My Words Are Writing Abroad

Hello all,

If you have visited this blog between August 2009 and now, first of all, thank you very much. Second of all, it may appear as though I haven’t written in a long time.

Well, in fact, I have been predominantly writing for the wonderful website Wine & Bowties.

For now, look for my posts there, and thanks again for reading!

Love Thy Broder

Now I know that I’m the one who’s new to Portland, so saying something like this might seem a bit ill-fitting, but:

If you live in Portland and have not yet eaten at Broder (SE 25th & Clinton), you should.

My friends had been touting this Scandinavian restaurant-evidently the only Scandinavian restaurant in Portland-called Broder (Swedish for ‘brother’) ever since I moved here, and I’d been dying to see what it was all about. My friend Andrew lives about 10 blocks away, so last week, the morning after a fun-filled night of True Blood and Banjo Kazooie, we ventured over there.

The official name of the place is “Broder Cafe,” which its size is indicative of. There are only about 6 or 8 tables in the small rectangular room, and if you go on a weekend morning, expect a wait. But it’s well worth it. We started out with a couple of coffees (Stumptown, first time having this locally brewed coffee, delicious) and aebleskiver: traditional Danish pancakes. They’re made in a special pan that allows the dough to be cooked in spheres, somewhat reminiscent of popovers:

They were so delicious looking that we ate most of them before I could snap a photo, and I must say they lived up to their aesthetic appeal. Broder serves them with homemade lemon curd, jam, and maple syrup. Andrew and I decided that combining the lemon curd and jam made for the best topping.

Next came our entrees. I am a sucker for egg salad sandwiches, and this might have been the best one I’ve ever had. They mixed the eggs in a curry (that thankfully wasn’t spicy), but gave the egg salad a unique flavor, unlike any I’d previously tasted. For my side, I ordered a special: pea salad with bacon, some type of crumbled cheese I can’t recall (blue? gorgonzola?) and cream. The salad’s flavor was very subtle, the bacon gave it a delightful crunch, and I definitely enjoyed it. Andrew ordered the lamb burger, which has actually been getting some serious publicity (among other recognitions, it was voted Portland’s best non-beef burger in the Portland Monthly). Despite not having tried too many burgers since moving here, I believed it after one bite.
What’s more, nearly all the entrees come with an assortment of pickled vegetables. I actually hate pickles. But I LOVED the pickled beets and onions that Broder served up. I didn’t know beets could taste so good.

And the cherry on top of this Broder story is that Andrew is now one of the eatery’s hip employees! Now that I have 2.5 friends working there, I’m especially looking forward to tasting the rest of the food Broder has to offer.

So, go eat here. You won’t be disappointed.

Glad ätande! (Happy eating!)

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

I am an incredibly avid reader. I love reading so much, that you’d be hard pressed to find me anywhere, anytime, without a book on my person. And now that I no longer have to worry about reading text books or doing school work, I actually have time to read for fun these days. So far this summer I’ve read a handful of good books: When You Are Engulfed In Flames (David Sedaris), Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (Haruki Murakami), and I reread the wonderful Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (JK Rowling). And even though I do enjoy sharing my thoughts and feelings about books I read with others, I’m not planning on blogging them whenever I finish a book I like.

But I would like to do just that in regards to the book I just finished: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows.

My sister lent this book to me after reading it for her book club. I’ve got to admit that I’m sometimes skeptical of book club books… but this one was a gem. The book is comprised of fictional letters, mostly written to and from the main character Juliet, an English author who is tired of writing her signature “Izzy Bickerstaff Goes to War” stories and wants to move on (WWII has just ended). A Guernsey (one of the Channel Islands) farmer serendipitously finds her name in a used book and writes to Juliet. This turns into many of Guernsey’s inhabitants writing to Juliet about their experiences during the German Occupation on the Channel Islands during the war, and ultimately so much more.

It’s a quick read, and I found myself slowing my reading down as I got further into the book because I so desperately didn’t want it to end. It’s almost painfully touching, and delightfully written all the way through. But what I loved most about this book were the characters. It’s amazing how Shaffer and Barrows bring the characters to life in such an affecting way and in so few pages, relatively speaking (admittedly some more than others). You’ll have to read it to understand, but I don’t know if I’ve ever wanted to know any character in any book more than Isola Pribby. My heart honestly ached with love when I read “Isola’s” letters.

I think a big reason I wanted to write about this, though, is that it’s not that I think this is the best book I’ve read at all-frankly, not by a long shot. But it was absolutely one of the most enjoyable books I’ve ever read, and I felt love for it while reading it. I found that interesting.

So, read this book! I think women are more likely to be drawn in by it than men are, but I’m sure there are plenty of men out there who would appreciate it. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

Long Live Crossword Puzzles

…on paper, that is.

I came across this article on GOOD that ponders the possible demise of crossword puzzles, and it got me thinking… While the slow death of printed newspapers has been known and discussed for a while now, the potential corresponding end of (legitimate) daily, printed crossword puzzles hasn’t been so much. Perhaps this is because crossword puzzles seem insignificant in comparison to the entire paper, but not to me. In fact, when I was a student at UO and we had the privelege picking up a free NYT paper on campus, I will (with a bit of shame) admit that, more often than not, I paged my way through the paper only to grab the crossword from it and recycle the rest. In an age where my generation spends more time perusing the Internet than doing almost anything else, I’m used to and also enjoy getting my news online. But when it comes to crossword puzzles, I just can’t do it. I feel very much the same way about online crossword puzzles as I do about Kindle (although the latter actually almost makes me angry): they’re just not meant to be. There’s something off about not using a pen and paper, or not holding an actual book in your hand. I suppose to be fair there’s something to be said about saving paper and the environment in doing virtual crosswords and reading electronic literature. In my opinion, though, when these days we spend so much of our day staring at screens, doing a tangible crossword puzzle or holding a real book in your hands is not only more tactilely pleasing and desirable, but also a breath of fresh air.

So, having never really cared if newspapers as a news source are an endangered medium, I am now worried that genuine, daily printed crossword puzzles’s days are numbered. And I sincerely, desperately hope that they’re not.

HEY PDX!

University of Oregon’s School of Journalism & Communication (whew, that’s a mouthful-eyeful?) is hosting a portfolio review for its advertising students THIS Friday (June 5) at the Turnbull Center (in the White Stag building). Come check out absolutely phenomenal work from the upcoming strategic/writing/art directing/planning stars of the ad world from 2:00-5:00 pm. You won’t even know what hit you.

The official invitation, courtesy of Monica Sellers.

Pervasivadvertising

My teammate for Brand America (Advertising Campaigns class>working in teams>attempting to rebrand the USA) linked me to this awesome video about the Swedish airport shuttle company Flygbussarna’s “50 cars or 1 coach” campaign. Perhaps the campaign itself is old news (though it wasn’t to me, and I was impressed), but this video asks the question, “can advertising be too effective?” and answers it by analyzing Flygbussarna’s work.

Aside from causing more than a few traffic jams, this campaign seems to have done nothing but good. I think it’s great: an installation piece turned multi-level campaign that is, on top of everything, helping the environment? Duh. I’ll let you check it out for yourselves, though:

FLYGBUSSARNA.

Identity Crossword

Here’s the identity video I made for my Branding+Content class. We could essentially create anything we wanted, using any media, to convey [an] aspect[s] of our identities. It was my first attempt at stop motion…

Camelbak

For my Writing Design Concepts advertising class, I’ve chosen to create a mock ad campaign for the wonderful Camelbak hydration systems and accessories. (Everyone should have a Camelbak water bottle at least… well, specifically for my purposes, in the college age demographic, more than just health-conscious women should).
The class thus far has been great, and rewarding because we’re really going through the creative process. We explored various strong brands, we narrowed it down to some that could use stronger concepts, we chose our own to work with:
+ we figured out what our brands are/are not
+ we developed them further as if they were people
+ we came up with a creative brief and CONCEPT for them
+ we came up with one hundred thumbnails (a daunting task) that further explored the concept
+ and most recently, we’ve turned some of those thumbnail ideas into roughs

I’ve quite enjoyed this in depth creative process. It’s gotten me really excited to do this for a living, (provided I can make it there). It will definitely help me develop my portfolio on my own and otherwise. It’s a lot of work, but it’s work that I love and can tell I will love doing.

I won’t go into my whole thought process here, but I think I’ve decided to stick

I’ve gotten slightly more stuck now that I’ve hit the roughs. I still think I’ve got good stuff, but it’s coming less easily at this point, which seems wrong. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? Ah well, such is the creative process I suppose: not linear. Deb did tell me today, though, that I should try driving my campaign with writing. I’ve been trying to not completely rely on writing (thus avoiding my lack of artistic direction/skill), and of course I wouldn’t ever just rely on my writing to give it mojo (would never have used that phrase before this term–thanks Deb), but this is exciting for me: getting to focus on writing (what I want to do) rather than struggling through making the finished product with all the programs I’m slowly but surely learning.

I’ll post some of my work as it starts to become more finalized.

So… what do you/would you like about Camelbak water bottles?

Tasting the Drunken Rainbow

Today in the ever-rising world of Twitter, I saw a tweet describing a way to make Skittles vodka. I was intrigued! It does seem like a process that I might not have quite enough patience for, but it definitely makes for a pretty awesome outcome.

Here’s all the stuff you need:

And here’s what it’ll ultimately look like. Pretty aesthetically pleasing:

To get savvy on the process and make your own ridiculously sweet, candy vodka, check it out at mixthatdrink.

Why Why Why WHY?

Why do people still go batshit crazy for American Idol?

I wouldn’t have even known that the newest season of American Idol was starting up right now if it weren’t for my roommate Andrew watching it occasionally. But now I do know. What I don’t know is why the contestants go absolutely nuts when they either do or don’t make the cuts.

First of all, I didn’t think people still watched it. I mean, sure, I watched the first couple, maybe three seasons of the show with my parents on a weekly basis when I was 14, 15 years old. But I just assumed that the path of American Idol was like that of Survivor’s: HUGE at first, watched by all of America, and then continued for way too long for anyone to keep caring about it. But I was wrong. People are still very, very much into it.

But OK. I guess I can sort of understand why people still watch the show. I still watch all the “I Love BLANK” reality VH1/MTV reality shows, which is far more embarrassing. What’s harder for me to understand is why the contestants still act like being a part of American Idol is the single most important thing that will ever happen in their lives. I’m pretty sure that the only winners of American Idol who have been legitimately recognized post-show are Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood. And then there’s Clay Aiken. He didn’t even win. But he is also disgusting and pitiful.

Are these people legitimately convinced that being the winner of the show will lead to a life of fortune and fame?

Yeesh.