July 23, 2008

We Go To Gotham

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We go to Gotham.

To eat. To talk. To bond.

We go to Gotham.

To be scared. To laugh. To yell.

We go to Gotham.

Hungry. Pregnant with BLT and Bay Shrimp Ceviche. Satisfied with conversation.
Scared of the clown. Laughing with the clown. Sad for the death of the clown. No more magic tricks ever.

Gotham Tavern
2240 N. Interstate Ave
Portland
www.gothamtavern.com

The Dark Knight
(Seriously? You need me to tell you where this is playing?)

Still Have Open Dates on Your Calendar?

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PDX Pop Now!
July 25-27
Rotture
315 SE 3rd Ave
Portland
(There will be great local bands here, including: Loch Lomond, Rainy States, Norfolk and Western and Liv Warfield.)

Bite of Oregon
August 8-9
Waterfront Park
(Mediocre food and the March Fourth Marching Band on Saturday night - great people watching.)

July 21, 2008

Have a Cup of Discount with Your Scalp Massage.

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Went to SE Hawthorne the other night to get my hair done by one, Simon Ho at DOSHA on Hawthorne. Lovely - no more long, stringy, hair. Haircut (including scalp massage) + product for my hair = $80. Yikes. (Totally worth it.)

Ate Chicken Chipotle salad at Cup and Saucer Cafe. Good inexpensive, flavorful salad. Strange service, with a staring waiter. But I distracted myself by facing the window, entranced by all the diversity that wanders SE Hawthorne at night.

Oh snap. Need a new purse. Mine is ragged. Crossroads Trading Company was still open. Great selection of name brand handbags. I fell in love with a smart purple bag with buckles. Granny or hip? Don't care. I'm getting it anyway. Heavy, real, purple leather. This will last me a long time. $25. That's a bargain.

My hair is cut, massaged and product filled. My new purse is shiny and purple. My stomach is full. Hawthorne served me well.

Crossroads Trading Company
www.crossroadstradingcompany.com
3736 SE Hawthorne Blvd.
Portland


DOSHA Salon
3490 SE Hawthorne Blvd.
Portland
www.dosha.org

Cup and Saucer 2 on Urbanspoon

July 20, 2008

Steal My Kisses, Please.

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A recent discussion of best Hollywood kisses yielded this list:

Stranger Than Fiction

Little Women (My sisters and I used to watch this in slow motion, just to see the saliva)

Some Kind of Wonderful

Ally McBeal (okay, this isn't an actual kiss, but it is one of the best romantic scenes on television. Robert Downey, Jr. + Sting singing Every Breath You Take)

The Whole Wide World (Forget Criminal Intent. This is the Vincent D'onofrio that I love. If you haven't seen this movie, you definitely should. Be sure to bring Kleenex.)

Bridget Jones (Hello. Colin Firth.)

Rear Window (Grace Kelly is perfect. Damn her.)

From Here to Eternity

Freaks and Geeks (Spin the Bottle)

What are your favorite Hollywood kisses?

July 16, 2008

Lizzy's BlackBerry Goes On a Play Date

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Once a month I treat myself to a massage from my good friend Lisa Still at HeartSong Massage. I've been going to her for about 8 years now and I was addicted from day one. She's a kick in the pants. Usually, I leave relaxed from a massage, and my tummy muscles sore from laughing so hard. Love. Her.

Today I was a half hour late for my appointment. I told her to give me a shorty massage, so as not to inconvenience her next appointment. Lucky me, though, her next appointment didn't show up. So we went to happy hour. Of course. What else would we do?

We headed over to Stanford's. Yes, a chain restaurant. The thing is though. They have a newish menu. At least since the last time I was there. Why not check it out, I thought. So, I ordered a virgin margarita, a chopped salad and the blue cheese and bacon chips to share. Lisa ordered a pomegranate martini and the chicken strips.

We alternated between being engrossed in the dating rituals going on around us and texting/emailing/taking pictures and then sharing. We both have new BlackBerries. We were comparing. And observing Leathery Tan Woman #1 trying to pick up on Hot Bartender #1, who could have been her son. We laughed. Flirting is fun to watch. And hard to turn away from.

Amazingly, there were actually two other Leathery Tan Women in the bar at the same time, but they had dates and were NOT trying to inappropriately pick up on young, vulnerable bartenders.

Lisa received a lemon drop instead of a martini and it seemed as though the waiter thought my friend wanted a virgin drink, too (no pucker in the lemon). Silly waiter. She got a pomegranate martini later on that was appropriately potent.

My margarita was too sweet and not sour enough. There was not enough salt on the rim either. The chips, though. They were beautiful. Oh. And tasty. So so so tasty. I even got a picture of them:

Chunks of blue cheese and crispy bacon with fresh chives and tomatoes on hot, freshly fried potato chips. The salt of the bacon + the creaminess of the blue cheese and the mild crunch of the chives with the hot potato crisps - it was a perfect marriage. Which is more than can be said about you people out there.

Wipe off your chin. You're drooling.

Our bar buddies next to us, an older couple, asked us what they were and because we are kind and we were feeling generous, we gave them a sample. (Don't you wish that you sat next to such nice people when you go to bars?)

The rest of the food was good old bar food. Nothing spectacular, nothing horrible, nothing memorable. Besides the chips. But we've already discussed those.

In the end, we promised to text more often, we hugged and parted ways. My next appointment is in less than 4 weeks. Can't wait.


HeartSong Massage
15800 Boones Ferry Rd., Ste. C203
Lake Oswego, OR
503-697-2031

Stanford's Restaurant & Bar on Urbanspoon

Save the Date(s). Part Two

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Climber + Derby + Tango Alpha Tango. August 5th. Doug Fir. $5.

Priscilla Ahn. August 27th. Lola's Room. $12.

Sondre Lerche
. August 28th. Doug Fir. $13.

Musicfest NW. Need I say more? September 3-6th. A few bands I am excited about: Port O'Brien, M. Ward, Vampire Weekend, Nada Surf. $50 for the whole damn weekend.

The Raconteurs. September 16-17. Roseland Theater. $35.

The Kooks. October 22nd. Crystal Ballroom.

Is there a reason to EVER leave Portland?

July 15, 2008

Save the Date(s).

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As much as I love summer, I always get a little excited about the fall. The back-to-school anticipation in the air, even for those of us that are done with school. Excitingly, there are so many things to look forward in the coming months leading into Fall. I'm helping with Wordstock this year, and it's going to be so great. And I just signed up to do another Write Around Portland workshop starting in September. The words are going to be all over my brain this fall.

Back Fence PDX

True Colors

August 15th, 7:30

Urban Grind East
2214 NE Oregon St.
Beer, wine, booze.


Write Around Portland

Wednesday, August 7th - Summer Anthology Release Party and Community Reading

Saturday, October 4th - Wordigo


Literary Arts

David Sedaris - October 31st

Annie Leibovitz - November 20th


Wordstock

November 7-9 at the Convention Center



July 11, 2008

Will You Marry Me? Okay. Fine. Then take me to Lucier instead.

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"So I promised the valet that I would go back for a drink. You guys want to meet me there?" I was hesitant. The 4th of July. I was not dressed up. No, in fact, I think you could say that I was definitely dressed down. Lucier is rumored to have a dress code. And a river running through it. (Now that would be very Robert Redford-ish if there really was!) Not the place I would go in my grubbies after sitting in the dirt watching the fireworks on the waterfront.

Laura seemed confident though - "Oh they'll let us in, it's just the bar." Why the hell not. Sure. Let's try it. We greeted the valet, who remembered Laura. Wait. Stop right there. If the evening had ended right then, it would have been enough. The valet was as hot as the 4th of July. And it actually WAS the 4th of July, so I can verify the accuracy of that statement. I reflected on my own appearance as I stared at him.

My eye makeup was of course smeared from the heat and the business of the day and by 10:30 I looked like a full-fledged heroin addict, with ripped jeans and a t-shirt and a red fleece blanket crumpled in my arms from the fireworks show. Ah well. Sometimes it's hot to just be yourself, yes? (The correct answer is: YES. Thanks for playing.)

The valet, darling as he was, assured us that we were not underdressed. "You know there's no dress code here. It says 'business casual', and this is Portland after all. You guys are fine."

We wandered to the patio and I caught a glimpse of the dining room on our way. H. O. L. Y. Did the architects know they were building a restaurant in PORTLAND? The chandeliers, tablecloths and flowers made me cough a little and cover up, as if I was exposing some part of myself.

We found the perfect place to sit - a couch and two cushy chairs around a coffee table. Mmmm. The menu was short. And French. My eyes went straight to the truffled parsnip chips (parsnip chips gratinees, black truffle-infused oil, bra tenero cheese). And some kind of fried cheese things (Fourme d’ambert cromesquis, fourme d’ ambert cheese croquette sauternes & honeycomb syrup). My friends ordered all manner of desserts.

The waitresses all wore uniforms of silky/satiny halter tops, black slacks and high heels. Malibu Barbie was our waitress. The original Barbie was in there somewhere, too. But all the Barbies were nice and friendly and spot-on waitresses. I'm only calling them Barbies because I'm jealous. Truly. They were all as hot as the valet. I began to wonder: Am I really in Portland or am I on a strange drug-trip to 90210?

Sigh. The food was A-mazing. The parsnip chips? Yah. Could have eaten the plate of them all myself and maybe even a second plate of them. The deep truffle flavor and salt permeated the delicate parsnips and it all came together with the cheese that was melted on top. Think hoity-toity nachos that rock. Thank goodness my pride was a little on guard that night and I refrained from the desperation-second-order. There was no need, really. The desserts, which included a black pepper cheesecake and jasmine creme brulee and then a chocolate fancy dish, had really interesting flavor combinations. I liked them and thought that the the pastry chef must be intriguing. I am really more of a salt person, though. I could have stuck with the chips and cheese and been so so happy. Instead, I pushed it a little farther and was stuffed.

Right about the time I was going to go into a food coma, Malibu Barbie came by and told us that it was last call. Sara and Chelsea went to the bathroom and came back all agog and with a beautiful brown fancy-dinner-napkin like paper towel as a souvenir.

As we were leaving, the waitress gave us a tour of the dining room. Gasp! There IS a river running through it. Not kidding. Well, it is really more of a trickle in a tiled moat around the dining room. But still. A river runs through it. She was talking about the symbolism of the different styles and walls and how it all reflects Portland, but I just kept thinking that I needed to run home and shower and put on some really nice clothes before I could understand anything that she was saying.

It is really, really beautiful. The food is rich and flavorful and memorable. I really want to go to dinner there, but it's going to have to be an occasion that's worth it. This is not a Friday night, restaurant group kind of a place. It's a 50th anniversary place. Or a my book just got published place. Or OMG I just got a $5,000 bonus at work place. Or a marriage proposal place.

But I don't put it past myself to dress up one night and pretend that one of those things is happening to me, just so I can eat dinner there.

Lucier on Urbanspoon

BlackBerry Blogging

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I am sitting here with all the windows open enjoying the breeze and the view of the Willamette River. And I am discovering blogging on my BlackBerry.

I am loving Stand By Me for the first time ever. This might be the perfect Friday night.