8/6/13-- Day Two: Today was easy peasy. I had a 10:00 appt in Portland, about 15 minutes from my house. The owner of Belladona Beads, K, is a late 30's woman with purple and red hair, a few old school tattoos, and a slightly geek/goth manner of dress. She was very friendly, and we hit it off right away, talking about how wherever you're from (she's a Detroit transplant) it's kind of hard not to become a hipster in some way here in Portland. "I own a hoodie," she said, "I only drink fancy beer, and ride a bike everywhere! Back in Detroit you only rode a bike if you had too many DUI's."

  K and her longtime boyfriend, E, lived upstairs from the shop, which was pretty cool looking: vintage red and black checkered tile, and another vintage counter that E had built. Once she got to looking at the beads, I knew it was going to be a good one. She pulled out a lot of each box, and after a bit, her store started to fill up with customers. She alternated between picking out more beads, and shooting the shit with me, while I tallied up what she picked out. After about 2 1/2 hours, she'd spent $2434, making those two hours of pleasant conversation worth $329 to yours truly.

  With my next appt up in Vancouver not until three, I opted to go get a burrito at the best, and probably only really good place to get a burrito in this town: Nutri Taco. If you're ever there, get the Super Gabby. So goddamn good, I'm incapable of ordering anything else. As I sat in my van and chowed down, I called the second appt to try to bump it up to two. The employee of the shop informed me they'd tried to cancel earlier, but had a bad number. Turns out the owner was out of town. Whatever, I thought, I've already made enough to call it.

  If you're still reading at this point, my friend, I admire your tenacity. I have a feeling this is what it's going to be like everyday. However, I'm still in my hometown, so everything is familiar and whatever to me. Tomorrow I leave for a for a three day trip up into WA, and then get back on Saturday, or Sunday. I can't promise it'll be any more interesting, but I know that on Friday I have to RACE TO CATCH A FERRY TO AN ISLAND!! OOOOOOOO!!! THRILLS!!!!

  And there's also the promise of all the EMOTIONS I'm bound to have when I leave for the long haul on the 20th. Like, the fact that right before I flew to NY to meet with Nir for the interview, I met a fantastically wonderful woman named Janine. She'd know from that day that I was set to be traveling around the country for long periods of time, but that didn't stop either of from falling deeply in like with each other, and we've been spending a whole lotta time together in the past few months. So, that'll be interesting to read about, in terms of romantic melodrama.

  Plus all my friends, and sister in the city I'm still quite fond of, Portland fucking Oregon. I'm going to miss alla that too! The beer theaters, the bars, the food, the parks, the weirdos on unicycles and tall bikes. What will I do for weirdness in fucking Wyoming??

  And there's the added attraction of me having never done anything like this before. This could have a strange effect on me. You all will be there to witness it in print. Oh so speshul!