Shortly after I arrived here in Portland, Ore., for the current run of Ben Franklin: Unplugged at Portland Center Stage (through Nov. 22), I wandered off during a break in search of coffee-making equipment.  (I hadn’t brought my Melitta stuff from Berkeley.)  At the popular Stumptown Coffee Roasters I became entranced with the idea of trying to make coffee with a “French press” — which had always seemed like a cool way to make a very strong brew.  (I imagined burly, caffeine-addicted French people — or maybe even French Canadians — applying enormous amounts of pressure to create super-intense cups, then writing muscular poetry about societal injustices.)

Wanting to get the French-pressing process just right, I asked the young woman who was helping me — Carrie — if she would mind my video-ing her while she made an exemplary brew.  Kindly, she said yes.  The result is one of those gritty, hard-hitting documentaries that blow the lid off of outmoded stereotypes of coffee preparation; needless to say, it is not for the faint of heart — watch at your own risk!

So far, a couple of weeks into this eight-week gig, both the coffee and the audiences have been hearty and complex, with a gratifying finish.  Once my family gets here, next week, I will be completely grooving on the whole Portland experience.

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some serious pressing to do. …

Posted: October 7th, 2009 under Ben Franklin: Unplugged, Coffee, French Press, Portland, Touring, Video Podcasts.
Comments: 7

Yes, Portland Has a Seal

I’m just about to do the second preview performance of Ben Franklin: Unplugged at Portland Center Stage.  I’ve been having a great time: the theater staff is amazingly friendly, helpful, and erudite; the first preview audience, last night, was warm and receptive; and, thrillingly, I’ve been able to hang out a bunch with my theatrical collaborator, director David Dower.  (We used to see each other all the time, but then he moved from the Bay Area to work at Arena Stage in Washington D.C., where he’s been doing incredible things — albeit [*sniff*] 3,000 miles away.)

Some quick highlights from my first week here (mostly spent rehearsing):

• David and I wandered over to a local gym, and I happened to mention that I really missed my Berkeley-based personal trainer Georgia — who has made my life, previously beset by frequent back ailments, so much better.  Almost as if by magic, a trainer named Von Ray appeared.  Within a short time, somehow David and I had both committed to training with Von Ray while we’re here (seven more weeks for me, a few more days for David).  A moment later, I found myself at Whole Foods with Von Ray helping me choose my exact meals for the next few days.  Von Ray is a force of nature: yesterday was “Terrific Tuesday,” today is “Wonderful Wednesday.”  He’s been working our asses off.  Oh, and one other thing: He doesn’t allow cursing!  I said, “Look, Von Ray, I’m from New York!”  No sympathy.  Every time I curse, I have to do 25 pushups.  Yesterday, I had to do 50.  Today I made myself say things like “Jiminy Crickets!”  It felt weird.  Golly.
• People at the theater told me I needed to check out Stumptown Roasters.  I did, and their coffee does indeed rock.  (As does their music: last time I was in there, I was delighted to hear them playing one of my all-time favorite albums, Television’s Marquee Moon.)
• Powell’s Books!!!  In a rapidly digitizing world, it is a sensual thrill to wander through their “City of Books” (just a block from my hotel, and from the theater) and pick up actual, physical volumes.  Heaven.  (Plus, given the horrifyingly slow Internet service at my hotel, rather than Google, it’s often faster just to walk over to Powell’s and look something up.  It might even be faster to walk to Tanzania, actually.)

And in two weeks, my wife and son come to visit me here!  And today is the birthday of my youngest brother, Sam (hero of Citizen Josh)!  And Joni Mitchell is playing on my computer’s tinny speakers (”People’s Parties,” one of my favorites), and she still sounds glorious!

Gosh darn, it’s enough to make you want to cuss for joy — but I don’t think my arm muscles can take anymore pushups today.  So I’ll just sip some more Stumptown coffee, run down to get my laundry from the machines downstairs, and prepare for that second preview.  (The official opening is on Friday.)

If you know Portland, I’d love your suggestions for places I should visit. And if you know people who live around here, please suggest that they come visit me at the theater — that would be way, um, friggin’ cool!

Posted: September 30th, 2009 under Ben Franklin: Unplugged, Citizen Josh, Coffee, Georgia, Oregon, Performances, Portland, Touring, Von Ray.
Comments: 7

Patriot Mug

Given my self-documented misadventures in the bowels of the U.S. tax system, it should come as little surprise that I am late in filing even this little blog item about tax stuff. In fact, I’d count it as a victory that I’m posting it so soon after Tax Day.

Back on the 15th, people had those “tea parties” — and yes, they seemed quite silly, and the “protests” looked suspiciously like pre-fab events born in the boardrooms of right-wing think tanks and Fox News (which I guess could count as a right-wing no-think tank). And yes, I was predictably infuriated by this latest salvo from the toxically successful anti-tax movement that — ever since its angry birth in 1978, with the sweeping victory of California’s Proposition 13 — has helped decimate all the public institutions I love (schools, libraries, public transportation, etc.: all those cool public things that Ben Franklin introduced to us). And yes, I heartily agree with every point made so pithily by Robert Reich in the latest entry of his wonderful blog, titled “A Short Citizen’s Guide to Kooks, Demagogues, and Right-Wingers on Tax Day.”

And yet. … And yet I have to admit there’s an element of that resentment — that fury — that, albeit incited by Fox and friends’ faux populism, rings true to me.  In this sense: As passionately as I support Obama’s presidency (I’m writing this on a day when, for example, his administration has recently declared carbon emissions to be harmful and publicly released the previous administration’s unforgivable “torture memos”), a significant part of me also worries about the continuing aggregation of centralized power in the Beltway and (some) corporate suites.  It’s one of the ironies of liberal democracy, I suppose: as someone (who was that?) once said, it’s the worst possible form of government — except for all the other ones.

So of course, it’s silly — and worse — for people to talk of secession because the majority of Americans happened to disagree with them this time.  But in many important ways, “the people” don’t have the power.  After years of living underwater, we’re happy just to be near the shore — with a semblance of the basic functions of government being reasserted.  But many, many people are still drowning — poor, marginalized, sick — and it is not unreasonable for them to be agitated.

Still, those shindigs two days ago weren’t real “tea parties” — not in the revolutionary sense, anyhow — since their ire wasn’t directed at the true source of their monetary and political impoverishment: the actual “elites” (the folks who actually have almost all of the money and power) rather than the fake ones that Rush and co. had conjured for them.  So … how’s about this:  a “coffee party”!  (I sense that “klatch” might come off as too foreign).  There’s already a “fair trade” movement to latch on to, focusing on paying a just amount for people’s labor.  Follow the beans, my friends, and you will follow the money.  Plus, if you cover yourselves with coffee grinds, rather than tea bags, I’m pretty sure your protests will have even more of an edge to them.  And no one from the the 18th century will be tempted to claim trademark infringement.  It’s a win-win, especially if you leave room for cream.

Posted: April 17th, 2009 under Coffee, Taxes, Tea.
Comments: none