Dallas was here, San Fran, Toronto.Then we had an elderly country doctor from Tennessee.

 He wasn't here to enjoy the foodie and or nightlife like most. He was on the clock doing infrastructure stuff. 

We became his single serving friends. It was good to have a bunch of time with someone we disagree with. 

I don't want to be in a feedback loop. 

I care about truth so that means trying to understand everyone's perspective. He was very conservative. How conservative? 

He does missionary work. 

That is actually against our religion lol. We still got along great. We agreed on a lot of things too. 

He was certain that there shouldn't be a bunch of military weapons in the hands of regular citizens. He knew the president was an unjust man. 

He also had exciting adventure stories about sneaking bibles into North Korea.

 I loved how his eyes twinkled awkwardly as I rolled a joint. "We do things different at my house." No booze is allowed at his place while it's encouraged here. I also got to show him that it wasn't a problem. It was fascinating to get to know him. He took us to dinner one night. 

On the way he was marveling about how beautiful Portland is. He loved how friendly and informed the people are. He said Portland reminded him of the towns of the 1940s. Lots of people just on the street talking and enjoying each other. He was delighted to see so many small shops and booming local economy. 

I let him know it's not an accident. Portland used to routinely run out Walmart, McDonalds and tons of other chain stores that crush small biz and ruin communities. 

We had din din over on Hawthorne. It was a treat to hear his wisdom and life stories. 

I think what we had in common was the brothers keeper thing. We all had agency over our communities and do our best to take care of everyone.We were also all self made people. 

On the way home we saw Metro boutique and the Haberdasher across the street. 

We know he has the bread for some threads. 

We tried to convince him to let us pick him out some new flash clothing. Same as his Andy Griffith barbershop style, just updated and elevated. 

We wanted to trick him out and send him home looking dapper for his lady. "Clown Eye for the country guy" 

Of course he wasn't having it. 

He gently explained that he has old school conservative values and flashy stuff is not considered very becoming.

 Ok ok fair enough...but I want to hear his wife say that. 

I bet she would love to be swept off her feet by a sharp dressed man.

Minneapolis in the house

This week we had a couple a women from Minneapolis having a friendcation and enjoying one of their favorite subjects:food and booze.
They got me up to date on the crazy booze laws in the Minnyapple.
I can talk about that stuff all night. Later I was washing dishes as I heard them in the next room talking with Olive. It was a giggle fest. I kept hearing words slip in between the clank of scrubbed pots.
Words like "erotic, sci-fi, festival, dinosaurs"
then Olive "Is that a fest you are attending?"
Them: "Nope we are the organizers."
Without knowing fully what they were talking about I went into the room and said
"I just want you to know how much I love and cherish the Twin Cities."
One of them looked at me over the sunglasses she was rocking inside and said the perfect thing.
"Minneapolis, Austin and Portland baby."
LOL YES! I love Austin too.
Been there a lot of times and never had a bad day.

I have grown apprehensive when men show up.

They do gross stuff. Luckily our place is popular with mostly women and they are a lot cleaner.
The last guy must have had stomach problems. He kept leaving the commode looking like someone took a baseball bat to a bean burrito. Yuck.
Olive and I didn't realize we were both cleaning the same dude's mess over and over.
One night I left the lid open hoping he would notice his art project and take care of it.
Unfortunately Olive woke in the night and had to clean it up first.
We don't work here but bathrooms are one of our normal roommate chores.
Yesterday he got my attention.
"Um the bathroom is out of toilet paper"
and Olive and I looked at each other instantly wondering "What are you gonna do with that?" lol