Winter Favorites by Melenie

Yep. Rainy season is in FULL EFFECT. It's driving me nutso...stir crazy...Bleh. However, I have come to fully accept the very fact that I live in the Pacific Northwest and it rains here. Alot. Period. Especially in the winter. With that said, although I get nutty from the drub, I do know that this rain is responsible for creating the ginormous trees and ferns I've come to love since I relocated. And I love the green come spring!

So I've compiled a list of favorite things that I turn to when I feel drab from the long rainy season here in Portland. (For those of you that live here or in neighboring Seattle, you can relate so enjoy). For those of you that live afar, send me sun if you have it.

1. I love wine.

I joined a wine club over the summer (Maresh Red Barn). This wine ROCKS. Really. It does. I love the fact that this dude who works there always wears the same blue overalls (his name is Sam) and he remembers my name. Plus their vieww of the Dundee hills is SICK. (Think Sonoma/Napa County meets a wave of green and a few alpacas). Love this place.

Also love the Portland winery Hip Chicks Do Wine. (Google their website). Their located 15 mins from my house and they have yummy wines. The winery is also solely run and operated by two VERY COOL women that are driven and super smart. They inspire me. If you go late in the day, the nice lady working the retail store/tasting room will give you a short tour of the processing room. Very cool. Something very chill to do in the rain. And the wine is considerably less expensive than those in the Willamette Valley. (their harvests come from there though) :)

Finally, the BEST wine for the price that I've indulged in recently is Charles Shaw's (formally known as "2 buck chuck" for you west coasters) Nouveau Valdiguie. The bottle is a mere $2.99 and tastes so close to a Beaujolais from the rack of a pricier wine specialty store. It's yummy. I like it. A case only costs $35 bucks. When I first moved here from philly I went Charles Shaw crazy...It was February and my first "Rainy season"...

One of my resolutions was to indulge in good wines in 2008. Cheers to that! Holler.

2. Title Wave Bookstore rocks my world.

If you live in Portland you know about this place. If not, then you must discover. I go here atleast once a week. (Sorry Powells, I love you too...BUT...) This bookstore is owned by the Multnomah County Library and holds books that are overstocked or outdated from each branch (which are quite a few). I swear my book collection has TRIPLED in the past year due to this place. All books are priced at like $1 to $3 from ANY realm and they have magazines for 25-50 cents. I just bought seven praxis/math guides, two zines, a political journal, and book for 8 beans. They often have sales where they offer you a bin to fill with as much stuff as you can for 10 bucks.

Go there.

3. Ristretto Coffee Shop makes an OBSCENE latte.

Seriously. It's my new favorite latte spot. I have a list of fav latte joints. But since my move to the Concordia 'hood, it's been a while since I've been to a few of them. Costello's Travel cafe rocks. Tiny's Rocks. Gold Rush rocks. and Stumptown will always have my heart. (Although it competes with Aj Java and Portland Roasting Co.)

4. Dragonfly Chai is BLAZING.

Buy a bottle for 5 bucks. Cop a box of soy milk, measure half/half, warm it up over the stove, mix in the mug. Indulge. I have one every night after dinner...it's from a local company here in Ports. If you want a bottle, holler. If I love you I'll send one. :) They have many flavors. (Black Tea, Roobis Red, and Green). The Roobis is my fav.

5. Stews and Soups are a big part of my winter life.

(ok. it's been a minute since i've blogged. So forgive the length.)

I LOVE cooking. Really. I do. And in the winter time I love making my homemade Juk and wonton soups (yes, from scratch my friends). We often go out for udon/ramen or pho, but it's fun to make it at home too. P and I have also broken out our Fondue kit that we got as a wedding gift and never used. I must say that this thing ROCKS. We recently made a "hot pot" and did it up sukiyaki style at home. It was life altering. We also used it during NYE for cheese and chocolate...yums. **Note: everything in moderation people!

6. Buy the pork carnitas from Trader Joe's. Like now.

So yummy. Rip the pack open, dump it in a cast iron pot, add a cup of beer (light or dark), a can of corn, and your favorite salsa. (I typically chop up LOADS of garlic and onion too). Let it simmer. Add cilantro. Enjoy. When I'm too lazy to cook an entire meal this pack saves me. I never added tequila to it, but I bet it would be a nice substitute for beer...

7. Rogue Beers RULE against most others.

www.rogue.com Visit this site. The Chocolate Stout is by far my favorite.
ok...enough for now. I'll add more later.

Nonetheless...Happy New Year everyone. Sorry I haven't called. Been busy hibernating.
Cheers.


Currently reading : The United States of Wal-Mart
By John DickerRelease date: By 16 June, 2005

toyota yaris

this is the car we bought today, same color, toyota yaris.

buying a car

cant decide, new car or used car?

new cars i'm looking at are the floor level toyota yaris, maybe the kia (only because of the 6-10 year warranty), maybe honda fit, but its out of my budget. i dont want to finance.

OR...used toyota or honda accords...

looking to drop around 10k....

what to do, what to do... the new car will put me at 12-13k though....

December

It's been awhile since my last post. Things are going really well, though pretty stressful learning to adapt with a couple of hours of reading a day for school. My first two classes are over this weekend and two new ones start this week: finance and managerial assessment.

had a little Babson holiday party last night and I have my work one tonight, which should be a blast. things are going great, i'm juggling some potential very large sales right now, should find out some news by end of year about them...

i think we're gonna buy a car this month, as we need to get out and explore more on the weekends, if we can get away from schoolwork. melenie's taken over cooking on the weeknights. i miss it. she does a great job, however, as she's an awesome cook also.

facebook.com is my new favorite web hang out. im probably mad late on joining that party, but i dig it, nonetheless. def. way better than myspace.

happy hanukah and merry xmas.

p

beaker from the muppets sings coldplay

bday wknd

Thank you for the birthday wishes.

Family visit was a blast. had some great times, some great food, some great laughs. i got a Nintendo Wii, a dope digital voice recorder, a bbq kit, cast iron pans, home depot gift card and a homemade apple pie. couldnt ask for more...dinner at Carlyle was fantastic, breakfast at Columbia Gorge Hotel even better and lots of wine and brandy tasting. oh, and honeycrisp apple eating, the best apples in the universe.

busiest week for me in ages...school and work proved to be super stressful this week with team conference calls lasting 2 hours each night and a long in person one on friday night....

Babson issued a press release about our class this week...

pumpkin carving video w/ me, erica and melenie:

School/DC/30

Life has been hectic, really hectic lately. First off, I've started school and went through 5 days in a row of 8am-8pm class from thurs-mon. Then, the next morning I woke up at 4am to fly to DC. Worked at a conference until this morning and now I'm waiting in DC to fly home. Cool thing is though, I fly through philly and have a 3 hr layover there, so my mom and sis are gonna pick me up to chill for a lil bit and maybe grab a cheesesteak. Waiting at the airport now blogging (writing this) on my cellphone and doing some observations for class. I'm REALLY excited about school, the kickoff was very inspiring. My class is about 45 very bright mid-30s to 40 guys from Intel, Microsoft, Nike, GE, Apple and more...mel is quitting her job next week, my parents and Er come out to visit next week and I turn 30. Getting old stinks. Pauly.

breast cancer walk

My cousin Abby’s team for the fight against breast cancer and the huge walk this wknd in Philly raised over $60,000!!!!

 

That’s amazing and I am very, very proud of her.  Abby, my mom, Aunt Lo, and many more are walking like 50+ miles this wknd for the cause.  Congrats on a great job, ladies and have an awesome weekend.

 

Paul

some links

a ton of links for you to browse:

a little info about my new grad school here: Babson College

SHOCK: GREENSPAN CLAIMS IRAQ WAR WAS REALLY FOR OIL

Oregon Wine

our new supermarket where everything is local, organic, sustainable, etc.: New Seasons

the current audiobook i rock in my mp3 player while biking to/from work: Malcolm Gladwell, "Blink"

our favorite new thai restaurant on alberta st, its actually fused w/ brazilian?!?!? but it's amazing: siam society

update?

sorry for not writing for such awhile...

been fixing up the condo a bit, learning how toggle bolts, how to put up mirrored closet doors, etc. bbq to meet all the neighbors last night was fresh...made 2 racks of ribs and some sum thum. oh, and we made sangria too...delicious.... so erica and rich came to visit...then a few weeks later, kellie and jesse came to visit...we went wine tasting and to the coast both times....def. our favorite things to do here...winter's hill is our current favorite winery.... we're off to america's dopest sake producer next time - Sake One.

studying accounting today. very fun.

we now have a new pet, a beta fish. its name is bater.

i got a promotion at work. yay!

ive been on cholesterol meds for awhile now and riding my bike all summer but my lipids are worse? nay!

i like these comedians, they're flipping hilarious. flippin! (like flight of the conchords...)

john heffron
http://www.comedycentral.com/comedians/browse/h/john_heffron.jhtml

demetri martin
http://www.comedycentral.com/comedians/browse/m/demetri_martin.jhtml

we have 2 other visitors coming this month...nicacelly, an ill clothing designer who se know from stink and mecca and my girl marisa tener...and also tim sword, from Food Export, USA, who we went to India with in December....

rich and erica visit

new spot is coming together very nicely. mel turned 29 on aug 1. rich and erica came to visit this wknd. wine tasing, chess on the coast, seafood eating, bar hopping, here's the Rogue brewery, best beer in the world:

school/condo

i've been accepted to 2 schools thus far for grad school and am waiting to hear back from 1 more. i'm torn between a very prestigious, top 25 school (according to business week) And #1 entrepreneur school worldwide according to newsweek... but MAD expensive... $50K for the 2 yr program... so torn between that school and a good local school thats very reasonable on the pocket...about 1/2 the cost of the prestigious one...i figure if i make $10k more per year with the prestigious degree, even if it's 5, well then i make that back in 2.5-5 years...so i'm gonna attend the prestigious school if student loans will assist enough....i've already got the burden of rent going up by $350 a month because it's not rent anymore...now it's mortgage + HOA dues...

new interpol album is boring. sales are great right now. new condo has the coolest neighbors...10 units and all the owners are cool peeps that are our age.

its been absolutely gorgeous here with the most perfect temperature and weather. 75 and sunny today. can't beat it.

im off to do some super late night moving.

p!

new condo tour - sorry about the lighting & camera-work

my boys from philly's new song/video: The Cobbs "Hold On"

Ratatouille

mel and i took 3 of her students to see the new Pixar flick, Ratatouille today. The movie was amazing...a rat aspires to be an amazing chef in paris...awesome for kids and adults, check out the trailer below:

amazing weather

its been an awesome summer thus far in terms of weather. another gorgeous high of 80 day today enjoyed with some wine, cheese and gelato at a chill neighborhood outdoor café...

condo

our offer on the condo was accepted and so i guess we bought a condo!??!?

it is located here.

it looks like this:

we close/settlement in about 2 weeks. we will move between mid next month and the end of the month...

the show flight of the concords on HBO is hilarious!

oregon strawberries and ranier cherries are so ripe and delicious right now.

peas.

gmat/condo

retook the gmat today, brought my score up 70 pts to a 550! good news, good news. also made an offer on a condo we really dig, for only $150k in a dope up and coming neighborhood!

tall lilys

we've got some tall lilys in our yard...

its been a while...

let's see what's new with us...well, we've been house-hunting exhaustingly over the past 2 weeks, going out almost every night looking at condos to purchase...we're still not sure exactly what we want though and finally realized howw stressful this can be whhen push comes to shove...for example, when you're sitting in the realtor's office going through the 50 page sale agreement with the pen in your hand, initialing everythign and at the last minute, ask what's up with the other property, then see that that one came back on the market at 10G's lower than what it was before, but it's still not necessarily in the your budget...or is it? hmmm....

after the past 2 weeks we've developed a way more knowledgable perspective on things though, and are gonna just chill and keep an eye out online but not go look at anything else unless we aboslutely love what we see online...we're gonna focus on school tests right now...I have to retake the GMATs because my math score was sub-par, and pretty much, same with mel, she has to retake the math portion of her PRAXIS test also... so we'll be studying the next month or so...

our cousin out here, Dylan, is graduating high school tongiht, so congrats to him, we're off to his graduation ceremony in an hour or so....

my plants are looking nice right now, especially the strawberry's and mel's HUGE lilys...pic to come...they tower over us...

early shout out to my mom turning 50 next weekend and tim-t turning 30 on the same day...

im thinking about driving to either Glacier or Yellowstone National Park this summer...which do y'all thnk would be doper? both are around an 11 hour drive...

• Glacier
• Yellowstone