Summer To-Do List

1. Find a new secret river spot. Show all my friends.

2. Stay away from bars, hang out in backyards, only—for backyards are the province of summer.

3. Freeze coffee into ice cubes and get buzzed on ’em in the afternoon.

4. Go skate-camping (skamping!) in the woods of Central Oregon.

5. Cut out everything in my life that isn’t absolutely awesome—including the toxic shit and the shit that’s of zero note.

6. Live off chips and watermelon.

7. Find my passport (closet? underwear drawer?) and head north to Vancouver. Drink caesars. Befriend some new Canadians.

The Weekend Report

Attended two surprise birthday parties. One, for Ben, involved NoPo's best front porch awash in evening light. The other, for Charlie, involved face-melting guitar rock from the band Magic Sword, as well as everyone running around all drunk with toy light sabers.

Slashed the Bracewell mini for the last time for a spell—as Bracewell himself is becoming a new dad, like, any minute now and will need nothing in his life for a bit but peace and quiet and, probably, diapers.

Took the dog for summer's first swim. Watched him lunge through the shining waves.

Moms and pops were in town with nephew Pat. As such, they were towed around by me in search of a Portland I insist upon, one that is not clogged with kooks and traffic but rather a mellow city of incendiary pizza, easy parking, and snow-capped volcanoes off in the distance.

Wine spritzin' on the porch with my boy Walter.

Mom and nephew—nice light and good marble at Pittock Mansion.

Don't pizza make you smile?

Fact: I went to a party that looked like this and I was not on drugs.

Tunnel Falls

Hiked 12 miles roundtrip to walk behind a waterfall last week. What's a long hike to you? Twelve miles is very long to me. The longest! But it seemed worth it considering that walking is good for you and meditative and also there was that sweet sap smell of the trees in the sun and how, once at the falls, you could slip into the darkness of a cold tunnel and then emerge again in a wild prism of overspray, which dropped over you like a veil and cooled your skin, giving you energy for the (long) walk back to the car.

Favorites 6.2.15

The close proximity of river season: Almost, almost, almost.

Marc Maron interviews Fresh Air's Terry Gross: Hey it's just two of my favorite interviewers, like, interviewing each other. Marc gets at a cooler, younger Terry. Terry gets at a more empathetic Marc. It's great.

Fried cauliflower po' boy at The Old Gold: Spicy, crunchy, soft. An incendiary sandwich for people of the vegetarian persuasion—and crucial acknowledgement that we can do better than reconstituted soy product.

Silicon Valley: Because Mike Judge, because Martin Starr, because everyone of us knows someone who's just fucking like one of the characters on this show.

Off The Grid

As a kind of antidote to my urban wanderings in NYC, I went off the grid this weekend for one long day on the Olympic peninsula. This involved a walk in the rainforest, which involved a field exploding with forsythia, sneaking through a paper-thin slot canyon, and a pale green pool that was the very definition of stillness.

The walk had a point—we were looking for a "big rock," a sacred spot to the local tribe. Maybe you can only see it if you really believe, though, because that rock turned out to be pretty hard to find. Only half of us actually beheld it, and me, being a believer—in life, in mystery, in things we cannot see—was one of them.

Here's to sacred rocks, and repelling down them with a beer in yer pocket.