Another Last Day In Portland
Today I'm catching an Amtrak train down the coast to San Francisco. I've had a really great time here in Portland. Now it's time to go once again.
A brief list of what's been happening in the last 36 hours or so:
- Went to a new bar opening up on Mississippi Ave on Wednesday evening. The place used to be an artist's livework studio, all piled with clothes and cavases. Now she, who was an acquaintance back then, and partners have turned the place into a really stylish-looking drinking hole, with tables and a bar cast in place from white concrete. It was fun going with friends seeing it but it's not the kind of place I'd frequent regularly, and it's disturbing to see yet another sign of the continuing gentrification of that neighborhood.
- After that we went to industrial/goth dance night at this club downtown. First time I've gone dancing for at least a year, and the first time to this place in a few years. It was lots of fun. There was a big group of us and that made it even better.
- Took about 80 pounds of books to the post office yesterday morning to shipi to myself, the last of my posessions I'd left with a Portland friend. The day before I'd gotten rid of virtually all my vinyl LPs, sold them for a nice sum at the record store. It felt liberating to be rid of them. I love getting rid of useless belongings.
- Midday yesterday, thanx to my friend Karl, I was a guest speaker for something called Project Youth Doc, a documentary filmmaking class for 13-15 year olds. I showed some of my film and talked about the process of making it. The kids seemed really interested and a few of them wanted copies.
- Went to see a free preview screening of "A Scanner Darkly." Had to wait in a line for over an hour but with friends and bottled mojitos it was fun. The film was pretty good, it suitably imitated the freaked-out, thoughtful, confused feeling that Phillip K. Dick's work always provokes. The animation technique that Linklater used in Waking Life lent itself really well to the story, but may distract most audiences from the concepts of the script. I can't remember if I ever read that particular book but it must not have been that close to my heart because I felt neither outraged nor pleased at the film's conformity or nonconformity to the text. I still think Man In The High Castle is his best work and would love to see that become a movie.
- I find myself fantasizing that a certain someone I am missing like crazy will, desparate for contact with me, borrow a satellite phone and call me from the wild. I feel like she's a Shroedinger's Cat who has disappeared into a black box for 12 days and there's absolutely no way to know what state she'll be in when she re-emerges. sigh....
That's it. my next entry will probably be from San Francisco.
Posted by steev at Julio 14, 2006 08:51 AM