Brunch to Books to Beatlemania

Trigger Warning: I say that almost jokingly tongue-in-cheek and it applies to both the left and the right. There may be a little politics, culture, talk of diversity, a little football favoritism and other topics that come up today out of the norm. These topics are treated with respect, and I think they highlight all that is beautiful about Portland (a point of view that took me quite a while to achieve myself, but that I now vociferously defend).

Today was another awesome day in Portland, with several engaging activities. As is usual for the Rose City this time of year, we started out with early morning fog, that transitioned into a 1/2 day of warm sunny weather, that then turned cold and rainy. While things were still beautiful outside though, I headed for my first appointment of the day at the Multnomah Whiskey Library where a popup Brunch was occurring.

The very skilled Chef Kiara Hardy and her staff of Kitchen Killa took over the Whiskey Library and presented a bevy of her team’s finest food items. And by finest I mean this was some damn good eats and I cannot wait until this chef has a brick and mortar because it is going to be absolutely killer.

I started out with an Irish Coffee with Irish Whiskey, coffee, demerara and cream made by the house bartender. Then, when the food showed up, I switched to a Bloody Mary to balance the savoriness of the drink with the sweetness of the meal.

For my brunch entree I ordered the Chicken and Waffle Benedict with Country Chicken Gravy, Crispy Chicken Cutlets and Poached Eggs over a Belgian Waffle. When it came out even the ladies sitting next to me were in awe of this dish.

I dug in right away and let me tell you that this entree hit all the right notes for me. If I had any complaint at all, I would say that it was maybe a slight bit too sweet with the vanilla in the waffle batter. I probably would have left that out and doubled down on the savory aspect with a little chipotle hot sauce and/or a lot more black pepper in the country gravy.

It was still so outstanding enough that I pulled the event manager, Crystal Chanel, aside and told her, “I’ve made a terrible mistake”. She asked what it was, and I said, “I didn’t register for the Chef’s next popup in a couple weeks. Can you get me on the list? I’ll take any time, and I’ll sit at the bar, but that was so good I just have to know what that Brown Stew Snapper with Brown Butter Pumpkin Grits taste like”.

Hopefully something will work out and I get another shot at this menu and I can report back, because it is very worthy of a second try (The Butter Poached Lobster Pancakes with Smoked Jalapeno Syrup sounds delectable as well), and I only wished that the Chef had the opportunity to share her skills with more people.

Part way through the meal Crystal also introduced a good friend of hers to the gathered diners, a candidate for Portland’s District 4 Council, Ciatta Thompson. I haven’t gotten into politics in this blog, and don’t plan to get too deep today or in the future, but when I heard what Ciatta got up and spoke about I was impressed. She described herself as a commonsense Progressive. Now, Progressive is not the label I would put on my politics, I’d say I’m more of a Libertarian with Right leaning tendencies, and when she came over to talk one-on-one, I stated that I had no issue with providing assistance to those that needed it and helping people have dignity, but that actions had to have consequences.

She talked about wanting to beef up the Portland Police Department, get rid of the illegal drugs on the streets and she had a great idea of using the low hotel occupancy rates in the winter to work with hotels to get people off the streets during the coldest part of the year. I watched her YouTube and found several ideas in common that we agreed on. I don’t generally vote along party lines, but rather look at the topic at hand and the ideas of the people. I had originally written her off after reading the candidate bios that the City sends out in prep for voting as the language just didn’t catch my attention, but after directly interfacing with her today and hearing more about her actual plans to clean up the city, I plan to give her a #1 in Portland’s new ranked voting system.

I don’t expect this post will turn into other votes for Candidate Thompson, but it should epitomize to readers the incredible real and diverse people interactions that I find myself running into almost daily here in Portland that I simply never had in California. Those not from around here (I’ve been here 13 months now, so while I’m not a native-born Portlander, this is now my home, and I’ll appropriate the voice of a veteran of Portlandia) should spend some time to get to know the place and its people and you too might fall in love. And, for those that still want to badmouth Portland, I say great stay away and leave the incredible scenery, (mostly) beautiful weather, award winning foodie culture, happening music scene, friendly people and more to those of us that live here.

I had planned out the day to have a little break between appointments, so I used that time to take a walk the 3 blocks over to Powell’s Books, the world’s largest independent bookstore to see what I might find there.

While there I picked up a used book (written in 2012, but the content is still relevant. Looks like the cover may have been signed by the author) that I had heard about before but had never read (Remember to open this story on the web or in the Substack app. Opening in email may crop these images).

After paying and heading out of Powell’s I was stopped by a gentleman just outside who stood hawking his own book that he had written. I’m normally pretty skeptical and when he approached me with some questions and handed me his book to look at, I was already in a pretty great mood and open to a new conversation, so I accepted his book to look over and we began to talk.

Turns out he was in the US Navy and stationed in South Korea and we talked about that for about five minutes when I asked him if the story was based on any real-world scenarios or total fiction (See the image at bottom right from the back of the book and you’ll see why this was relevant). Having been stationed in South Korea in the US Army as a Korean Linguist and Intelligence Analyst myself, living there for 12 years, I was receptive to the conversation. I don’t normally read a lot of fiction these days, but I thought I’d give it a try and support a fellow Veteran. I figured anyone with enough chutzpah to stand outside an independent bookstore and independently sell your books, keeping all the profit, deserved my attention (and my $20). Apparently, Volume 2 (and I think there is a Vol 3 as well) are already out, so who knows if I’ll enjoy it or not and continue on.

Anyway, another positive out-of-left-field encounter today with someone who I might not have otherwise engaged with if I myself wasn’t putting myself in scenarios where I would meet new people and be open minded enough to engage with those of dissimilar backgrounds.

The afternoon was getting on and I had a ticket for the Portland Art Museum’s new Psychedelic Rock Posters and Fashion of the 1960s that opened yesterday and runs through March, so I walked the 10 blocks or so in the other direction.

The fashion portion consisted of a number of dresses and other clothes on display

And in the link above readers can learn more about the over 200 different posters on display rather than me rehashing here. Needless to say, this was a who’s who of the 1960’s SF (with some Portland thrown in) Rock and Roll scene.

I was sober and these posters were still psychedelic. I couldn’t imagine trying to understand or convey any of their messages in a reduced state of mind.

I went to the Museum to see the posters, but I also knew that there was an exhibit on Paul McCartney’s photos as well. I hadn’t previously thought that going to the Museum solely for the photos was enough, but since I was here, I wanted to check out the wing depicting McCartney’s photos capturing the Beattle’s journeys in late ‘63 and early ‘64, to include going on the Ed Sullivan Show on February 9th, 1964.

These were just a few of the hundreds of photos and all of this was a little before my time, but the Beatles are timeless and either form a large portion of my music playlists, or they have informed many of the other artists I love.

That took up a bit more of my afternoon before I headed home to watch the dismal game between my San Francisco 49ers and the Kansas City Chiefs (Yes, Faithful to the Bay, #FTTB, and while I’m highly disappointed in their performance, they are still “my” team). I wanted to end the day on a high note, but sadly that was not to be.

That’s ok though because the part of the day that will stick with me for quite a long time are the interactions and experiences that I had with real people here, as there will be many more football games to be seen in the years ahead, and as much as I love my team, I don’t let their wins or losses define me or my attitude on life.

Originally published on NW Wondering Wanderer