When Knitting Was a Manly Art

Personally, life is pretty good right now. Work is still a struggle though. Our night manager, who went on maternity leave, is coming back to work on weekends, but our youngest employee is leaving for a three week graduation vacation, so we’re still shorthanded. Boss is handing me more responsibility, but that also means I don’t close the restaurant as many days. Currently closing only two nights a week.

With all the free time I now have I’ve been doing a lot of reading and visiting Powell’s Bookstore in Portland. And with that, I’ve discovered new site online where you can catalog your library and I’ve been busy adding books in my collection. I hadn’t realized how my cooking related books I had until I see in a listing like this. Still digging out all my knitting books, so all of those haven’t yet been entered.

One of my recent additions is The Portland Bridge Book. Portland is one of the great bridge cities. Bridges help define Portland and the city, county and state have done a magnificent job of preserving our bridges. The book inspired me to create my own personal archive of pictures of the bridges.

I started today in the little North Portland Community of St. Johns and the St. Johns Bridge. Opened in 1931 and at river mile 5.8, it is the first Willamette River crossing for automobiles as you travel upriver and is Portland’s only suspension bridge. At the east end of the bridge is a public park known as “Cathedral Park” because of the gothic arches that pass through it’s center

At the east end of the bridge is a 29,000 ton cable anchorage

And a walk over the bridge to the west side and and opening in the trees where I was able to put together a 4 shot panorama of the whole bridge.

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One of the things I’ve been doing to keep myself busy is to volunteer down in Brooks, Oregon at a Power Equipment Heritage site known as Antique Powerland. Specifically in the steam-powered sawmill. About a year ago I was asked to help out on the roller line (moving fresh cut boards out of the mill) and have been coming back regularly ever since.

Today I spent about 5 hours moving boards that will eventually be used for various projects on the grounds. At this point we cut all lumber that is used for building projects. The mill has electric power for lights, but all the power equipment is powered by three steam engines (with another expected to join to run a new/old trimmer saw before July). Forgot my camera this morning, but I’ve got a shot of head rig (saw and carriage) and boiler unit that powers the whole thing, from a run late last year.

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I think so, but don’t be too surprised if posting continues to be a bit spotty for a while.

Life in general is pretty good right now (7 on a scale of 1-10). Work continues to be the main issue still, though I’ve finally started getting regular days off. Wednesday and Saturday this time around.

We’re still a couple people short since the first part of May. We’ve actually had some new-hires, but all but one haven’t lasted more than a couple of weeks and one of whiny young ladies, who’s been around for a couple of months, called in 1/2 hour before her shift was to start and quit. Not good, as we already had reservations for a Birthday party and we were already one person short for the shift. Sigh…

Not much knitting going on, though I really need to finish the little sweater before the baby is too big to wear it… One step at a time.

The annual Portland Rose Festival is in full swing, with the Rose Parade scheduled for this coming Saturday (with a weather forecast of rain — Of course, it always rains Rose Festival week).

Drove into Portland yesterday, parked near Union Station

and walked down to the waterfront to capture a couple shots of the Festival Fleet coming down the river. Only Canadian and Coast Guard ships yesterday, with the U.S. Navy ships coming today.

Along with fireboats streaming Red, White and Blue water (ok.. ok.. Just red and white in this shot, but I swear there was blue earlier)

And armed gunboats on the river. Things have changed considerably in the past couple of years. Amazing security. Blocks and blocks of chain link fencing preventing anyone getting near the area the ships dock. Armed military patrolling along the waterfront. Xray machines at all entry points. Another Sigh…

Time to get cleaned up and run some errands and head for work. 2pm to 10pm tonight, but I’m closing with one of my favorite young ladies, so all is good…

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