The Waypost: where everybody knows your name

The Waypost is a bar that's about a block from my house, and it is hipster to the core. Seriously, think of the most hipster place that you've ever been in your life, then multiply it by 750 and that's the Waypost. Weirdly enough, I love it. I think its because its also one of the weirdest places I've ever been. Its really tiny, and apparently the owner is from Arizona, so it looks like it would fit right in if it were in Tucson. You never know what you're going to find at this place, and here are the experiences that Paulina and I have had there so far.

"Umm...do you think they'll still serve us tea?"  
We started off on the appropriately weird note for this place. Both Paulina and I were under the impression that it was a coffee shop that was open really late, so one night we were both like "oh hey I really want some tea and a cookie but its like 10 pm, want to go check out that Waypost place?" And since we were just going to get some late night tea, we did not feel the need to dress up. Paulina was wearing leggings and a sweatshirt, and I was in sweats. We get there and SURPRISE, its a bar. Like full on crowded bar scene filled with people drinking alcoholic beverages while wearing their hipster best. Both Paulina and I just stood there so awkwardly in our pajamas trying to figure out where we had gone wrong in our lives. The bartender thought this was the funniest thing in the entire world and still made us tea. We drank our tea at a little table that had a drawer in it, and the drawer was filled with all sorts of bar doodles from the hipsters who came before us, which was pretty cool. One person wrote a really long letter that I'm pretty sure was supposed to be super profound, but their handwriting was not great. We found some pens and decided to leave our mark. I drew a dinosaur (obviously) and Paulina tried to write a love letter to her soulmate, but unfortunately her pen ran out of ink.

The poetry slam 
Another night, Paulina got super amped on us going out and doing activities, and I was not feeling it at all. Finally I agreed to grab a beer at the Waypost, on the condition that I wasn't actually going to change out of my sweats. So we go, and we walk into a full on slam poetry situation. Paulina couldn't deal, and walked out immediately laughing her ass off. I went after her and was like "no. You dragged me out of bed for this, we are having a beer". The lady kept slamming her poetry, and we tried so hard to follow but we couldn't. Apparently some of her poems were really funny, but honestly we had no idea what was happening. I don't think we're deep enough for hipster slam poetry. The bartender who served us tea was also there, and he remembered our names. Unfortunately for him, I called him Brian even though his name is Antonio.

This sums up how thrilled I was to go out that night.

Hipster friends 
Before this night, every time Paulina and I have gone to the Waypost, we have made absolutely no effort to make any new friends. We never wear anything besides workout stuff (or sweats in my case) and we usually sit in the front area and eat our nachos and drink our beer in a very anti-social manner while making fun of all the hipsters around us. We're those girls who don't talk to anyone but each other and the bartenders. One night we decided to change all of that. We made efforts to wear hipster things (I wore my thick rimmed glasses, we both wore plaid) and we went to go and see what was happening. There was a band playing, the bartender remembered our names, we got some beer, we were ready for friendship. Unfortunately, friendship wasn't ready for us. Not a single person talked to us the entire time we were there. At one point we were sitting at a table and literally every single person was on the opposite side of the room from us. This was a little bit devastating, but luckily the band started playing songs on ukeleles and that made everything better. As we were leaving, this super badass looking girl started talking to us about how she had hitchhiked her way to Portland and had been sleeping under bridges. We kept our cool while we were talking to her, but as soon as we walked away both of us were like "OH MY GOD SOMEONE ACTUALLY SPOKE TO US!!!!!!!!!" It was a big moment, because apparently Paulina and I are 13.

Brunch 
The Waypost serves brunch on the weekends, and it has saved our lives a time or two (or a lot) when we've either gone out the night before or are just too lazy/haven't bought groceries and don't want to make breakfast. Most of the time its pretty standard: we wake up a tad hungover/Paulina drags me out of bed around 10:30, Paulina puts on real clothes, I stay in whatever I happen to be wearing, we drag ourselves the block and a half down the street and then sit down to a delicious breakfast. I broke the routine a little bit after the Pants off/Dance off party (see previous blog post if you don't know what I'm talking about) when I woke up more hungover than I have been in a good long minute. It was one of those hangovers where you have to lay in bed for a couple of hours regretting all of your previous life choices while trying to evolve into an actual human being. I kind of thought I was dead, but I finally managed to stumble down the street around 2:30 pm (brunch is served until 3 pm) because I figured that eating something would make me feel better. I was wrong. I ordered my food and sat down, and everything was just too much to deal with. The walls were too bright, the music was too loud, I was too hot, and I took exactly one bite of my breakfast and was like I am going to vomit. I went back to the bar and had to explain to the bartender that I had greatly underestimated the dire situation of my hangover and that I needed a to-go box at that exact moment because I really wasn't going to make it. She laughed at me and got me the box, and I made it home.

In case you couldn't tell, if you come to visit we will go to the Waypost more than once. Its magical.

Naked Portland

http://38.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lgo813u1wV1qzxzwwo1_500.jpg

Oh hello friends! Blogging once a month is how you become internet famous, right? Anywho, tomorrow I will have lived in Portland for two months (!!!) and I have to say, this city has welcomed me with an unusual amount of nudity. That probably sounds pretty weird, so let me explain. 

STRIPPEROKE 

When I first heard of stripperoke, I didn't believe that it actually existed. If you know me, you know that I really like both strip clubs and singing karaoke, so the idea that I could sing karaoke at a strip club was really just too good to be true. But it exists, and it is fabulous.  I really just can't stress enough how much I love it. It is held every Sunday night at a strip club in town called Devil's Point, and you sing karaoke on a stage while a girl shakes her boobies and does lots of acrobatic things on a pole to your sweet jams. The first time I went, I had no idea what I was getting into. First of all, Devil's Point looks sketchy as fuck. Its basically the dive bar of the strip club world. I'll be honest, I went in thinking the strippers were going to be the girls who clearly have some serious daddy issues and minor meth addictions, but I could not have been more wrong. These girls are the most athletic strippers that I have ever seen. I want to work out with them because their bodies are fierce. The girl who performed while I was singing was defying some serious lays of both gravity and physics with the things that she was doing. Oh, did I not mention that I sang?? I stood up on a stage in front of a large crowd of people and sang "I Believe In A Thing Called Love" by The Darkness while a topless girl danced around and did flips and shit.  Just let that mental picture sink in for a minute, because it was just as funny as it sounds. My favorite stripper (I've gone more than once) has the funniest signature move that I have ever seen. She does kind of a weird handstand on the lap of a guy sitting by the stage, so her ass is in his face. Then she shakes around for a minute before slamming her ass back into the poor guy's face really hard. I have a friend who got a bloody nose from this move. Yeah that's right, this girl's ass is so firm that she can give dudes a bloody nose. I saw her do it to another guy, and he was like "I think I just got my nose broken by a butt hole". SO FUNNY. 

Oh! Speaking of the second time that I went to stripperoke, I went with a guy who I knew in high school that I hadn't seen in about 6 years and was randomly in Portland for a night with some of his friends on their way to Seattle. One of his friends sang "Let's Get It On" and it was freaking magical. So basically I'm the best person to visit, because I'll take you to go and sing karaoke with naked girls. 

THE NAKED BIKE RIDE / PANTS OFF DANCE OFF

Portland does this thing every year called The World Naked Bike Ride, and its exactly what it sounds like. Thousands (no joke) of people ride their bikes through the streets naked (or as naked as you want. Their motto is "go as bare as you dare") as a protest against the over-use of crude oil and exposing the vulnerability of cyclists. Fun fact, the reason that they are ale to do this is because naked protesting is a form of free speech, so as long as you're protesting, you can just let your bits fly free with no fear of getting arrested for public indecency. The ride was last night, and good lord, it was a sight to be seen. I was not an active participant (mostly because I don't own a bicycle) but I was able to catch a little bit of it. My plan was to cruise downtown and see some of the ride, then cruise back to my house to get ready for a party my friend was throwing after the ride, but I ended up not having to go because as I was walking to the bus stop a full on fleet of naked cyclists zoomed by me and I decided that was enough of the ride for me, so I went to a bar by my house and ate some nachos to recover from the surprise amount of dong that I had just witnessed. Then I met up with one of my homegirls, and after a small(ish) amount of pre-gaming, we headed over to my friend's party. The party was called "Pants Off, Dance Off" and I tell you what. I wore a tutu and a bandeau and was significantly overdressed. 

Ah Portland, I like you for your weirdness and your awkward amounts of nudity. 

Things I've learned from Space Jam

Space Jam is one of my favorite movies in the entire world. I was thinking about it today, and you know what? There are actually a lot of life lessons to be learned from Michael Jordan and the Looney Tunes crew. I think these are things that everyone should know, so here you go! You're welcome.

1. Nobody is good at everything. 

I don't care what you think, Michael Jordan is the greatest basketball player in the history of ever. I mean seriously, remember the opening montage from the movie?! Ridiculous. Plus he goes full on animated and scores the winning shot against the Monstars. But even though he was this super kick ass athlete on the court, he sucked at baseball. He was embarrassing. But he played it because in the beginning of the movie little Michael told his dad that he was going to play professional baseball.  Sometimes you try new things and you suck at them. Its OK to not be good at everything you try, because sometimes you're just bad at stuff. Michael is bad at baseball, I'm bad at cooking. 

2. Sometimes you need to ask for help. 

Bugs Bunny and his homies thought they had everything under control when they first challenged the tiny aliens to a basketball game, but then the tiny aliens stole the NBA talent and everything sort of went to shit. Instead of trying to beat the Monstars by themselves, the Looney Tunes characters understood that they were in way over their heads, so they went and asked for help. Pride can be tricky, but its important to remember that you really don't have to face anything completely alone. Guaranteed there is at least one person in your life who will be willing to help you out. This is something that I need to work on. 

3. Sometimes its the most unexpected people who save the day 

There is no denying that Michael Jordan is the hero of Space Jam, but Bill Murray and the fat guy from Jurassic Park also have their shining moments. Stan was the one who figured out how the Monstars got their talent, and Bill jumped in so that the Tune Squad didn't have to forfeit the game after Bugs got hurt. Its important to put a little faith in people instead of just writing them off, because sometimes they can surprise you.

4. You can always make a comeback 
In the first half of the game, the Tune Squad pretty much gets their asses handed to them. At one point, the scoreboard goes through the numbers really really fast until it stops and just says "its a little one-sided, isn't it?" Then Michael and Bugs trick the rest of the team into drinking the special drink which all of a sudden makes them awesome. He then gives them a motivational speech about how it was really just water and the talent was inside of them the entire time. Seriously, it rivals the "ducks fly together" speech from The Mighty Ducks as my favorite motivational sports moment. Then they go on to win the game and goddamn is it inspirational. It can feel like the odds are completely stacked against you, but if you ask for help and believe in yourself, its always possible to get your shit together.

http://htmlgiant.com/film/space-jam/

Saturday Thoughts Vol. 4..................The Sunday Edition

Yeah I know its Sunday, but whatever. Maybe I'll just change this to Weekend Thoughts? Anywho, here's what I've been thinking about!

1. Vibes 
I have come to the conclusion that I give off very weird vibes. When I was in Flagstaff I got stitches in my neck (broken blood vessel situation, it was gross) but I had to get them removed in Portland because I got them the day before I left. After she took them out, the doctor here was like "OK now try not to get punched in the neck". Totally serious, like getting punched in the neck is something that happens to me on the reg. Then my friend's dad was in town for a couple of days, and he told to be careful of bar fights. This was also a thing in South Dakota, I drove the company truck to Montana one day and multiple people asked me if I had any warrants for my arrest out in that state.

2. Jobs 
I got a job at an athletic club in town and I'm pretty amped. Its a super elite and fancy establishment (think "country club in a city" sort of deal) so apparently my hood rat vibes did not overpower my other awesome qualities. Unfortunately, I let all of my certifications expire when I was in Hawaii, so I have to re-take the lifeguarding class. I haven't read the lifeguarding manual since I was about 18, so we'll see how this goes. Haha

3. High School 
Portland is weird. A lot of people I went to high school with live here, and I've been hanging out with them a lot. But the two that I hang out with the most are people that I didn't actually stay in touch with after high school, so its been extra weird. I saw both of them the first night I was here, and it was one of those "so........how have you been the last couple of years?" situations. Its been a lot of fun though. Also a guy I went to high school with who also lived on Oahu lives here too, so that's pretty cool.

4. Hipsters 
Hipsters. Ugh. I hate hipsters. I promise I will write an actual post in the near future going into more details about this hate, but I'm too lazy. So just take my word for it, there are a shitload of hipsters in Portland, and I am having a hard time dealing with all of them.

5. Clothing 
I am so bad at Portland. I never seem to be wearing a raincoat when its raining, or wearing pants when its cold out......its a mess. And being super underdressed is apparently my thing in this city. I've unintentionally worn sweat pants to TWO different bars, and I accidentally went to happy hour at this place called Portland City Grill wearing a hoodie and polka dot under armour running shorts. Its on like the 30th floor of a building downtown and was full of working professionals. So that was embarrassing.

Can't even find the stop for the Struggle Bus

I have a shockingly terrible sense of direction. People think I'm kidding when I say this, but its really bad. Most of the time its just little things, but occasionally I get so lost that its just too ridiculous. Today was my first time getting so lost that I almost cried in Portland, and I am going to share it with all of you! Don't you just feel so lucky? 

Today I went to visit my roommate at work for the first time. Getting to the actual place was fine, its two bus rides and you're golden. Total, it takes about half an hour. I hung out there for a little bit drinking italian sodas and discussing our very hipster Easter (originally this was going to be a post about how much I hate hipsters, but then I got lost and I decided that story was the one that needed to be told) and then around 3 pm I decided to head home. 

HOLY SHIT Y'ALL.

I have no idea what happened, but her building was like a goddamn black hole. Seriously, I was defying some laws of physics or something, because no matter what direction I tried to walk I was always going to opposite direction of the stupid Google Maps thing. Every. Single. Time. I didn't even know that was possible. I just kept walking around this stupid building, before I finally found a stop for the city car thing. Of course, I round the corner just as the fucking thing leaves. WHOMP WHOMP. I didn't feel like waiting there for the next one to come, so I decided to find another bus stop (because clearly I was so good at that). I finally got on track with the Google Maps dot, and I'm cruising, when all of a sudden it takes me to this giant tower looking thing and basically tells me to continue straight through it. I figured GM was lying to me, so I turned around and then was back at Paulina's stupid building again, and at that point I was basically convinced that I was just going to have to live there. I decided to give the tower route another shot, so I went back that way and headed to the elevator that was at the bottom. It took me up to this giant bridge, and then  Google told me that the bus stop was in the middle of a pedestrian bridge. It wasn't. In case you can't tell, Google Maps and I are in a fight right now. I continue across the bridge, and ended up in a full on residential neighborhood. At this point I had been trying to find a bus stop for almost 45 minutes, so I was very upset. I said "where the fuck am I" out loud, and because I had headphones in it was a lot louder than I thought. This homeless guy looked over at me and was like "you're on planet earth". COOL GUY, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THE HELP, I REALLY APPRECIATE IT. 

I finally found a bus stop, and the numbers of the buses matched up with the ones that Google was telling me I needed to use. Hooray! So the 17 rolls up and I get on, super amped to finally be heading home. I sit down, look at my phone, and just watch the little blue dot start moving the exact opposite direction of where I needed to be going. No joke, I almost cried. Turns out I forgot the small detail that its actually really important to know what direction you should be going. I figured I would get off at the next stop, but that took forever because the bus took me across a bridge spanning a large body of water. Unfortunate. Also unfortunate, the bus stop that I got off at appeared to be located in Sketchville, USA. After the bus left I was standing there trying to figure out where I had gone wrong with my life, when this large man just walked up next to me, grabbed a paper bag that was sitting on the ground and proceeded to chug the contents of the paper bag. That he had just picked up. Off the ground. Yup. I could see the bus stop that I needed to be at across the street, but it was a busy 4-lane road with no cross walks in sight. It felt like 400 years, but really I think it was about 5 minutes before I finally got to a cross walk. I crossed the road and found a bus stop, and finally got on the stupid 17 going in the right fucking direction. 

Before I get into the next part of the story, I think its important for everyone to know that I have a really bad habit of just full on ignoring my GPS. It'll be like "OK you need to get off at ______ stop" and I'll be like "that's cool. I'm gonna get off at this one instead. Just to make things a little bit more interesting". I have no idea why I do it, but its a thing. I also do it in cars, where I'll just randomly take the wrong exit. Anyway, back to the adventure. I'm sitting on the bus, and I vaguely hear the announcement that the next stop has a connection to the 4. My brain was like "OH! THERE IS A BUS STOP FOR THE 4 A STONE'S TOSS FROM MY HOUSE, I SHOULD TOTALLY GET OFF HERE SO I CAN GET ON THE 4". So………..I got off the bus. Turns out the connecting bus stop was actually a little bit of a walk away, and at that point I full on thought I was going to be homeless. Like oh yeah, I have a house that I pay for and has all of my stuff in it, but I can't find it so now I live on the streets. Just as I had accepted my homelessness as a fact and was trying to decide what corner I was going to live on, I finally found the stop. Seriously, I'm pretty sure I heard Jesus and all of the angels singing my praises. The best part was that it ended up being a 5 minute bus ride to get to my stop, and I didn't get lost because you can literally see my house from this bus stop. I finally got home at 4:50 pm. Yeah. It took me almost 2 hours to get home from a place that it took me 30 minutes to get to. So stupid. 

Oh, and I took this picture at one of the 47 bus stops that I went to today. It basically sums up my entire afternoon. 

Saturday Thoughts Vol. 3

We finally got internet, so I was going to write a Saturday Thoughts that would update everyone on how Portland has been so far, but I am way too lazy. So here's something I wrote on the plane when I was coming out here. Enjoy. Also, sorry the format is so fucked, but I just copied it from Word and I am way too lazy to fix it. 



True Life: I’m not a fan of flying.  I’m on a plane right now, and to take my mind off of being 30,000 ft in the air I’m going to watch Iron Man and tell you about some of the weirder flights I’ve been on.


 Switzerland    When I was 10, my dad was living in Zurich and I went to go visit him. The day before I left, I got the worst stomach flu I have ever gotten in my life. Nobody could get ahold of my dad, so at 10 years old I flew overseas by myself puking every 30 minutes or so. The plus side was that nobody wants to sit next to the girl who’s puking her brains out, so I got the entire middle row to myself.


 Belgium  
I did a foreign exchange program in Belgium my junior year of high school, and I got in a car accident a couple of days before I left. My face got fucked up by the airbag, which made flying super uncomfortable. I had to get special permission to bring the topical medicine on board, because it was a big tube, but I had to put the medicine on my face every hour. It was so dumb, and I met my host family looking like I had just gotten my ass kicked.


 Frankfurt    
The summer before my senior year of college (OH SWEET JESUS THERE IS TURBULANCE WE ARE GOING TO DIE) I went to Europe to visit my friend who had spent the semester studying in Italy. I sat down ready to sweat through 14 hours of airtime, when the guy one seat away from me looks over and says “just to let you know, I fucking hate flying”. I just kind of sat there and was like “uhhh……well that’s a bummer”. He looks me dead in the eye and goes “I’ve already been drinking, and I’m going to drink the entire flight. Are you old enough to drink?” I had been 21 for exactly 4 days before this, so we proceeded to get hammered. I have never had so many rum and cokes in my life. This made trying to navigate through the Frankfurt airport to get through customs and catch my connecting flight to Milan super exciting.


 Coming home from Italy   The return trip from Italy was a goddamn mess. My flight from Milan to Frankfurt was scheduled to leave at 7:30 am, which meant I had to be at the airport at around 5:30 am. I didn’t know that the bus stopped going to the airport at 11:00 pm, and didn’t start again until 7:00 am. This meant that I had to spend the night at the Milan airport by myself. I didn’t want to sleep because I didn’t want my belongings stolen, so I drank my body weight in caffeinated beverages and pretty much just sat there twitching until I could board my plane and pass out. After I got to Frankfurt (sober, this time) I boarded a plane for one of the Carolinas, but I forget which. I sat next to a guy who looked like Jesus, and we drank a lot of wine and watched movies together. It was pretty magical. I arrived to whichever Carolina we were going to not very sober. Then the real fun began. The flight to Phoenix ended up getting delayed for almost 5 hours. This was because (no joke) they left the plane on the tarmac for too long and it was too hot, so they had to let it cool down. Then, in the process of cooling down the plane, they found some sort of mechanical problems. At this point, I had slept for about 2 hours in the last 30, so I was not a very happy camper. I kept going to the Starbucks, and I’m 99% sure the barista thought I was on drugs. By the time we finally got on the plane, I had basically become convinced that I was going to have to live at the airport like Tom Hanks did in that one movie nobody actually saw.


 Hawaii  Flying back to Hawaii after my knee surgery was ridiculous. My little sister was flying out to visit our dad the same day, and because I couldn’t function by myself, I had to go with her and was at the airport over 5 hours early. I just posted up in the airport café watching Netflix with my leg propped up on my suitcase. I had hoarded my last two prescription painkillers, and I popped them as soon as I got on the flight. This young couple was sitting next to me, and I feel so bad for them because I was a mess. I watched the first 30 minutes of The Big Lebowski laughing my ass off, then passed out on the guy next to me. When I woke up I decided that I needed to ice my knee, and I spilled the ice cubes all over myself. To top it off, every time they asked me what things they should do, I couldn’t quite remember the names for anything, so I just made shit up.   




Well this was fun. I’m going to watch Iron Man now.

The best advice I ever gave.

http://mentalfloss.com/article/51919/whats-your-best-advice-college-students

Yesterday I had breakfast at Macy's (the best coffee shop on the planet) with a dear friend, and I had one of the best ego boosts ever.

We were talking, and all of a sudden she goes "you know, I normally don't think too deeply about our friendship, but I realized that you have given me some of the best advice I've ever gotten, when I asked you how to passive aggressively handle someone who is annoying you". I sort of laughed and sat there hoping she would continue, because I couldn't actually remember what advice I had given her. Luckily, she then said "I encounter a lot of stupid people at the cafe, and I just look at them like they're stupid when they're talking or only give them one word answers. Its so weird, but it makes everyone be so nice to me!!!" Hahaha I love it. That is exactly how I handle interactions with people that are annoying me and it always works.

From this conversation I learned two things:

1. Clearly I give the best advice on the planet.
2. Something you think is silly can be the best advice someone has ever gotten.