shadows, sw 2nd & clay

A semi-brief non-photo interlude

So you might've noticed I've done a lot of wordless photo-only posts lately. I've been on deadline for the last, oh, few months really, and this blogging thing has seemed oddly burdensome. I've got a bunch of unfinished posts in the Drafts folder, and photos for even more posts that I haven't gotten around to tweaking and uploading yet. It kind of feels like work, in a lot of ways.

So I thought I'd take a break from the usual pseudo-useful, quasi-informative stuff for a minute and just dump a few personal notes and observations and whatnot.

* Last winter, I began to understand why old people head south for the season. Cold, dreary winters are cumulative, I realized - the seasons are a progression, not a cycle; you don't completely get your life back after the winter finally ends, and at some point you just can't take it anymore. If that means holing up in an RV park outside Yuma for a few months, playing shuffleboard and griping about Kids These Days, well, it's not a terribly attractive option, but it's either that or endure 9 long months of cold and rain for the 66th freakin' time. I can sympathize.

* In fact, more recently I realized that big software projects are a lot like cold winters. You put your life on hold for a while, and soon forget all the little things you used to do before crunch time set in. It's a real struggle to get your life back afterward, if you ever do.

* Somehow every year we manage to find time to watch the Tour de France. It's not always gripping TV, but even when it isn't it's still three weeks of riding around sunny France, now in HD. I think it's like what some people see in fishing shows, I guess.

* One bitter irony this year. You might've noticed my occasional cat photos here starting about a year ago. What I haven't mentioned is that the poor guy's very sick, and his kidneys have about had it. He's not likely to be around much longer. The irony is that feline kidney failure results in anemia due to a lack of red blood cells. This is treatable by giving the cat EPO, the very same substance that riders regularly get kicked out of the Tour for abusing. It would all be rather amusing if my cat wasn't fixing to kick off.

* There was a time when I would've done a bunch of overwrought posts about the recent situation in Iran (search the archives for "Belarus" to see what I mean). That was before I became so averse to saying "me too". It's not that I don't care, or don't understand what's going on; it's a country I've been fascinated by for quite some time now. I guess I feel I need to mention this because I was posting nothing but bridge & flower photos at the time, and I'd like to point out that my interests are rather broader than you might think from reading this humble blog. So whatever.

* Until the election in Iran, I thought Twitter was hopelessly lame. Then I saw what it was good for, and concluded it was just me that was lame, not the service. I still think MySpace is teh st00pid, though.

* Did I mention I'm at Tugboat? Well, I am. If you hurry, you could make it down here and attempt to identify me, if you care, unless I leave first, which I almost certainly will. I have photos to take, after all.

Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

photo friday, modernist edition

Kelly Butte, Infrared

Office Tomatoes!

I grew these in the window next to my desk at work. If this whole software thing doesn't work out, I just might have a future in subsistence agriculture...

Mt. Tabor, Infrared

portlandia [semi-obligatory]

So I've got this semi-regular, semi-interesting series where I track down statues and other public art around town, take a few photos, and try to say something entertaining (or at least educational) about them. I figured I'd have to to get around to Portlandia eventually, and today's the day, it seems. I'm stuck at home with a cold, and I don't have anything better to do, so I guess I might as well.

Every short list of Portland trivia mentions that we have the second-largest hammered copper statue in the world, #1 being the Statue of Liberty. So, in truth, she's a very distant second, although still quite large, you have to admit. This statistic is the first thing everyone says about Portlandia, so I figured I ought to go with the flow and do likewise, although I've always thought it smacked a little of small town boosterism, sort of our version of having the world's second-largest ball of twine, or the world's largest water tower painted to look like a giant peach.

Portlandia was intended to be a sort of civic symbol, embodying our thrifty, industrious, maritime heritage or something along those lines. It's never really turned out that way, though. I just don't think you can impose civic symbols by fiat, although our fair city just keeps trying time and time again (*cough* aerial tram *cough*). I would guess the Umbrella Man in Pioneer Courthouse Square would win by a mile if you asked people what statue really embodies the city. Most people just don't relate to the whole allegorical maritime commerce theme, if you ask me. It doesn't help that she's in an odd location, semi-hidden on a pedestal a couple of stories up, on one side of a city office building. It also doesn't help, publicity-wise, that the sculptor retained all rights to the image of the statue, and is absolutely opposed to Portlandia being used for commercial purposes, despite the whole maritime commerce theme. So no Portlandia t-shirts, coffee mugs, fridge magnets, shot glasses, collector spoons, paperweights, bottle openers, boxer shorts, snow globes, Halloween costumes, cutlery, bobblehead dolls, dominatrix gear, or any similar such things. Period.

I think I'm probably in the clear, though, when it comes to posting these photos, as this humble blog remains utterly noncommercial, and I've never made a single freakin' cent off the damn thing. Quite the opposite, really, when you consider the cost of camera gear I probably wouldn't have bought otherwise, and gas I probably wouldn't have used. If I started reviewing restaurants or first-run movies, this little hobby would get awfully expensive awfully fast. Oh, and the photos are Creative Commons licensed, so nobody else is going to be making money off them either.

A recent conceptual art project let regular people dress up and pose as Portlandia. The project's creator got the sculptor's grudging go-ahead to do this, which I guess was the polite thing to do, although I don't know whether it was strictly legally required. Even under today's rather draconian copyright laws, I don't think you can copyright a pose of the human body, and I think this would probably qualify as free speech anyway, at least under Oregon law. If it came down to it, you could probably argue it's a form of satire, if nothing else, if you had an expensive lawyer.

The Portland Water Blog has two posts about Portlandia. These, I'm sure, were some of the easier posts they've put together, the statue being just outside their office. There's something to be said for quick-and-easy posts.

It's also #31 at ThingsAboutPortlandThatSuck. The post mostly quotes from an entertaining Portland Public Art post, "I Loathe Portlandia". I personally don't loathe Portlandia; usually I just forget she exists. I don't walk past the Portland Building all that often, and when I do I often forget to look up, and when do look up she's often obscured by trees anyway. There's an idea that gets batted around now and then of moving her from her pedestal to a more prominent, ground level location. The sculptor's opposed, saying she was designed to go where she's at now, and he's forbidden the city to move her. I do think he has a point about the location; if she was at ground level, it would look like she's using her trident to hunt gophers. Which would really jumble up the whole allegory thing.

A few other photos from around the 'tubes:

• Portland Bridges
• A rather ominous photo at Invisible Yet Necessary
• A large photo at odd portland, a new fledgling blog about said topic.
• This photo is apparently part of a downtown walking tour of some kind.
• On Flickr: Portlandia in 3D!

And off on a tangent, it turns out there's an asteroid by the same name out there, 757 Portlandia. Sadly, named after neither our statue nor or our fair city.