Portland Meandering (with prior addenda)

Surviving their trek to deepest, darkest Portland (and points in between), our weary heroes return to basecamp to plot the next day's excursions. With many painful tales about the ribs of former room-mat-tes (with many painful tales about the ribs of former room-mat-tes, etc.).

Forgot to mention yesterday:

- Dropped off Fibonacci's birthday present when we passed through Twin Falls. Mom had plenty of time to eat due to my clever wrapping strategy. ;^) (She also offered to throttle me for him, for some strange reason)

- Nearly got lost in downtown Boise, due to not printing out directions back to the hotel. Mom had us heading away from the Capitol Building in the wrong direction...I was thinking we should go in a different wrong direction... finally I got us headed back towards the Capitol until I found the street we'd come in on (one-way, of course), found one going the opposite way, realized it wouldn't get us back because the one we'd been on had ended at Capitol Boulevard, went two over to another going the correct direction, and made it back to the hotel.

- Got upgraded to a suite at the Econolodge, with no extra charge. Why? Because Mom wanted a groundfloor room and either (a) all ground floor rooms are suites or (b) this was the only ground floor room open all five days. Anyway, the suite is awesome. If you took the living/dining room, kitchen, bathroom and closet from my apartment in Fort Collins, you'd have something close to the right size. There's a kitchenette separated from the beds by a wall, and the bed area is larger than most. Bathroom...fairly average, but there's an extra phone in there. We're not entirely sure why... Our only major complaint is that the wireless network is weak and dodgy, cutting in and out nearly randomly.

- Dessert at Corbett's Fish House was also excellent. Rum coconut torte, or some such name.

Today:
Powell's, Whole Foods Market, Portland Music Store, Sheet Music Service, Monkey King, Global Village. And a few random stops in between wandering. Lunch was at Whole Foods Market (salad bar, mainly). Dinner at Assagio's (warning: flash intensive). Surprisingly good. It's the sort of dish I would have turned my nose up at not long before discovering I was gluten intolerant. Honestly, I think the rice pasta made it better, espcecially since Mom ordered the same dish with the regular noodles and it disagreed with her. Dessert was a flourless chocolate torte that was also quite good.

Backing up a bit, Mom heard about a big music store in Portland that her pastor thought was called "Portland Music Company." We found one. They had no sacred choral music, which is what she was looking for, but directed us to "Sheet Music Service" on the other side of the river. Crossing Hawthorne Bridge, we conveniently saw a sign for McLoughlin (where our hotel is) which would later be useful. Anyway, I got bored at the music store and left Mom there while I went hunting for the import store I'd accidentally found last summer by going to the wrong Powell's (there are several smaller branch-outlets). I found another import store nearby. Monkey King has Chinese Imports. Global Village has fair-trade imports from nearly everywhere. Both are on the same block (3500's or 3600's) on Hawthorne. The only thing I bought for me there was a small buckwheat pillow. My neck has been missing my contour pillow the past few nights, and I'm hoping the buckwheat bolster will help.

Tomorrow: Japanese and Chinese Gardens! YAY!