Lowering the Weirdness Level in Portland

I said goodbye to my husband and babies last Thursday morning to catch a taxi, shuttle and two airplanes to go visit Nanette and her family in Portland, Oregon.  It was the first time I had been away from the boys for more than just a couple of hours so it was a big deal.  I cried a little here and there throughout the day I left but was also looking forward to some me-time.  Something I have only had very small doses of for the last 4.5 years.  So it was a fun, but kind of difficult, time for me all wrapped into one.  Anyhow, moving on...

I noticed even at the airport gate in Chicago that if you are a guy from Portland, you probably are sporting one of these things- a beard or skinny cords.  If you don't have either, you better at least have a cardigan sweater on to make up for it.  I hate going places and being obvious that I am a tourist.  I have very few pictures of my trip, in fact, just because of that reason.  I think though that there was no way to hide it in Portland.  The motto is "Keep Portland Weird"- don't believe me?



It is painted on the building right there by Voodoo Donuts.  I think I'm pretty normal and not-weird so I'm sure the weirdness level dipped a bit over the weekend.  Sorry Portland.  Speaking of Voodoo Donuts, it is a must in Portland so we went there for breakfast Friday morning.  I love donuts so it wasn't hard to convince me.  I decided to step out a little and try something different.  Now they have a lot of crazy donuts so maybe it wasn't so different but I got the "fritter of the day" which turned out to be strawberry-pineapple-banana with sprinkles on top.



It was good but a little too much sugar for my breakfast.  I ate half and threw the rest away before I gave myself a stomachache.  From there, we cruised over to Powell's City of Books where I loaded up with books for the boys for Christmas presents.  We shopped around downtown a little more and then headed over to the Clackamas Town Center.  I had requested a visit to one of the H&M stores and the mall provided that along with lunch and a showing of Silver Linings Playbook.  The movie was great and I was just happy to see any movie in a theater because that rarely happens these days. I picked up some Molasses Chips for Rob at See's Candy, bought the boys some more clothes at a super-duper sale at Gymboree and then we headed back to Nanette's place.   Brent picked up dinner for us at Killer Burger which was fantastic.  Such a good burger.  Thursday night's dinner was also a big winner- we went to Hopworks and the soft pretzel sticks were amazing.  I felt like I didn't really get the whole Portland experience since it is beer-heaven and I don't like beer.  In fact, no one ordered beer at Hopworks.  Lucky they didn't kick us out.

On Saturday we went to the Little T Bakery for some breakfast.  Like everywhere else they took me, this place had fantastic food.  We did a little shopping in the Sellwood area and then were headed to the Japanese Garden when we got distracted by the a food cart pod downtown.  It was lunchtime, after all.  I got distracted by this one, in particular.



Mmm, Cuban food.  I ordered the pork box and it was great.  The pork, the maduros, the black beans and rice- all of it was delicious.  As we were all getting our food from the various carts, it started to rain.  No one brought an umbrella (I was advised not to use one as to avoid looking like a tourist and being snickered at) so we decided to head back to their house where we all took naps.  We hung out there for a while before heading over to Dove Vivi for pizza.  Once again, delicious food.  We all spent some more time at home hanging out before I headed to bed fairly early since I had an early flight the next morning.

Now, about my flights home.  What I had booked was terrible.  I was using a mileage award for the ticket and my choices were poor.  I was supposed to fly Portland-Seattle-Chicago-Des Moines with about 4 hour layovers.  Yikes.  I tried on the phone to get the direct Portland-Chicago flight so I could completely skip Seattle but had no luck.  When I got to the ticket counter, "Sure!  There's room on that flight."  So I got to Chicago way ahead of schedule.  It looked like I would spend 9 hours there before my flight to Des Moines took off.  I figured I would spend $30-40 for a rental car and just drive home from O'Hare.  This was where my plan started to unravel.  I never checked the cost of the rental car until I got to Chicago and then realized it was going to be $140 for a car.  Uh oh.  As I'm talking to Rob on the phone about this, I realize there are 3 flights bound for Des Moines, all leaving at 2:00.  It was 1:40.  I hang up with Rob and run from the L gates all the way over to the G gates to see if I can get on one of the planes.  As it turned out, Des Moines was foggy all morning and no flights had been able to get in there yet.  Bad for everyone else, fantastic for me.  I had to pay a small fee but I was able to get on a flight that left at 2:20.  Woohoo!!  Rob and the boys picked me up at the airport and I made it to my house about 9 hours before I thought I would.  My advice is that if you want to change a flight, keep asking because someone just might tell you yes.  And even more miraculously, my bag made it to Des Moines ahead of me and was waiting at the baggage claim counter.  I wasn't due in until 11:35 that night so I have no idea why that bag was there- it shouldn't have been, but it was.  Everything just turned out perfect.

My boys didn't get more than about 4 feet away from me once we were home, which I loved.  It was a great trip but I was thankful to be home again and see my husband and my boys.