By Bob Hicks
Over at Oregon Live, Friend of Scatter D.K. Row reports that Oregon’s two major gubernatorial candidates, Demo John Kitzhaber and the GOP’s Chris Dudley, have pretty much nothing to say about how they would or wouldn’t approach statewide funding and other support for the arts. Both ducked a request by the statewide lobbying [...]
By Bob Hicks
It’s pretty grim, according to Steve Law’s report, Historical Society may ask voters for tax levy, in The Portland Tribune, and Sarah Mirk’s followup, State History Museum Will Run Out of Cash in 2011, Pitches Tax To Stay Afloat, in The Mercury’s Blogtown.
Things are skeletal right now. Oregon Historical Society boss George Vogt [...]
In a town of gifted animators and graphic novelists and even the cartooning Simpsons daddy of ‘em all, Matt Groening, John Callahan has long held a special place: the edgiest of the edgy, the guy from way out there, the quadriplegic artist (we mention this because that fact is so important to the formation of [...]
By Laura Grimes
LEAVENWORTH, Wash. — “Is this a barbarian village?” the Small Large Smelly Boy piped up. “Do barbarians live here?”
He was jokingly referring to Leavenworth, Wash., the Bavarian village that screams for “quaint” to be added automatically to every reference. This is the place made for tourist buses and resorts.
I don’t consider myself a [...]
By Laura Grimes
The Small Large Smelly Boy and I have been on the road for a while, bravely negotiating a clogged highway along a lavender festival, fording a large body of water by ferry, climbing mountains, and gingerly making our way through Sasquatch Country.
JoJo can prove it. Our parenting thinking is so warped that we [...]
By Bob Hicks
CRACK! DOOM! CRACK! DOOM!
The sky splits above the high desert. Great bursts of lightning roil the midnight blackness with a frenzy of white heat. The thunder rattles deeply like the cries of gods at war, and the rain is rain — hard, fast, fierce, a gullywash of frantic energy that, soon spent, will [...]
By Laura Grimes
The Pantsless Brother was passing through town recently, but I was prepared this time. Gas or no gas, I found him some pants. Whatcha think?
A clever friend sent the photo to me, and she can’t remember where it came from. Gotta love those flames on top of the head. But is that … [...]
Mr. Scatter hasn’t been writing a lot lately, at least not for print. Lots of notes, lots of transcriptions, lots of interviews and looking at stuff and thinking about it, but not so much for instant gratification — Mr. Scatter’s or his readers’.
In case you missed it, he did have this piece in last Friday’s [...]
By Bob Hicks
SAN FRANCISCO — The cabbie’s whipping around the corners like a Tim Lincecum curveball, as wild and abandoned as the wind whistling down the bay. We’re heading back toward town from an art studio near the south waterfront, and the driver’s rapping out opinions like a batter playing pepper in spring training. Mr. [...]
By Bob Hicks
The Wall Street cowboys keep whoopin’ it up with other people’s money, the Dow dips and rises like a desperate trout on a line, the economists crunch numbers and announce happily that the recession’s over.
And in the real world, people brace for the worst. Jobs disappear. People take pay cuts and thank [...]