Donuts for work

Friday was National Donut Day. We brought in donuts for the shop, mill and warehouse. 6 dozen donuts disappeared pretty quickly.
Portland is home to the world famous Voodoo Donuts. They have all kinds of exotic combinations and even some fancy shapes. But the best donuts, and I include maple bars, fritters and twists, are from the Helen Bernhard Bakery. Pretty straight forward in types and toppings but are a donut delight every time.

Loading grain in Portland.

Loading grain at the Columbia Grain terminal in Portland. They have been running non-stop since the longshoremen went back to work. Vessels from all over the world but mostly The Far East in to take on soft white wheat. 

Spring is here.

Along with daylight savings time, baseball practice and daffodils, another sure sign of spring is having to mow the lawn. I started the 2014 yard work tonight by mowing the front lawn. I'll mow about 35 more times this year before the lawn goes dormant for the winter. In May and early June it needs it a couple of  times a week. Mostly though its just once a week through the summer. We have a pretty small yard and it only takes about 30 minutes to mow, edge and weed it once a week. I'm not a big fan of yard work so this is just the right amount and we like having grass to look at and walk on. While I'm not looking forward to the weekly chore its a sure sign that warmth and longer days are on the way!

Brason Avenue, where we live now.

This used  to be the name of the street we live on. Back when this was East Portland instead a part of Portland, the north/south avenues were named instead of numbered. We now live on 7th Place. It's 2 blocks long and doesn't exist elsewhere in the city. We live in an old neighborhood in a new house. Most of the streets and houses were put in around 1910. We still have tether rings for horses embedded in the sidewalks and iron rub rails on the curbs to keep them from chipping. These all go back to the days of horse drawn transportation.  

This is our house. We've lived here for 10 years. The original house on this lot was condemned and torn down. The chain link fence on the north side of the house is all that's left of the original property. It's been a great place to live. We have 4 restaurants, a brew pub, coffee shop, park and bike shop within 4 blocks. The quintessential Portland neighborhood. It's known as the Dekum Triangle and the Woodlawn Neighborhood. 

This is who lives in the house. My wife, Diane and myself. She is the reason this is such a great house. She fills it with love and grandchidren, takes excellent care of me and herself and makes it a place where all our kids are happy to come visit.  And she drives the red Jeep in the driveway. Pretty much just our youngest lived in this house. The rest were out of the house or just here sporadically by the time we moved here but all know it as a  home they can come to. 

Snow days

It's not all fun when it snows.

The snow started on Thursday and kept going through Friday. What a mess for the city of Portland and surrounding communities. The company I work for, Ruan Transport, hauls a lot of different commodities and products. Some of them are pretty basic, essential items that need to be delivered regardless of the weather. Two of the most essential are dairy feed and medical supplies. 

We deliver dairy feed to farms in Oregon and Washington, feeding cows that produce milk for Darigold, Tillamook Creamery, Fred Meyer, Safeway and many others. These take place daily and are necessary to keep the milk flowing. So they need to happen in good weather or bad. The drivers chain up for the snow and adverse conditions, take an extra thermos of coffee and head out on these runs. These are tough runs, on roads that are off the beaten path and don't see the snow plow and sanders that the major highways get. Yet they get through and get the job done. Wet cold conditions, climbing ladders covered in ice to open bins, turning and maneuvering in icy farmyards, the feed gets delivered and the cows fed. 

Another one of our terminals here in Portland delivers supplies to hospitals throughout Oregon. These occur daily also and can have critically needed items on our trucks. Surgery supplies, medicines and sterile products are on the trucks and the deliveries keep them providing essential services in their communities. On our Friday run to Medford we had some items that they had an urgent need for and, again, the driver chained up and ran on 260 miles of snow covered roads to make the delivery that was needed. We were the only scheduled delivery that arrived that day. 

So while a lot of people enjoy a snow day by spending time with family, sledding or just having a day off work, our drivers come in, brave the elements and make sure the animals get fed and hospitals can continue to provide care. They worked through the weekend to cover the needs of dairies and hospitals. Trucks!! the lifeline of America!

Snowing in Portland.

Ruan yard in North Portland

We don't get much snowfall in Portland but when we do it's a mess. Roads get backed up, services stop and the city is unprepared to keep the streets plowed and clear. But it is a welcome change on occasion from the winter rains. Many people had a long commute home. Some of our drivers might not make it home tonight and schedules tomorrow will be disrupted. 

On the plus side it is really quiet outside and we walked up to dinner at a neighborhood place without having to worry about cars and traffic. Something about walking in the snow is calming and a totally different experience than a normal day's walk. Quiet, serene and a nice crunch to our steps. 

I like the occasional snow we get but glad it only comes once every 5 years or so. 

Cold, cold, cold!!

It is really cold here in Portland. Maybe not by Minnesota standards or anywhere in the Midwest, but really cold for Portland. Temperatures in the teens and below, with a strong east wind. The house we live in is pretty new so the weather doesn't affect the comfort level inside the house. Well insulated, double pane windows, water pipes buried to an appropriate depth and an efficient furnace keep it a warm and toasty 70 in the house. This is a far cry from the houses we lived in out on the farm. 
The first 14 years after getting out of college I lived in houses that did not have central heat. They were heated by wood stoves located in the living rooms. They were also on well water which required some special care to make sure your water did not freeze up. These houses were built in the early 1900's by farmers who didn't waste money on insulation. They were drafty and poorly constructed. We learned pretty quickly to pay attention to the weather forecast and make sure there was a heat lamp in the pump house and plenty of wood on the porch if the forecast was for below freezing temps and snow. Often it would get cold enough in the bathroom for ice to form in the toilet. 
The morning routine would involve getting up and starting the electric heater in the bathroom and then getting the wood stove going again. Usually it would be down to coals and took a little coaxing to get it going to begin heating the house up. Wood heat is wonderfully warm but it took a while to spread out and warm the house. The kids would get dressed in the bathroom where the electric heater would warm it up to a comfortable level. It took about an hour for the house to get into the 60's and we would be headed out the door to work and school about then. 
The other issue with living in the country was frequent power outages. When the power went out in cold weather the water pump would freeze up when the heat lamps went off. When this happened it was a couple of unpleasant hours thawing the pump and pipes to get water back. In the late 70's we had an extended cold snap and 2days without power. We never did get the water un-thawed till the temperatures got above freezing and went about 2 weeks without water in the house. We had to haul water in from the neighbors to flush our toilet and visit friends and relatives to get a shower every couple of days. 
When we moved into the city in 1990 we had central heat that came on automatically in the morning and pipes that didn't freeze, no matter how cold it got. It took us a while to get used to not having to go through a frantic routine every time it snowed and got cold. All in all I appreciate the well insulated, well heated and well built house I live in now, but still have fond memories of waking up and still having running water and how good it felt to stand next to the wood stove and feel the heat warm you to the bone on those cold country mornings.