Lady Gaga

This goes out to Juliette, who apparently loves this song as well.


Anneke has come a long way since daddy forced her to do karaoke to Rush.

KC Part 4: family

As hard as it was being away from my own family, I had the best time with my sister and hers. My sister is gifted at creating a welcoming, comfortable home where you feel like you can just hang out, and to me that's the essence of hospitality. I played with my niece and nephew during the day, and at night Emily and Adrian and I stayed up until all hours on the patio watching the lightening bugs and talking. Thanks for the wonderful visit, Emily!

KC Part 3: cuisine

Gates BBQ and Quick Trip: reason enough to visit Kansas City.

The Gates catchphrase. You will not find 16 pieces of flair here.

You will find burnt ends sandwiches. yum.

Quick Trip soothes the troubled soul, with it's rows of fountain drinks including shots of vanilla syrup and something called Green Tea Fizz. It's like...convenience store heaven. It makes our Plaid Pantry look squalid.

On our last day we went to Grinders in downtown KC. The meatball grinder I ordered was about three feet long.

KC part 2

The afternoon before her gig Emily let me attend a Popsicle Appreciation seminar in her beautiful yard. I think the skills I learned therein will be very enriching for Anneke.

KC, Part 1

I did it! I made the solo trip to Kansas City to see my sister and her family. It was nothing but hard being away from Anneke, and the only two consolations were that I knew she was in excellent hands with her Daddy, and I had a blast in KC. My first night there I got to go to one of my sister's gigs! She's so talented; I was blown away.

The venue

The signage

The Emily Frost Quartet

The ladies: Randi, Emily, and me. Randi and I had been plotting Emily's birthday festivities for months.

More Portland Hill Walks

Here we are completing another Portland Hill Walk, this time through Washington Park and surrounding neighborhoods.

Start at NW 24th and Burnside

Soon you'll come to the Holocaust Memorial; one thing I appreciated about this memorial was that it gives a really concise history of the events leading up to and surrounding the Holocaust. It also has transcripts of letters they found that were written by a nine-year-old girl who died in one of the camps. On the other side are lists of the names of relatives of Portlanders who died in the camps.

Later on you go through the Rose Garden and come to the playground.

And toward the end you walk past the Sacajawea statue.

Definitely a must-do for natives and non-natives alike!