I got a couple of reading books because I finished the one I flew out here with. But mindful of my luggage situation, I controlled myself.
Here's Bob and Jeff's Boston Pops tickets with Powells:
After Powells walked around looking for food and slowly made our way across downtown Portland. At one point, we passed a fur store complete with a protest outside. It was very orderly. The punk kids had their signs, a few animal costumes, and sidewalk chalk. A couple of police officers stood across the street watching. A kid with a mohawk rode a bike in circles around the block leading anti-fur cheers and using proper hand signals for turning.
Here's Bob and Jeff's Boston Pops tickets with the protest:
On the way back to the hotel, we stopped at the Portland Saturday Market. A bunch of booths with local artisans selling their wares. The usual art fair merchandise: pottery, jewelry, knit items, carved items, and funnel cakes. The 6th or 7th booth we hit was a very talented glass bead maker. And I gave up any pretext of not shipping stuff home. I bought some lovely purple earrings with matching necklace for myself. I bought some other stuff for x-mas for my sister. And I also bought a neat copper and blue goldstone spiral wind thingy for another sister present. Tomorrow, I have to find USPS before the airport.
We crashed at the hotel for a bit and after I disconnected the TV from LodgeNet, we watched High Fidelity on C's iPod. Then it was dinner and the show.
Setlist was great. Just A Toy is always fantastic live. When You Dream acoustic was delightful. There was an adlib about Ed's new tattoos and Steve's wine tasting activities on their 2 days off in Portland. There was also an adlib about Wallace Shawn that ended with "No more rhymes and I mean it; anybody want a peanut?". I got lots of stage love from both Steve and Ed. At the Boston show, I got picks from Mike Dougty and from Ed. R. drilled holes and put jump rings in them, but she was out of leather cord for necklaces, so she gave them to me unmounted. I spent some time before the trip fashioning my own jewelry out of them. The Doughy pick now lives on a satin cord choker. And the Ed pick became an earring. After tonight's show, when Ed was tossing picks, he came over and pointed me out and tossed me one. But it fell short of the barrier and landed out of reach. He threw up his hands and pointed at his ear, clearly intending for me to have a pair of earrings. Fortunately, we convinced the security guard that the pick was meant for me. So R, I need your drilling services once again.
After the show we waited in the cold for a long time. owlmoose was glad for her scarf. The guys finally came out. Tyler was shocked to see letters_to_ed and I because he didn't notice us during the show. He said the 8-track has a special home on the bus and that when they get back to Toronto, he's going to find a player. He also asked if we'd actually recorded BLAM on it. Sadly, no such luck.
Ed told us about his new tattoo, explained the change from Fun and Games to Ink, and I thanked him for my pick and he thanked me for dancing (during the show, he gave me a great grin after the first Brian Wilson jump that we shared). We made some requests. And then we discovered that Ed's Sharpie is a special BLAM sharpie!!! If he hadn't given me a pick last night, I think I would have grabbed it from him, because he was all done signing when he showed us.
Steve came along and AM made requests. He blanched because they were all Ed songs. So I asked for Powder Blue sometime in California. During the show, I'd called Bob during When You Dream and I got a text message in response saying "Seriously. When you dream? F them. :)". I showed it to Steve who laughed and said "He never asks for it, it's always Crazy or something else". But there's no hard feelings, because he posed with the Pops tickets (and I didn't use a flash but it kind of works with his expression):
Okay, that's all. Back on the road in a bit for the trip back to Seattle and the next show.