Portland.

Can't say I've ever opened a hotel drawer to find this combination before.

Art is for pretentious ninnies

Rather than spend money on generic prints or resort to the sweet framed photos of chicks on semi trucks I bought at Bag N Save, Jenna and I decided to make our own. Oh dear god. We were joined by the adorable Sarah Schroeder in this endeavor, might I add.

First we have Sarah's creation. I commented that it looked like something you could buy in Target's dorm room section, but I meant it in a good way:



Jenna did this one. She has actual talent that comes with taking classes for this sort of thing:



Then we have this BITCHIN' tree I did. Basically I just really like blue and green - globes, maps, etc. A tree is green. The sky is blue. Connect the dots:




Then I reverted back to my usual cynical self, and did. . . this:

Suggestions Needed for New Compound nickname.

As of July, the News Link Compound will be no more - Shannon is moving to Chi-Town, Cathy's going her own direction, and the house is one or two cracks away from condemnation. It's been fun, but alas, it's time for new digs. So. . .

THE SETTING:



Roughly 5 blocks from my current residence; within a block and a half of both a generic and hippie grocery store, coffee house and porn shop.

CAST OF CHARACTERS:

Thew, your fearless leader (sans beard, at least currently):



Christopher Schacht, AKA Chris AKA Schacht, who will be attending the prestigious UNL College O' Law because he has nothing better to do:



Jenna, who was basically in the right place in the right time, will keep Chris and I in check when it comes to all the girls neither of us will be bringing home:



Stay tuned.

While I'm at it, here are some from the Columbia River Gorge

I'm killing time at the airport in Phoenix and figured I'd post some more.

These are from the Oregon side of the Columbia River Gorge. I've driven back and forth through it four times now and I don't think I'll ever get tired of it.

Just east of The Dalles, OR on the Old Columbia River Highway. Lots of winding around and stuff. That's I-84 down there:



A town in Washington (not sure which):



I spent a couple of hours on the bank of the river taking photos of a rail gang repairing this line of track. The railroad is big on preventing "slip, trip and fall" injuries, and this kind of puts it into perspective, as walking back and forth across the ballast wasn't exactly easy, and well, yeah:



I took this one on my first trip out there back in March. Cloudy but still kickin' rad:



Multnomah Falls. I believe it's the 2nd tallest year-round waterfall in the USA (no idea what #1 is):

The Sand IS WHITE

I suppose this is worth posting.

Thursday evening, after wrapping up my job responsibilities in Belen, New Mexico, I decided to take a detour on my way to El Paso and visit White Sands National Monument. There were a ton of people there - not sure if it's usually that way this time of year or the fact that there was a full moon that night, or perhaps because there's nothing else to do in the vicinity of Alamogordo. . .

At any rate, I used my work camera, a Canon Rebel XT, to take some shots as the sun went down:



I'm HUGE (!!!):



Yucca:



A couple of the better landscape shots I took:





Abusing the camera's timer setting to recreate the cover of 'The Gods Must Be Crazy'



Full moon rising. Wish I had a tighter lens: