Posted inRecreation

Metolius River tubing video — first on You Tube!

Below is rare footage of people tubing down a stretch of the Metolius River in central Oregon, a river known for its beauty, cold water, great fly fishing, and... Notable lack of people tubing down it. I know this, because I've visited the Metolius regularly for over fifteen years. I've only seen a tube in the river once or twice, at most. Like I said, the Metolius is cold. Spring-fed from snow melt in the upper reaches, where the video below was taken on an August, 2013 day. It also is a wild and scenic river, so when a tree…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Recreation

Camp Sherman forest fire raises questions about “containment”

The Green Ridge fire near Camp Sherman in central Oregon is nearing 100% containment. Its been burning away for ten days after a lightning strike got it going on July 31. Though the fire has been heading away from Camp Sherman and the Metolius river, naturally people in the area have been concerned about its spread -- now up to 1,500 acres, according to the latest official fire info. Since my wife and I are part owners of a cabin on leased forest service land, Friday evening I decided to attend a fire status meeting for residents and visitors at…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Marijuana

If marijuana is good medically, why not legalize it?

Today CNN's chief medical correspondent, Sanjay Gupta, came out and said that he has been wrong about medical marijuana. In part because the federal government has been lying about marijuana's supposed dangers and lack of benefits. I mistakenly believed the Drug Enforcement Agency listed marijuana as a schedule 1 substance because of sound scientific proof. Surely, they must have quality reasoning as to why marijuana is in the category of the most dangerous drugs that have "no accepted medicinal use and a high potential for abuse." They didn't have the science to support that claim, and I now know that when…
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Posted inSalem

My Strange Up shout-out to Salem citizen activists

Hey, this is two-week old news... but summer is for slowing down. Forgot to blog about my last Strange Up Salem column -- which Salem Weekly called your activisting strange in its online offering. (Copied in below) I wrote it before I knew that the Stop Parking Meters Downtown folks had succeeded in getting a freaking magnificent 8,000 signatures on a petition to, not surprisingly, stop parking meters downtown.  Great example of how determined citizens can rage successfully against the City Hall machine. Salem's political leaders are on a roll... straight dowhill from the Public Servant Summit that they should be…
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Posted inDogs Salem

Photos/videos of 2013 Willamette Humane Society Mutt Strut

My wife, Laurel, is a volunteer for the Willamette Humane Society here in Salem, Oregon. She walks shelter dogs one day a week, along with walking our dogs every day of the week.  Yesterday she helped out at the 2013 WillaMutt Strut event at Riverfront Park. Here's Laurel with our younger, smaller dog, Zu Zu. She aided Annie Ingersoll, Humane Society dog trainer extraordinaire (in straw hat) at the Teach Your Dog a Trick booth.   Naturally I demanded to see a trick. Here's a video of Laurel complying. We left old dog Serena at home. I wanted to defend…
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Posted inSalem

Broken Pringle Parkade meters irritate Salem parkers

Ah, what delicious irony. And what a wonderful additional reason why the City of Salem shouldn't be trusted with its proposal to put parking meters in downtown Salem, a.k.a. "the 20% tax on small business gross receipts."  Today my wife and five female friends met for lunch at the Marco Polo Global Restaurant. Each drove her own car. Four parked in the Pringle Parkade.  Together, they had to move their cars eleven times to find a working parking meter. Three women encountered three broken parking meters each. One woman encountered two broken meters. There weren't obvious "Broken" signs on the…
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Posted inSalem

Why parking meters in downtown Salem will hurt businesses

Imagine what would happen if City of Salem (Oregon) officials told downtown small businesses, "We're going to put a 20% tax on your gross revenues. From now on you're only going to be getting 80% of the money that you've been taking in before. Deal with it."  There would be outrage. A massive outcry. Businesses would do everything they could to stop the 20% tax from going into effect. Which is exactly what is happening.  The City of Salem admits that putting parking meters in downtown Salem would result in a "20% leakage" of visitors now using the free two-hour…
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Posted inTango/Dance

Love this fat guy dancing video… inspiring!

Thanks to Lora Lamon of Salem's RJ Dance Studio for sharing this marvelous video. On her Facebook post Lora said: All you guys who think you're too cool to dance . . . . get over yourselves. Here's a guy who is totally comfortable in his own skin. I laughed. I cried. I applauded. I LOVED IT !! Yeah, me too. The fat guy is a really good dancer. And I bet, a really good person. He sure brought some joy into my life today.  
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Posted inCurrent affairs Salem

Progressive reasons to oppose parking meters in downtown Salem

A proposal by the City to put parking meters in downtown Salem (Oregon) has some progressives wondering what side of the issue they should be on. Not surprising.  Progressives/liberals, of which I am proudly one, often aren't of the same mind. Anyone who has been part of a progressive group knows that leading them is a lot more like herding cats, than sheep. Liberals are independent-minded and like to go in all kinds of different directions. Which is a great thing. Better decisions happen when diverse views are put out, heard, considered, and argued before a preferred direction is chosen.…
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Posted inHome life

How to find your lost car keys

I learned a valuable lesson this week: how to find car keys. The method is simple. Order an expensive replacement key. Here's how I found this out after losing a key. I can't remember exactly how much the parts guy at Portland's Mini Cooper dealership said a replacement key fob and programming would run me. About $450, my shocked mind recalls. It used to be that you'd take your extra car key to a locksmith and get another key. Those days are long gone in the pre-electronic past. I enjoy being able to lock, unlock, and start my 2011 Mini…
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Posted inWeb/Tech

I get love for saving some wet iPhones

I've been blogging regularly for about ten years. That's about 100 years in Internet time, since most bloggers either haven't been at it for very long, or don't keep on blogging for very long. Early on I learned that when I labor at writing something seriously profound on a meaningful subject, it isn't going to get much attention. Yawn, say the denizens of cyberspace. You're not a cute kitten video.  Or a tip about how to save your iPhone if it gets dumped in water. But hah!, last year I covered that base in "My iPhone speaker survives toilet water.…
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Posted inSalem

Looks like downtown parking meters are a no-go in Salem

Great news! Got this tonight from Carole Smith, of the Stop Parking Meters in Downtown Salem campaign:  -------------------------------------------- Congratulations!  We collected our 8,000th signature today!  Hurrah! We need 5,688 verified signatures to get placed on the May Primary ballot.  We collected 40% more signatures than we need - just to be safe.   THE BIGGEST CONTRIBUTORS were the 55 downtown businesses who collected signatures in their stores. The DOWNTOWN BUSINESSES COLLECTED 40% of all the signatures gathered.  We could not have succeeded without your help.  We cannot thank you enough for your help and commitment to help the initiative petition succeed.…
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Posted inRecreation

My customized Intex River Run tubing approach

You're a genius! I say that a lot to myself. Sadly, I don't hear it nearly as often from other people. But during a recent visit to central Oregon's Metolius River, a place we come to regularly, a couple of fellow tubers noted how I'd made an addition to the River Run tube that they also had been using on the cold river (48 degrees at the spring-fed source; not a whole lot warmer downstream). Genius, they told me. And I don't think it was just their beers-on-a-hot-day talking. I've walked up and down the banks of the Metolius for…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Salem

Mayor Anna Peterson shows what’s wrong with Salem city government

Ooh, the Mayor got a bit testy tonight! The truth hurts. Tonight, via CCTV, I watched the City Council hearing on downtown parking meters. In her testimony, an opponent of this ill-advised idea correctly said that the City's Parking Task Force didn't allow citizens to speak at their meetings, forestalling a collaborative approach to downtown parking problem-solving. Which, if you read the state's guide to how parking policies are supposed to be developed, is a big no-no. Stakeholders of all varieties have to be intimately involved from the outset.  Astoundingly, after the woman finished her testimony Mayor Peterson took the…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Salem

Don’t trust City of Salem to manage downtown parking

Tomorrow the Salem City Council meeting includes a public hearing agenda item dealing with downtown parking policies: b)  Parking Management Vision and the Parking Task Force Recommendations – Ward 1 – Councilor Bennett - CANDO (UD) Watch out, Salem citizens! Beware! Blindly trust no city official! This is the same Mayor, City Manager, City Council, and City staff who have brought you a string of poorly thought-out and poorly-implemented decisions. Including, but not limited to... -- Cutting down five healthy beautiful trees in front of the downtown U.S. Bank building for no good reason.-- Giving the go-ahead for an unneeded, unwanted,…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Elizabeth Warren makes great case for Glass-Steagall II on CNBC

I'd love to see a Hillary Clinton/Elizabeth Warren presidential ticket. Whoever the GOP chose as a vice-presidental candidate, Warren would demolish in debates. Have a look at how she makes CNBC anchors appear as economically amateurish as they are.   Warren is talking about the importance of restoring the firewall between savings and investment activities of banks through a bill being referred to as Glass-Steagall II. Makes a lot of sense. Why should banks be able to play risky investment games with money people have in FDIC-insured savings and checking accounts? That seems horribly wrong. If banks want to take…
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Posted inSalem

Seven impressions of 2013 Salem Art Fair

Today my wife and I headed to Bush Park for one of our favorite summer activities, the Salem Art Fair. Here's some impressions we had of this year's event. (1) Compared to the typical pre-$5 admission charge Friday crowd (we always go on that day of the Friday-Sunday fair) attendance seems lower. But we're fine with the fence, gates, and money takers. If someone isn't willing to pay five bucks to attend the fair, they don't understand the value of what the Salem Art Association is offering. Plus, children under 12 are free, and there is no charge to get…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

This is my favorite kind of blog comment…

Today I got a comment on one of my posts that started off with the best lead sentence ever:  This is the first intelligible writing I have found on the internet today. Dude, love you, man. Or woman. Whoever.  That is exactly what I think about my own writing whenever I publish a blog post. But sadly, I rarely have someone echo my own thoughts so precisely.  Here's the entire comment, which concerned my Florida's "Stand Your Ground" law applied to Trayvon Martin also post. This is the first intelligible writing I have found on the internet today. If we put race…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Florida’s “stand your ground” law applied to Trayvon Martin also

Driving around in my car today, listening to political talk on satellite radio, I kept hearing people say, "Trayvon Martin had a right to 'stand his ground' also." Makes a lot of sense. There Martin is, walking along, minding his own business, when a guy starts following him in an aggressive, intrusive manner. Eventually they get into some sort of altercation. At some point Martin realizes George Zimmerman has a gun.  Florida's Stand Your Ground law says you don't have to flee if you fear for your life, or if you are threatened with bodily harm. You can defend yourself…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Zimmerman jury instructions raise question of free will

I'm bothered by George Zimmerman's jury giving him a "not guilty" free pass after he killed Trayvon Martin. However, this morning I also was philosophically perplexed -- along with bothered -- after reading an AP story in our local newspaper about the jury instructions.  Despite a clamoring by some for a conviction against George Zimmerman, jurors acquitted the former neighborhood watch leader of all charges, leaving many to wonder how the justice system allowed him to walk away from the fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin. Part of the answer is found in the 27-page jury instructions on two matters: justifiable…
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