Blogging the conference Day #2

We went to Howell's, which is a bookstore that literally covers an entire city block and stands 5 stories tall. I'm genuinely surprised I got out of there with only buying 12 books (though 10 of them were a collection of the complete James Joyce in a very snazzy green case).

The other two were my favorite childhood book that I've been looking for for years, pictured above, and a pop-up book by my favorite living poet.

EDIT: Powell's, not Howell's.


The bike rack outside Howell's was decorated with metallic literary references. I enjoyed them.


Finally, my record collection is complete.


I spoke too soon.



Portland has unlabeled metal sculptures scattered randomly around the city. My first thought was corporate art, since they have that generic look about them and are very large for no real reason, but they tend to appear outside parking garages and other buildings that probably wouldn't pay for art, much less clean the bathrooms.


I've seen these on phones all over the city. They go on to explain in tiny type that the Patriot Act allows public phones to be tapped and blah blah blah. Hopefully it's some sort of civil disobedience, because informing the terrorists of the tapped phone seems like the opposite of what we should be doing. In fact, I don't think any signifigant part of the War on Terrorism should involve stickers at all.


The McDonald's here had a bacon cheeseburger. Bacon on a McDonald's burger, Chet and I had never seen such a thing. We are from the South and easy to amuse.


The McDonald's also had a little lounge you could sit in and watch CNN. The fast food here is just operating on an entirely new level.