Pirate Dog PDX

Open letter to eHarmony

I understand that dating is hard and match-making isn't for sissies. My former friend Carolyn-the-cat-f#%ker was an eHarmony pro and had advised me that I'd have to kiss a few frogs to get that handsome prince. (As a cat-f#%ker, you might imagine she'd be hard-to-match.)

And, in fairness to you and your "29-points-of-compatibility," I did garner the handsome David from eHarmony, so I can't say that you are without any worthwhile moves. Thank you.

How-so-ever. I participated in your "free trial" over New Years weekend, and it was a sobering, near-lesbian-making experience. From the dude who listed the last book he read as "Old Yellow: the story of a boy and his dog" to the man who "preferred not to leave his house" and referred to his cat as "the missus" to this guy, I had to ask myself: "What does someone have to do to get rejected by eHarmony?"

My Mr. Right won't sport a wife beater t-shirt and comb-over. So, I tried to break up with you, eHarmony, citing the end of my "free trial." (It's not you. It's me.) Yet, you've continued to pursue me ... sending me more just like him. Trust me: I'm not the future Mrs. Nose-bandaid. People who know me will tell you that.

Maybe I'm just old fashioned. But, I think I can do better. Please. Find this man a woman, preferably someone with nursing experience and no self-esteem. Good luck.

(In fairness, this photo was taken from thesmokinggun.com. He's my made-up amalgamated eHarmony dude. Yes, he also looks like Neil Diamond. He is not.)

Save the Nerds

After a lifetime of charitable work, I am so burned out on saving the gay, black whales for Jesus, I sometimes dream of clubbing baby harbor seals, myself. (They won't club themselves, ya know, as PETA will school you in graphic Donna Karan-hating detail.)  And, yet, even I can still fight for ...

IPRC is Portland's nonprofit Independent Publishing Resource Center. They provide a safe space for creative expression and the celebration of a freakishly awkward dork community: Writers.

By providing access to resources and tools for the creation of independently published media, the fine folks at IPRC are making it possible for me to NOT wait for the publishing world to discover me. And, they've been doing that since 1998 ... long before I even needed or knew I wanted nerd community. I only wish I still had braces.

So, what's the first item of business on my IPRC agenda? Their Chinese New Year Celebration on February 7 includes a timed, judged write-off about rats, in celebration of the Chinese Year of the Rat. Adios, Year of the Pig.(February 18, 2007-February 6, 2008) You had your chance.

As it happens, I am a rat-writer from way back. At Peninsula Humane Society, I penned the highly acclaimed "New Homes for the Little Guys." Missed it? Hm. It is considered by some to be the definitive work on rat adoption in San Mateo County.

Since IPRC is between my apartment and Chinatown on SW Oak Street, I think I might swing by, pen a little rat-prose, grab my "prizes for the most versatile writers," and still make it to the Chinese red underwear party at the bar formerly known as "Hung Far Low."

It's good to be a nerd.

Weird is a "Thing" Here, Too!

I must get a post done about the fabulous folks at Bean Tree Coffee on the Riverwalk, around the corner from my apartment. Tracy and Chad (and their Bernese Mountain Dog "Kona") own Bean Tree Coffee House. They're awesome, doggie friendly, and they've been my designated coffee providers of choice since I broke up with the Dave Matthews coffee dudes next door (except today, since Bean Tree is closed on Tuesdays). This is not that post, though. The Bean Tree folks are super cute, and their post will include photos. Which we don't have right now.

This post is about the Weird.

If you live here, you've seen this bumper sticker. If you live in Santa Cruz, you've seen our own "Keep it Weird" bumper sticker and thought, "Handled." Kabuki Pink Umbrella Guy, anybody?

In Portland, keeping it weird means buying local, which is why I mention the Bean Tree. Though there are Starbucks and other chains-a-plenty in Portland, there are a surprising number of independent vendors of all shapes and sizes that give Portland an actual personality all its own. Local "weird" businesses even have their own chamber of commerce, and, as today's graphic indicates, their own bumper stickers. Here's their walk through the streets of weird Portland. Enjoy.

PS: I would do anything if we could get Portland a pink umbrella guy, too. "Robert" just dresses a city up ... like a set of pearls with jeans.

The French are all Hype, but Nice Anyway (By Rico)

We've got this dream that someday we can bring joy to old and sick people as pet therapists. Scratch that. SHE has this dream, that I will entertain old and sick people while she takes the credit, and maybe, just maybe, that will karmically balance all the outfits she puts me in and the off-color jokes she's been known to make. So many outfits. We are going to have to visit a LOT of old people.

So. To achieve HER dream, I have to get over my distaste for other dogs. To that end,we're attending Miss Caroline's Night School for Stoopid Puppeez. If you've been reading along, you know how that's going.

Now, we're doing playgroups. Yesterday, we went to LexiDog Boutique and Social Club. They offer a free Sunday playgroup for dogs of all sizes. I played in the 12-30 pound group.

According to LexiDog's website, "playgroups are a time for you to bring your dog to play with other dogs in a warm, dry indoor environment, while you get to visit with other dog loving humans."

According to reality, French Bulldogs OWN the LexiDog mid-size playgroup. This is good news. The French have such a cool look, like mimes. As you may know, I want a beret so bad, so mom got me to go to this "playgroup" deal suggesting that the French Bulldogs could tell me where to buy a beret in my size. And, you know, maybe give me some tips on growing a tasteful pencil mustache. Tres Francais, I thought.

Not so. Here's what I went through:

Do you see berets? Striped French sailor suits? I do not.

Ppfffffffttttttt ... You smell like beans, monsieur.

Dude. You look like a loaf of bread. Not even French bread.

She smells like bouef bourgingnon. Pretty, too.

The French are insane. Know that.

The French obsession with Jerry Lewis totally makes sense now.

Is that a pencil mustache? No. They're teeth. Wait. You're not even FRENCH!

La femme jolie, avec treats!

"Bonjour? Je suis 'Winston.'"

BTW, they were all named "Winston," as in Churchill or "Sherman" as in tank or "Butch" as in tough little fireplug of a lesbian or "Tulip," you know, 'cause it's ironic. But, they aren't French names. What gives?

I thought the French weren't supposed to be f-a-t. They're hitting le fromage a little hard, n'est pas?

Okay. In fairness, I smell haggis. Maybe I really do smell like beans.

That was my day.

I have to say I like the French (and all the dogs I met at LexiDog) better than puppeez.  The LexiDog staff was super nice and I loved their fashion-forward boutique. No berets, but they had sailor suits (I think French) ... for $60! Maybe for my birthday.

Hung--Just Right in PDX

There are two Chinatowns in Portland. Old Chinatown includes mostly Cantonese speakers, has a homeless shelter on every block, a walled historic Chinese garden, giant ceramic foo dog gates, and narrow, dirty streets. It's walking distance from my apartment.

The new Chinatown has more Mandarin speakers, and it is more organized, but we keep it on the East side, way out on SE 82nd street. Strip-mall city. Soulless. Blech.

Back in the day ...
In the 1800s, the Chinese firmly established their community in Portland, between what is now called the Pearl District and the Willamette River. The Chinese were busy, busy, busy in shady Stumptown. Bars. Brothels. Kidnapping. The birthplace of the Shanghai Tunnels, Chinatown boasted a honeycomb of underground passages that are still in existence and visitable in this part of the city. We no longer use the tunnels to bop people on the head and send them out on commercial boats to serve as crew. (I wish!) Now, the underground tunnels are used by ghost tours and the homeless.

In 1928, Chinese bar owners with "Porky's"-grade humor opened "Hung Far Low." Wait. Not "Porky's." It was Molly Ringwald's "Sixteen Candles" that featured Chinese exchange student "Long Duk Dong," which might have been an even better Chinese restaurant name.

Anyway, the food at Hung Far Low was, by all accounts, hard to swallow, but the establishment had an impressive sign, as you might expect. Before Hung Far Low moved to the East side, the sign said "Cocktails" at the bottom, but "vandals" had long ago blacked out the "tails." Of course. How could they not?

In 2005, the Hung Far Low bar/restaurant moved to SE 82nd street. While locals worried the sign would disappear when the bar/restaurant did, it did not. The building's owners simply altered the sign, so that it now says "building" where cock(tail) used to hang.

History du Jour, served up fresh and hot ... by your Pirate Dogs.

Hello Berkeley! Hey Belize! I can see your ISPs!

Actually, there are no ISPs from Belize visiting the Pirate Dog's blog. Unfortunately.

But, maybe with Belize in the  title of a Pirate Dog post, someone FROM Belize will Google "Belize" + "chihuahua poets," and find us. Then, Rico and I will have a cool, new pen pal who offers her beach front home for the first annual "Pirate Dog Belize" conference. It could happen. Someone from Oklahoma City googled "Nyquil" + "Redbull" + "vodka" and found us. I suspect the "Pirate Dog Oklahoma City" Conference may not be appropriate for all pirate dogs.

I'll keep you posted on my quest for Belize, though.

Actually, I wrote that title for this reason: Recently, I acquired statcounter.com, a free service that shows me who Pirate Dog's lurky little pals are, you know, beside those of you I'm lurking back ... and/or related to ... and/or just plain love. Hi Mom. Dad. David. Annie. Uncle Charlie (at both his SC and Berkeley estates). LB. VA. Herb. Mara. JWo. Atlanta-person (Google Search: "Willamette" + "Dammit"). I can seeeeee you.

I just wrote "Belize" because "Tucson Medical Center" doesn't rhyme with "ISPs." Plus, it plays havoc with my iambic pentameter.

See, though none of my well-intended lurkers works for Tucson Medical Center, in two days, I've had more visits from that corporate entity than from my entire family-o-freaks combined. Hm. Shouldn't you be working down there, finding a cure for turquoise poisoning or something?

Now. If you're lurky and friendly, I sure would like it if you'd follow rebel-Herb's lead and comment now and again. LB, VA, JWo, I appreciate that you, too, have dipped your collective toes in the comment pool.

I know you got it in ya. My sweet daddy sent all manner of helpful Lawrence Welk websites to my email address yesterday, in response to my post. I can use his research and all new fun facts in chapter two of my Lawrence Welk saga: "Revenge of the Champagne Ladies." I'll bet you all would have enjoyed having that resource made available to you, too. That's the beauty of a blog. It's the sharing.

Of course, I want you to visit--even if you don't want to comment. However. As I have committed to posting regularly, I cannot allow poor Herb to bear the burden of entertaining me alone. He's got his own hungry, yet hilarious blogbeast to feed.

Tucson, please stop.

The rest of you, throw a bone to your writergirl and her tiny buccaneer pal. Or, you know. Don't. I'll still love you, naturally.

And now, back to our program ...

"Belize. Belize. Belize." She said, in an attempt to improve her Google search rankings for the convenience of our future Belizean pen pal/hostess. "Belize." Oh, and you aren't a family-o-freaks. I just like how it sounds and nicely folds in those of you who aren't actually, legally related.

"Belize!"

Peddling a Peculiar Brand of Hotness

There's a saying that if you remember the '60s, you missed it. Not so if you were born in 1965 and got to live through the Summer of Love as a toddler. As children, we just saw a different 60s ... a Dr. Seussian '60s, which was probably not all that different than how the adults saw it, now that I think about it.

As a little kid, I went to parties with my super-hot, single-gal mom and witnessed the passing of "peace pipes," as I helpfully relayed to my grandmother when my mom and I came home. Mom was quick to add that she never "played Indian" (that I saw). (ahem) Yet, I remained unspoiled. That's what a good hippie mommy can do for a kid.

On the Ed Sullivan show, I remember seeing the Rolling Stones in their blue and white striped sailor suits, all freaky and skinny and rock-n-roll scary. I was laying on my gramma's rug watching the big console television through a haze of my grandparents' cigarette smoke (before second-hand smoke was invented). Neither gramma nor I had ever seen such a thing as the Rolling Stones. We agreed that we were disturbed by them, a gramma and her three-year-old fuddy duddy.

At the other side of the musical spectrum, grampa and gramma wouldn't miss Lawrence Welk on Saturday night at 7 p.m. A big bowl o' wholesome (enough to choke a Mormon), the Lawrence Welk Show provided "family values" entertainment, at its Arian-raciest. Welk fired creepy Bobby Burgess's dance parter Cissy King for her upstart attitude. Cissy was a ballroom dancer. What could she have done?

The Stones never played the Welk Show. The Osmonds did. So did Pat Boone. And, Anita Bryant. Creationist-pop for America's most chaste television viewers, that was Lawrence Welk. Over the show's 27-year history of original episodes, Welk's band played Tea-for-Two an unbelieveable 67 times.  Technically, that's Tea-for-134. Welk loved tea. It's the most wholesome breakfast beverage, you know.

That said, even Lawrence Welk did the '60s. At least for the five minutes it took to take this photo. Don't miss the second person from the left. He's giving the famous three-finger peace sign, unique to Welk hippies.

Lawrence Welk is on the far right--in drag. Hey, that might be my single favorite sentence since I started this blog.

Oh! Oh! That's Arthur Duncan next to him. He was the black guy on the show. Besides the Mexican girl who only sang in Spanish, Arthur was the only Welkie of color. Period. Arthur did sing, yes, but his special skill was ... tap dancing. Naturally.

Diversity, you might be thinking right now, is not a word coined by the Germans. True. But, for the record, though he retained a "Wunnerful" German accent his entire life, Lawrence Welk was born in North Dakota. (Another hotbed of diversity.) Consider that Welk didn't learn to speak English until he was 21, living in the smack-dab middle of the United States.

Still. 27 years on American television. Lawrence Welk was the second richest television entertainer of his time. Only Bob Hope had more dough. Someone besides my grandparents thought he was hot. You gotta respect that in a guy.

Oregonian Steve Keeps Portland Weird (So I Don't Have To)

Thanks Steve! You are an eHarmony cautionary tale, but you're doing the Lord's work, and we all appreciate it. Plus, you've discovered Pirate Art in Portland. Wow!

Oregon Crime Spree

I am no stranger to dangerous cities.

I lived in LA when Helter Skelter went skipping through the bloody hills of Hollywood. I lived in New York when John Lennon was shot. I lived in San Francisco when Polly Klaas was kidnapped. Scary stuff.

Oregon crime, however, is another breed, altogether. I was not prepared.

This fall, in Oregon, 75 stolen lawn ornaments from as many as 20 neighborhoods were all posed, against their wills, on a single lawn. Horrifying. Oversized painted frogs stood with gnomes who seemed happy as could be to stand with little concrete squirrels offering concrete acorns to something-with-a-novelty-hat-and-rain-vest.

Gnome-stock!

By last week, many of the stolen lawn ornaments had been returned to their rightful/worried sick owners. Oregon Police, fearing that the crime trail has grown cold, are still looking for a suspect. Or suspects. Police believe that one person couldn't have posed so many characters so quickly. Here's what our local news had to say: Gnomes find homes, but suspects still at large.

Happy Martin Luther King Day!

Dr. King's most memorable quotes, as portrayed by Rico's bathtime interpretive dance.
 

"Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed."
    --Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

 

 

"All progress is precarious, and the solution of one problem brings us face to face with another problem."
    --Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

 

"In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."
    --Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.