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Special surprise after the gig

'Portland' as an adjective? Please explain to an ignorant person on the other side of the pond what the meaning and origin are.
Portland is a mecca for the strangest people in America. A popular local bumber sticker here says to "Keep Portland Weird," and they maintain a lot of regional weirdness. Portland is a city where you express an interest in anything, and the first 12 outgoing people you meet that share your interest show up on unicycles.
 
Portland is a mecca for the strangest people in America. A popular local bumber sticker here says to "Keep Portland Weird," and they maintain a lot of regional weirdness. Portland is a city where you express an interest in anything, and the first 12 outgoing people you meet that share your interest show up on unicycles.
Hhhmmm ... been there several times for academic workshops. I felt at home there. And let's hear it for Powell's City of Books!

But does that mean that England is the same as weird USA?
 
Portland is a mecca for the strangest people in America. A popular local bumber sticker here says to "Keep Portland Weird," and they maintain a lot of regional weirdness. Portland is a city where you express an interest in anything, and the first 12 outgoing people you meet that share your interest show up on unicycles.
"Keep Portland Weird" was a viral marketing campaign started by a number of small business owners (the record store Music Millennium and I can't remember who else), mimicking a similar ad campaign in Austin, TX.

After the timber industry waned in the early 90s, Portland had a renaissance as a mecca for white creative types (I moved here in 1989 with a band, and didn't know this was happening until it was too late, lol). Craft beer and advertising (Wyden + Kennedy) were the first wave, then came tech and the foodie scene in the 90s and 00s, and now weed. There has been massive gentrification and displacement of the already-small Black community out to "the numbers" (the 3-digit numbered cross streets on the east side of town) and the working class suburb of Gresham.

The tattooed weirdness Portland has today is highly curated, IMO, famously lampooned in the TV show "Portlandia" as a place young people go to retire. But if you're not a trustafarian or white-collar professional, you really can't afford housing in the city any more. The life I had in the 90s working part time in a sheet music store and playing in a Tejano band to pay $150 rent in a shared house in the central city is long gone.
 
"Keep Portland Weird" was a viral marketing campaign started by a number of small business owners (the record store Music Millennium and I can't remember who else), mimicking a similar ad campaign in Austin, TX.

After the timber industry waned in the early 90s, Portland had a renaissance as a mecca for white creative types (I moved here in 1989 with a band, and didn't know this was happening until it was too late, lol). Craft beer and advertising (Wyden + Kennedy) were the first wave, then came tech and the foodie scene in the 90s and 00s, and now weed. There has been massive gentrification and displacement of the already-small Black community out to "the numbers" (the 3-digit numbered cross streets on the east side of town) and the working class suburb of Gresham.

The tattooed weirdness Portland has today is highly curated, IMO, famously lampooned in the TV show "Portlandia" as a place young people go to retire. But if you're not a trustafarian or white-collar professional, you really can't afford housing in the city any more. The life I had in the 90s working part time in a sheet music store and playing in a Tejano band to pay $150 rent in a shared house in the central city is long gone.
Agree with all of this. I live in Portland now I a house that's way too expensive for what it is. Being black in Portland is a tough, strange, road to hoe. We've considered moving towards Gresham to not feel so isolated, even though both my wife and I work on the other side of town.
 
Yeah, Portland's been trying to be Austin for a long time.

Unfortunately, Austin's been succeeding at turning itself into Dallas.

All the giant beards, lumberjack shirts over heavily tattooed arms the diameter of chopsticks, man buns, etc., stuff really reeks of desperation at this point.
 
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Yeah, Portland's been trying to be Austin for a long time.

Unfortunately, Austin's been succeeding at turning itself into Dallas.

All the giant beards, lumberjack shirts over heavily tattooed arms the diameter of chopsticks, man buns, etc., stuff really reeks of desperation at this point.
Between the two, I prefer Portland to Austin. I have never felt as unwelcomed in a place as I did when I went to Austin. While Portland is incredibly white and has a history of legalized racial exclusion, people in Austin would stare at my wife and I as if we just didn't belong; we went to a reggae concert in Austin that was a also a NORML organization meeting, and everyone who didn't act we weren't visible was hostile to interacting with us. I tried to talk to the organizers, the band, and the fans, but no one would give more than two-word answers.
 
Between the two, I prefer Portland to Austin. I have never felt as unwelcomed in a place as I did when I went to Austin. While Portland is incredibly white and has a history of legalized racial exclusion, people in Austin would stare at my wife and I as if we just didn't belong; we went to a reggae concert in Austin that was a also a NORML organization meeting, and everyone who didn't act we weren't visible was hostile to interacting with us. I tried to talk to the organizers, the band, and the fans, but no one would give more than two-word answers.
Being white and inobservant I didn't get anything of the race history in Portland. What I do remember on one visit was staying at a hotel in the Rose Quarter and asking at the desk for a map as I wanted to walk across the bridge into the centre.

"You wanna walk?"
 
Agree with all of this. I live in Portland now I a house that's way too expensive for what it is. Being black in Portland is a tough, strange, road to hoe. We've considered moving towards Gresham to not feel so isolated, even though both my wife and I work on the other side of town.
I moved to Gresham 6 years ago and I feel like I can breath again. The Portland gentrification I've seen in the past 35 years is off the hook. Even Beaverton is more diverse than Portland now.
 

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