Pearlescent Russellville Sunset

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Nothing special about this, except tonight was a sunset day for pearlescent fire-clouds which were most gorgeous.

This, looking west from the corner of SE 103rd Dr and Stark Street, bustling downtown Russellville. 

Russellville PDX, Where We Try Hard

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Russelville is kind of a Miss Congeniality of Portland neighborhoods. We're not particularly noteworthy except, really, as Gresham's gateway to Montavilla; we don't have any notable quirks or brands or atmosphere other than the 70/30 Nitrogen/Oxygen that the planet provides at (for now) no extra cost.

But what we have is guts and know-how and gumption. You try hard ... we try harder. I mean, I could have settled for subscribing to New York magazine but I wasn't happy until I was New Yorker. 

Now, you may be proceeding eastbound on Stark at about SE 100th Avenue. If so, turn around; that's a one-way westbound and you're in for a world of hurt, pal. There. Now that you've stopped driving like an asshole, and you're westbound on Stark as PBOT intended, it has occurred to you that your wealth management isn't stangy enough? Now, wealth management is complicated; you're not expected to know what stang is, really, but you are aware that your portfolio isn't keeping up in the stanginess department.

What to do, what to do?!

Well, if you're at 100th and SE Stark, just look up to the left, pal. Your prayers, which you didn't know you were praying until I told you just now, have been answered.

Yes, in Russellville we try everything harder. Living, playing, your nerves ... everything. 

And so it goes.

[pdx] Molten Gold In The Skies Over Downtown Russellville

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The one-way couplet that distributes east-west traffic along SE Washington and Stark Streets from SE 75th through SE 108th Avenues has its anchors in two nabes of long-standing establishment. By far the more well-known is Montavilla which, as befits its name. starts on the northeastern shoulder of Mount Tabor and is in full effect through about SE 82nd Avenue.

The other comprises the area from about SE 92nd Avenue through 108th, and has a freeway running through it. That area is Russellville, and that's my home. The areas have two different characters: Montavilla a little more toff, with a strong dash of modern Portlandia; the businesses along the north-side of Stark between 80th and 76th feature a measure of poshness that's not too hard to discern from the street. There's still the echo of the working-class there, but it's seeming to attenuate over time. Russellville is still pretty down and dirty in the good way, and real; where Montavilla has the hip late-night bistros, and the pet supply store with artisanal products, it's Russellville that has the pizza parlor, the Dollar Tree, the strip clubs, and the Target store, and the freeway running through it (I-205).

Please note I cast no aspersions intentionally. But I live here; this is what I see. And, in the manner of community, if Montavilla gets the finer stuff, that's not to say they're bad; similarly, to say that Russellville's a bit more careworn, that's not to say we're all bad either. But sometimes we get compensated in unexpected ways. Such as late Saturday afternoon, when The Wife™ and myself walked out of the Jack In The Box at SE 105th and Stark, to see the sky.

It's all in where you're standing, and where you are when you are.

The sun, which was setting behind Mount Tabor to the west, was impinging on the clouds and not merely illuminating them from with out, but scintillating sunset rays were clearly at furious play in the clouds themsevles.

A thing like this can even make a Denny's look like a place that has a dignified view of heaven.

Meanwhile The Wife™, whose powers of observation are typically quite sharp, directed my view over the Saylor's Old Country Kitchen, the restaurant on the north side of SE Stark Street. It's famous for a 72-ounce chunk o'meat that's free if you can eat it all down at one sitting, but tonight, it was renowned for this:

You can see it just over the sign, above it at to the left of it. The setting sun was actually inflecting the clouds behind the point of view. It's a sun-doggish, sun-bowish thing, which is a little inaccurate to say, because those effects happen totally different ways. But it's how I thought of it.

Since it's a little tough to see unaccented, I bumped up the reds and it stands out much better.

It's all in where you're standing. And when you're standing. And that's like life. 

[pdx_liff] #OregonSnowmageddon2013

2974.Yeah, it happened again. Bunch of snow and hideously cold weather hit the Pacific Northwest, and Portland in particular.

Here's some scenes from a certain transit home from work on a certain recent Friday morning for a certain 3rd shifter involved in a branch of the transportation industry.

SE 102nd and Stark Street, in the bustling Oregon metropolis of Russellville, which is actually a sub-metropolis of Portland.

This'll be notable for recording the gas prices on a certain Friday morning in December 2013 as anything else.

This next shot proves that there are some stretches of Hawthorne Blvd that are less fashionable than others, but just as cold and wintry. More evergreen trees, too!

Next, SE Stark and 122nd, looking east. Look at that line of headlights dwindling into the east there. Not only was the traffic on the greater Portland freeway system historic, but the side streets were no great shakes neither. But interesting looking.

SE Stark, looking east from about 112th Avenue. They say, today, in the weather, now that we're in Bitter-cold-and-the-water-in-your-bathroom-pipes-is-frozen-and-I-hope-to-God-they-haven't-burst-alypse 2013, Oregon is actually a few degrees colder than Alaska.

So now we know where Alaska goes for vacations.

Here.

While it is personally easier to survive steely cold snaps than it is the heatwaves (one can always put on another layer) it's no less horrid. The prolonged extraordinary cold can be just as oppressive as the hot, and just about as enjoyable. We look forward to the warming this coming week with a mixture of eagerness and apprehension - those frozen pipes don't exactly encourage.

Seeing "12 degrees" on the home weather station is only amusing for just so long, and it's a lot of a shorter time than you'd otherwise think, oddly enough.

And so it goes.