chase the light

Current time line interjection… See that? I brought my XPan along on my trip and shot 13 rolls of film! 13! One of the main points of this trip was for it to be a photo adventure to take loads of film pictures. I went out of my way so many times to get panoramic photos like these. Unbeknownst to me my camera’s shutter had silently died and gave no indication or sound that it was broken. I just went on my merry way not knowing there was a fatal error going on. So, much to my dismay when I got home and took everything to the lab and $200+ dollars later… there was this photo and a couple more on the first roll but after that nothing but 1/2 frames and shutter blurred images. I can’t even believe it. It was totally devastating. The amount of time I spent shooting with that camera was profound and now it’s life had just ended on the first day of using it and I had no idea. Ugh. So… the rest is all just iPhone. So sad and just not the same. I’ll make a little memorial gallery at the end as my R.I.P. for my beloved XPan. The handful of “artsy-smeary” photos I could salvage deserve a place in the world. Some are still quite good in that state, but ugh, just gutted. Okay, well, with that said, Day 2!

I got up very early this morning to make my way off Whidbey and to get to Portland. Said my goodbyes to my sister and brother-n-law and got in line for the ferry. Something like 6:00am but the terrible night of sleep was going to make for a rough day. I wasn’t first in line but I did get a spot at the front of the ferry. It’s only about 20 minutes so went upstairs to the cafeteria and picked up a drink and a souvenir sticker. An unfortunate thing has happened to the souvenir world where absolutely everything is AI generated. So I vowed to try and buy obviously human designed things as much as a could. In image two you can clearly see the eyeball of the Orca on the white eye patch. Yeah, that’s not where the eyeball is silly computer. And that looks nothing like the Space Needle. Le sigh.

Pointing the car to Portland there were a lot of signs that caught my attention. Sleater-Kinney! What? I never knew the band Sleater-Kinney got their name from a road! TIL. Also Longview (Greenday), Rush Road, Castle Rock (Stephen King) etc. As it was past 10:30am I was able to stop at the farthest north In-N-Out for a breakfast burger. That’s a thing ya know. It’s also now the closest INO to Vancouver. A mere 5 hours. That done, I’m finally going to cross the Oregon border. Come take me dysentery. Spoiler alert, I survived.

The first thing I wanted to do is stop at Blue Moon Photo and Machine. I find out why “Machine” once I get there. I needed some film and just to have a look. Nice to see so many cameras, films, and… typewriters. Yep, I’ve entered Portlandia for real. Typewriters are the machine portion of the name.

Next stop was across town to the iconic Multnomah Falls. Yes, the falls with the funny name and beautiful look. If you don’t know these falls you’re lame and should un-lame yourself. I’d like to return to these and some other falls in the area as it was just too busy. Even my friend Sean gave me a heads up that I needed to book a sparking spot in advance. I’m staying with Sean tonight and will be good to chill out and relax. Picked up a little souvenir pin and headed out.

I arrived at Sean’s and it’s like we’d just seen each other last week! When in fact it’s been quite a few years. I first met Sean on the film Dinosaur at Disney. He was also my Supervisor at Imageworks and later again Dreamworks. So got to hang out with a newly minted Oregon retiree. Oregon is awesome by the way. After chatting for a bit we walked around the neighborhood and it was soooo Portland. Great cafés and shops and not single chain store. It’s like the whole city is an artisanal zone or something. Amazing. We went and checked out the Bagdad Theatre… speakeasy? It’s a bar inside the theater but behind the screen! Above the bar you can see the back side of the stage screen. Absolutely beautiful in there. Pictures 13. 14. After that we got in the car and headed downtown and just drove around a bit. Stopped to check out the Portland Theatre where Jerry Seinfeld just happened to be performing that night. Had I planned better… I’m liking Portland though. Good vibes. I’ve only driven through on the Great Storage Unit Relocation Odyssey from a few years back. After a few more sights we headed home and stopped at a 7-Eleven for drinks and the owner was Moroccan and had little Moroccan and American flags everywhere for the World Cup. Ha! Go Moroc!

So Day 2, done. Wiped out and Sean and his wife have the most lovely very Portland craftsman home that they’ve done up beautifully. Best Air BNB in Portland. Five stars!

Something wacky with the gallery, but who cares right? You’ll be okay.