Archive for the 'north portland' Category

Attorneys who love chickens

Published
by
sarah
on April 17, 2008
in Uncategorized, north portland and portland is awesome
. 3 Comments

It is a Sunday, and of course I am going to the Chicken Fest at Livingscape Nursery. I have volunteered to help, I am, after all, That Chicken Lady. It is early, and it is cold, and I wonder if maybe I am too early. There are no chicken banners. There are no chicken-y greeters. I wander around, a minute, finding all the lovely hens who have been loaned by local chicken people. I say their breeds to myself. Banded Rock. Ameraucana. Rhode Island Red. Australorp! Cochin.

I see someone who is wearing a chicken hat. Ahh, I’m not too early. When he stops buzzing about, I approach him.

“I’m Sarah Gilbert,” I say. He is wearing worn jeans and a yellow felt hat with a chicken, and looks like he hasn’t shaven for a day or two. Like the sort of person who would run a nursery focused on sustainability and native plantings. “Are you THE Sarah Gilbert?” he asks warmly. He seems vaguely familiar. “Of course you are!”

We know each other, he tells me, and I can’t place him. I blame the chicken hat. “I’m your patent attorney!” he says.

Steve Adamson is very probably my favorite attorney, ever. His patient and careful explanation of the patent and trademark process for one of the startups I worked for was key in developing my own geeky love for intellectual property. I think my boss was very, very slow in paying him, and Steve never got angry or sent me to collections. I find myself hoping that he was paid in full. I went on maternity leave with my second son before that had been wrapped up.

And now he’s here, on N. Vancouver Avenue just around the corner from Pix and SCRAP, running a nursery. Where they sell chickens! I bought two babies, an Ameraucana and a Columbia Wyandotte (”I saw a picture of this chicken and I knew we HAD to carry them!” Steve said excitedly.) They also have blueberries, and huckleberries, and all kinds of great plants and seeds. You should really go there for your baby chicks and your native grapes. And maybe if you are an IP geek too, you could kvetch with him about the state of the USPTO. That’s just the kind of place Portland is.

Neon Avenue

Published
by
kmazz
on April 14, 2008
in culture and north portland
. 0 Comments

This is really something special. A neon corridor on Interstate. For designophiles and culture vultures like me it would be like Christmas lights all year long. In fact, why don’t they rename the street Neon Avenue?

The signs would be grandfathering into code governing the gentrification soon to descend on this neck of Portland, saving these vintage artifacts for all posterity.

Check it out here.

Portland is a Salty Town

Published
by
Dawn
on April 14, 2008
in food and drink, north portland and northeast
. 1 Comment

Maybe I eat a little too much salt, but I have a big weakness for fancy salts, which are ridiculously easy to find here in Portland. I’ve always loved salt, but until a few years ago, I ate mostly run of the mill table salt. About 7 years ago, I bought a salt grinder and switched to sea salt, which seemed so exotic to me at the time. A few years later, Todd introduced me to coarse kosher salt, which is great on so many things.

It wasn’t until a few months ago that my first dinner at Nutshell changed the way I looked at salt. Nutshell has a bread, olive oil and salt menu where you select a type of bread along with one or more high-quality olive oils and fancy salts as an appetizer. I tried Turkish Black Pyramid salt, which is just as the name describes: black in color and naturally shaped like little pyramids.

We decided to go online and buy a few cool types of salt to have at home, and a google search for Turkish Black Pyramid salt led me to a site called The Meadow where I ordered a “starter set” of salts to try. The day after placing the order, I went back to the site to see where The Meadow was located (to help gauge when my awesome salt would arrive). I was surprised to find out that they are located at 3731 N. Mississippi Avenue in Portland! Oops. I could have just visited the store to pick out my salt, which I have done several times since that first order. They also have a huge selection of chocolates, so even if you aren’t as much of a salt fan as I am, it is well worth the trip.

I will never think of salt the same way again!