City Vitals

As you have already experienced, my blog is slowing turning into a Portland loving propaganda site. I know, I should keep my opinions of how I live in the best city in the US to myself, especially since it inadvertantly says that those who don't live here are lame. :)

But, please indulge me in the "honeymoon" period in my city with some more pro-Portland posts.

PRNewsWire writes:
CityVitals, developed by Portland-based economist Joseph Cortright in
partnership with CEOs for Cities, lays out the rationale for the things
cities must be really good at doing today and a new set of metrics -- 20 in
all -- to measure their progress.
"Every week it seems a new ranking of cities makes the headlines," said
Carol Coletta, president and CEO of CEOs for Cities. "Unfortunately, few of
those rankings are relevant to what makes cities successful today.
CityVitals gives urban leaders a much richer picture of what's going right
and what's going wrong in their cities and uncovers their best
opportunities to improve."
"To be successful today, cities have to develop their own unique
formula that addresses the four dimensions of urban success: talent,
innovation, connections and distinctiveness," said Cortright.

So, here's how Portland rates in a few of the categories.

Innovation : Self Employment. Ranked # 6 with 10.8% of residents owning their own business. This might be a bit lower because there are not as many tax incentives to own your own business here in Oregon as there are in other cities that try to attract new businesses. I learned that the hard way.

Connectedness: Voting. Ranked #7 with 66.2% voting in the last Presidential election.

Distinctiveness: Restaurant Variety. This is an interesting one. The ratio of ethnic restaurants to fast food. Ranked #4, after San Fran, NY, Boston.

The two categories it ranked the highest, at #3 in both, Economic Integration (Percentage of the population who would not have to move from their current neighborhoods in order to equalize the distribution of high-income and low-income households across all neighborhoods in the metropolitan area) and Movie Variety (Variance of local movie attendance from national movie attendance for the top 60 motion pictures nationally in 2005)

So, that's the skinny on some of Portland strengths. Come visit anytime. :)

Lunch time

I usually eat lunch at my desk. I know, that's boring and anti-social. But, I only take a half hour so I can leave at 4:30pm and it's easier to just sit at my desk and work on some of my ecommerce stuff during lunch. But today, I had a couple of visitors. Julie Chang was in Portland from Eugene and came to have lunch with me a the deli on the first floor of our building, called Freddie Brown's Deli. It's owned by a cute Korean family and they wave at me every morning as I enter the building. As we were ordering, Shasta called so we invited her to come on down since she was just at Portland State Univ in downtown. It was the most fun I've had at work since I started here. If you're ever in downtown during lunch time, give me a ring. :)

Melon Madness and Corn Roast

Portland Farmer's Market is having a fun event today at the EcoTrust. I don't think I'll enter the Zucchini Hot Rod Carving event but I sure will eat alot of Corn, that's for sure. I love that you can pretty much find a farmer's market on any day of the week. Of course Sat is the biggest near Portland State Univ but practically every community has it's own farmer's markets. The one in my neighborhood, Hillsdale has a little one on Sunday that I've been to. I like supporting the local farmers here in Oregon. I just have to eat more fruit and veggies now.

Walking Tour of Portland

Yesterday after work, I went on the Walking Tour of Portland as part of my church's two week long Urban Camp. It was crazy. We had like 50 people show up and it was a blast. I learned so many wonderful little facts about Portland. I especially liked hearing about all the public art in downtown Portland. The one place I want to explore more once the weather cools down a bit and I need to head indoors is the Center for Performing Arts. Portland has a magnificent arts culture and of course it's performing arts has to be fantastic too I'm sure.

Crazy Weekend

This was one of the busiest weekends in a long time. But there were SO many wonderful activities going on. Here's all the fun activities I got to do:

Fri 6pm : My church, Mosaic, is having a two week fun extravagance called Urban Camp. There's an activity every day for two weeks. Today was Concert in the Park at the Rose Park Theater. It was great to see so many from the church come out for the concert.

Fri 9pm : After the concert, I grabbed some friends and we went to see Illume in downtown Portland. It's a 3 block outdoor photo exhibition of extreme sports sponsored by RedBull. There were amazing photographs from all over the world.

Sat am : worked on my websites.

Sat 4pm : BBQ at Dave's house with a rousing competition of Croquet.

Sun 7am : I rode in the Bridge Pedal with some friends. We opted for the 24 mile, 8 bridge route. It was a long but very beautiful route, taking us over 8 amazing bridges over the Willamette River.

Sun 12pm : Bite of Oregon. We got free entrance after the Bridge Pedal to sample the wonderful delicacies of Oregon. I had some seafood paella. Yum.

Sun 5:30pm : Mosaic Church service.

Sun 7pm : crash after a very busy weekend.

Fast Cities - Portland

Fast Company, one of the many magazines I subscribe to, has a good article about the Fastest Cities in the US. Of course Portland is listed. It's hard to find a list ranking cities that doesn't include Portland. From magazines to books like "Cities Ranked & Rated" (where Portland ranks 3rd), all tout the virtues of our great city. Here's an interesting fact from the article :

With 125 projects and counting, Portland has the most structures certified by the U.S. Green Building Council.

Voodoo Doughnut

Chip and Dan Heath, authors of the popular business book "Made to Stick", have an article in the June issue of Fast Company, called "Give 'em something to talk about." The article starts out, "If you go to Portland, Oregon, everyone wants to talk about Voodoo Doughnut. They talk about the caffeinated doughnut. Or the chocolate-glazed chocolate doughnut rolled in Cocoa Puffs cereal. Or the voodoo-doll-shaped doughnut that bleeds raspberry filling when impaled with a pretzel pin."

I experienced Voodoo Doughnuts yesterday when on my usual 5 block walk from the bus stop to the office, I noticed a small sign for Voodoo Doughnuts on the side of a brick building. Of course I have heard of Voodoo, I am on top of Portland culture after all, but I never actually experienced it before. The sign was to their bakery and distribution center with a tiny counter where a pierced/tattooed young woman sells doughnuts. I had a traditional chocolate and peanut covered doughnut and it was very good. Maybe it was the fact that I didn't have breakfast or that I am a recovering carb addict, but in any case, Chip and Dan are right, even I'm talking about Voodoo Doughnut.

My New Business

My web empire is growing! Okay, not quite an empire yet but you gotta start somewhere. I now own another web business called Smart Pet Supply. Please visit and buy lots of cute things for your dog or cat. The site currently sells alot of cutsey things for small dogs. My first sale was the Pistacchio Dog Stroller to a woman in Beverly Hills. I know, it's silly to have a stroller for your dog, but you gotta love the American lifestyles of the rich and frivilous. :)

Love Won Out Conference

Last weekend, I attended a conference called Love Won Out, by a great organization called Focus on the Family. The conference deals with the issue of homosexuality from a Christian worldview and it was is Portland last weekend.

I decided to go because I have been challenged and even frustrated at how the church deals with homosexuality, or should I say, how it doesn't deal with it. A speaker told a story of how one gay man received Christ after hearing the gospel message on TV and the next Sunday went to local church to ask for help. The pastor's response to his face was, "there's no place for f*gs here." I know that is appalling and we would never say anything like that, but what will it take for the church to actually tackle issues in our society that are so foundational in showing the world who Christ really is. The church was given a chance to step up and show Christ love to dying people during the AIDS epidemic but what it choose to do was condemn the dying instead.

The conference renewed my hope that people can and do change in this area. I have walked along side men and women who desired to leave their homosexual lifestyles with deep hope that they would find victory. I know it's possible because I've seen it. But, like all life change, it can't happen outside of a community of grace and truth. I hope the church will become that type of community for all people.

Republican Presidential Debate

I just watched the Republican Presidential Debate with George Stephanopolous. Fred Thompson wasn't there because he's not an official candidate but did you know that he's polling at 13% in Iowa? Interesting. Well, nothing new or surprising at the debate. One interesting personal question asked by someone in Idaho, "What is the biggest defining moment mistake you've made in your life?" Some had the political agenda answer, just another shot at getting their position out there. Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani made everyone laugh by saying there's no way he could just name one of his many mistakes, may he be referring to his divorces? :) Tom Tancredo (R-CO) answer was that his biggest mistake was taking 30 years to acknowledge Jesus Christ as his savior.

It's a milestone election with both a woman and an African American running with such strong campaigns. It's going to be an interesting election year!

Oneonta Falls

Oneonta Falls near Multnomah Falls. I went with the hobnob folks on a beautiful hike to the falls. Here we are on a cool little bridge. There was also a small waterfall where the water gathered into a pool. Some of the gang went for a nice swim in FREEZING water. I'm from Orlando, so I don't go in water below 80 degrees. :)

My new Samsung phone

Yet another reason to love the Koreans: the Samsung phone. I just got the Samsung Trace which is a great little phone. I had to replace my broken Motorola phone, which wouldn't ring when anyone in my address book called. So, strangers could reach me but I wouldn't pick up for any of my friends. Some of you know this from frustrating personal experience. So, why did I buy a "non-Korean" phone in the first place? I know, I got taken in by the free offer when I signed up. But this time, I waited until the a Samsung was free. I would have also taken an LG, also Korean. :)

Birthday

Yesterday was my Birthday. I turned a milestone year but I won't tell you which one. :) The festivities started last week when I was visiting my sister in WA. After dinner on my last day in town, my sister thought it would be fun to have a little party with a cake, which she asked me to get on the way to picking the kids up from daycamp. So, of course I went for my favorite, Baskin Robbins Ice Cream cake. Oreo ice cream with chocolate cake. yummm. We had a little party with my sister, my neice Mindy and 3 other 8 year olds.

Then, the day before my b-day, Julie Esh, an old friend from Crusade came into town to visit me and some other friends. It also happens that we have the same b-day! So, after I got her from the airport, I took here out to dinner a cute local restaurant on Nob Hill called Rose's Restaurant and Bakery. I went on and on over dinner about all the reasons Portland is so great. Now she wants to move here. :) It was fun to have her because the next morning we got to have b-day bagel together before I went off to work.

On the evening of my b-day I threw myself a BBQ party and invited some of my old students, most of them from the OEX summer projects I led to East Asia. It was so much fun. 11 of us sat on my deck with hot dogs and burgers and had a great time into the late evening. I feel very blessed that I've moved to a town where I have so many close friends. It's the main reason I love Portland so much.