The bushes outside the restaurant make a map of intriguing little cul-de-sacs on the panels below the windows. For a moment I give the designers too much credit, imagine that they've cleverly pasted an appliqué of a foliage pattern on the outside of the panel. But no, it's just the traffic on Division on a Monday night, just the glare of big, bad life intruding on our interior; just the dreary reality of a Portland Monday night punctuating our consumption of pasta in identical white bowls. I've learned to lean forward into this rain of blows, learned a stance that will protect me from the worst of the bruising checks and bone-crunching blows against the half boards. I mean, what the fuck? What do I expect? I am technically adult, supposedly and on paper able to deal with these little frissons.

Why then am I sore? Why am I still not quite numb? What the fuck? The real purpose of a stocked bar: it's there when you need it.

We stop in at Apex Brewing. There's a granny smith-green tandem bike hanging from the ceiling with a block-printed tag hanging on: "Double Douche". The walls are covered with bicycles and motorcycles, code for the faithful. I ignore it all and enjoy my beer. Live and let live. Just drink, drink and forget. Or no, not forget, no, no, not forget. Reset. Reboot. A human who's learned to mimic his technology. Ingest the right chemical and reboot, magically regress to a specific moment, defined by not so much a hope of an outcome, but an ignorance of one, a willingness to entertain the best possible. Does that make sense? No matter. I am insulated by a sovereign tonic: ginger ale and rye whiskey. Honestly, it takes out pretty much everything.

Listen to this while you read the rest of my bullshit.

While I sit there listening to the loud and not too annoying music and the sounds of the pinball machine in the next room, a group of twenty- or thirty-somethings walk in, one of them on crutches, but all clean-cut and obviously in some bracket significantly higher than mine... They walk in and sit at another high table, glad but not joyous, happy but not over-happy, sexual but not unhealthily so, just glad to be there and enjoy some brews and be clean and well-adjusted. I instantly hate them, with an unreasoning, totally unjustified, contemptible hatred. Just another pudgy Portland hater eating his liver over a cool brew. But I plug in, I pitch in my dollar a drink, I get service, I get a smile. It's all part of the deal. After all, I am an aging freeloader, an improbably lucky man whose luck is the wrong flavor and who resents the fact. Where's the pathos in that?

On the other hand, the beer is pretty good. Those Germans, you have to hand it to them if only for their beer alone. Even the inexpensive stuff is pretty good, not like the head-pounding, bilious piss that the big American brewers dump into the public trough. I think this while I hoist a great glass stein of Warsteiner Dunkel, drink a silent toast to any unknown German forbears that may have been brewers. Then I think of Germans on Our Side: Günter Grass, Werner Herzog, Jörg Buttgereit. All they want is to tell the truth as they see it. See that place. See only that place. Don't look back, don't look back, just see that.

The little Iron Monger figurine waits in his coffin at the center of the board for a steelie to hurtle along and jar him into life. What would happen were no one to put in their fifty cents? He would just sit there, waiting, patiently, for someone to drop their quarter. Perhaps he would wait a long time. And when they did he would have to act as if he had been paid the courtesy just recently, just a while ago, when in fact he had waited through millenia, through endless golden and silver arcs of day and night, endless dusty hours... And who am I, who are we at any given moment? Are we the player or the figurine? Ah well, fuck it.

Lemmy

We just came home from a trip to the Clinton St. Theater to see Lemmy: 49% Motherfucker, 51% Son of a Bitch. A fine sketch of a true original and one of the greatest rockers Britain ever produced. Lemmy and Motörhead are still kicking ass after thirty plus years of solid rock. Go see it before the print moves on. It's showing through January 20th.

The one song I wished they'd included in the movie: "Shoot You in the Back", from Ace of Spades. I want to see an ultrasplashy spaghetti western with music by Lemmy.

Southeast Loops 1: Two Bridges and Bushwhacker

I've wasted endless hours trying to diagram my walks around town on Google Maps. There's just too many lines and points; pretty soon the map is unreadable, unless you want to save a new map for each loop, which is also impractical. So I'm going to describe them as posts on this blog and link to the places on a Google Map. Open the links in a new tab or window so you can refer to the map without toggling between map and text constantly. For a map to take with you, I recommend the very good and free maps from the Portland Department of Transportation. They show fairly all the features that are important to a pedestrian: food, drinking water, bathrooms, sidewalks, signals, and many other points of interest (including Heritage Trees- see below).

The first walk on the list is also probably the one I take the most: the Two Bridges/ Bushwhacker Loop. It takes you through some quiet neighborhood streets and even a little industrial: you get to cross the rails twice on two different pedestrian overpasses.

Start at SE Milwaukie and Mall. Cross Milwaukie at Center and walk down the hill to SE 15th St. Head north through Brooklyn Elementary park, then turn east on Lafayette. Cross SE 17th and climb the stairs of the footbridge there. At the other end of the bridge walk north up SE 20th. At Division cross to Ladd and walk northwest to Ladd's Circle. Follow the circle west to SE 16th and walk south through the south square. Worth a look there is the impressive old brick structure on the St. Philip of Neri lot. At Division you'll find a nondescript tan building that I suppose is a garage, based on several muscle cars I've seen there in the past. Cross Division and walk south on 16th. Follow 16th to SE Brooklyn St. Here Brooklyn ends at another footbridge that crosses the tracks behind a lumber yard. Take the steps and turn right, or northwest, up Brooklyn, then turn left on SE 13th Place. Turn left and cross Powell at the crosswalk in front of Southeast Grind coffee. Walk south through the Subway parking lot to find Bushwhacker cider and have a pint (or two, or four). If you can still see straight, turn south on SE 12th and walk to SE Pershing. Turn west and cross Milwaukie at the light. Walk south along Brooklyn Park and turn west again at SE Haig, a narrow cobble street that really ought to be one-way but isn't. Admire the hot rods and various collectible cars in Majhor Murray's lot. Walk up the steep hill to SE 10th and turn south. On 10th see some interesting architecture: a rolled-eave craftsman, a handsome roman brick veneer home and, if you look one block east at Center, the 1901 Sacred Heart church. Walk down 10th to Cora, then head east to 11th. Turn south and walk to SE Mall St. Don't miss the handsome China Fir that was recently designated a Portland Heritage Tree. Turn east on Mall and end at Milwaukie. The whole loop is about 2 1/2 miles.