Random Shot #3

Agh! I have to make sure I post in between these random shots... That was sort of the point. To get me posting more.

Forest foraging pays off

Phil's in Seattle

As a lot of you already know, Phil moved to Seattle a few weeks ago to work for Urbanspoon. This is quite exciting for all sorts of reasons, but I am selfishly mostly excited about the fact that he's closer in mileage and therefore we get to spend significantly more time together. He moved into a cool rental house with a lot of weird features including 1) a warm water dog bath in the basement; 2) tons of windows in every room and not a single curtain or shade; 3) pine flooring; 4) cork walls in one room; 5) a sink that has a regular faucet, and also a "pot filler" that is extra tall and can run at full water pressure while the other faucet is being used; and 6) fruiting shaggy mane mushrooms in the driveway. In case you couldn't tell, I really like Phil's house. I like Seattle too. I'd never been to Seattle before he moved there, and oddly enough, now Josh and I are both spending a lot of time there together as well. (Phil and Josh and Ava went to see the new Matchstick Productions film, and of course Josh dressed up as Saucerboy.)

Last weekend while walking around in a city park, Phil and I found what says is his most favorite mushroom of all. Seems like the perfect combination of rain and sunshine, and temperature this year. We've been finding a lot of mushrooms every weekend, whether we're trying to or not!

Phil with shaggy parasols

Chanterelles from two weekends ago

How would you like your meatloaf? Wrapped in bacon.

Ahhhh.... Food in Portltand. Amazingly satisfying when you never leave Corvallis. Not that I don't love some of my regular places in Corvallis - like La Conga - but it's the beauty of the food that Corvallis lacks. Here are a few of the delicacies from this weekend.

Cute Italian cafe off of Broadway in SE Portland. Mom had the lunch deal (above), $10 for fresh mozzarella and tomato on a bed of basil and a glass of wine. I ordered a formaggio panini with a cup of Italian Wedding soup (below). Ooooooh, yum.

For lunch yesterday, Josh ordered the stuffed meatloaf, wrapped in bacon, with mushroom gravy. Daaaaaaaaaamn. Who ever thought of wrapping meatloaf in bacon is clearly a genius.