Odysseus Among the Lotus Eaters

I've been watching the show Portlandia with a mixture of interest and despair. It pokes fun at the stereotypes of Portland - the socially conscious, tattooed bicycle rider with a weakness for a compelling food sourcing story. It also jauntily confirms a fear that's been creeping in me since I arrived, that this is the city where "young people go to retire." Because, really, in a city where unemployment is above 10% and the number of newly arrived college-graduates just keeps rising, what else are they to do?

The kind of aggressive professionalism that I associated with the New York yuppie crowd, that character of New York that I delighted in scoffing at, I find myself longing for here in Portland. I find myself just wishing that if there were a few more people pathologically prone to networking, I might be able to scare up new leads for jobs. The coffee shop near my house is packed every day of the week; behind the counter it feels like there is always one or two more employees than they technically need, and as for tables, well, I see people take their coffee outside in the cold and watch through the windows for someone to leave so they can come in, open up their MacBook Pro, and start searching craigslist for a job.

I turn 27 in a couple of weeks. I don't subscribe to any fantasies of a "traditional career arc" or anything like that, but I do notice that as I grow older I accumulate more obligations, limitations, etc. What I'm trying to say is that right now is my time to kill myself at a job, the time to put in my hours, to learn, to advance, to develop my own perspective on a profession and my role in it. And here I am watching a season of Battlestar Galactica a week and reluctantly composing a playlist for the craigslist posting "SWINGERS CLUB SEEKS DJ FOR SEXXXY THURSDAYS."

I can feel myself getting sour. I'm not sure what the solution is, whether to move, to stick it out or what. Once I'm employed this is all going to feel like a fun growing experience, but while I'm in the midst of it I'm feeling a little desperate.

Fraud follow-up, again

For a few days I was really obsessed with tracking down this "Gloria" and interrogating her. Not, I have to admit, to bring anyone to justice, but for the prurient reasons of wanting to know how and why she does the work she does.

My zeal took me to the LexisNexis people search where I used a friend's account to track down the phone number used to call me. Here's where the story gets good. The guy who gets the phone bills was jailed for sexual assault about eight years ago. It appears he's out now, and for a while was living only ONE BLOCK from my old apartment in Ft. Greene, Brooklyn. Now he lives on Humboldt St., only a few blocks from where I taught for two years. Dude probably stood in front of me in line at the Lula Bean, probably wondering, "who in this room will someday fall victim to my guiles?"

Note: I'm not posting any of the perp's details to this site mostly because I've succumbed to the delicious sort of paranoia where I worry this guy's prison buddies Google me, find me, and tell me with their fists to keep out of his business. Or else.

So, anyway, none of this search has brought me any closer to "Gloria," my caller. I don't doubt that if I get in touch with the criminal mastermind himself he would never pass on his employee's contact info to someone claiming to be an "uncredentialed journalist and parttime blogger." There's the option of tracking down the tax records of VTS Marketing, the website I was first directed to, and seeing who they employ. But those are methods I'll have to learn from the internet. The other option is to sell my story to This American Life or Bored to Death and have them do the followup. Or, I just wait and hope to be contacted again by a murky telemarketing scheme, and this time have enough sense to get the caller to commit to a confidential interview on the spot.

Holiday Ale Follow-Up/Fraud Alert

I almost bit on a telemarketing scheme last night. If Amanda hadn't been in the background telling me to hang up, I might have gone through with it.

A woman called at 7 PM telling me my name had been picked to win two 7-day vacations, one to Orlando and the other to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. It was a weirdly late time to call, especially since she was calling with a NY area code, making her time 10 PM. She said she represented the raffle booth from the Holiday Ale Festival, where I dimly remember filling out a card to win a vacation. But I was like seven or eight samples in at that point so the memory is pretty fuzzy. She went through each trip in depth, including the side packages I had won, like golf vouchers and a spa package. She even talked me through the downside, that I'd have to sit in on a hotel tour at the Orlando hotel, which was part of the marketing deal. Then she said I'd need to give up my credit card to pay for a $199 processing fee for each person going on the trip.

The whole conversation was so friendly, and her tone was so perfect - I heard in her voice some weariness, like she'd heard people celebrating this kind of thing before. But like she could also still understand my joy, that this trip was really going to be an incredible gift. She laughed conspiratorially when I said my girlfriend would love the spa package, and she listened to me babble when she first called, trying to get a hold on what was happening. She was clearly a native English speaker, and clearly well educated, and she sounded so unwaveringly reasonable. So when she told me I had to give my credit card number or hang up the phone, I stayed on and tried to bargain with her for another ten minutes. I outlined my suspicions, which she talked me through, and sounded genuinely hurt that I would deny myself such a prize. When I finally hung up, I did so still 50% sure I was passing on an opportunity that I would never see again. It was only when I googled the phone number and read the testimonies of 20 or 30 people who had been approached by this same person, that I understood how close I was to being fleeced. And I'm not even a senile shut-in!

Now, looking back, I can't stop thinking about who this caller is. How was she recruited for the job? How long did it take for her to get this convincing? Is she an actress and it came naturally, or did she spend months developing this poise? And, what I really can't get out of my head, her coldness. How she could be so calm, lie to me again and again, and let me hang up so politely. She was incredible, a smooth and supple practitioner of her craft.

I can't help thinking that a profile of one of these callers would be such an incredible magazine piece. It would have to be anonymous, probably, but to hear her take on fraud and the morality of it, and the unique skillset needed for such a job, would be fascinating. So now I'm really hoping I get a call like this again, and that I have the presence of mind to understand what's happening while it's happening. Of course, the other, more rom-com outcome would be a romance sparked out of telemarketer fraud. That's a script that's waiting to be written.

Notes from the Holiday Ale Festival, 12/4/10

I went down to the Pioneer Courthouse Square yesterday to experience the northwest's premier winter beer showcase. For $25, I got a cheap plastic mug with a map of the event on the side and 10 4-oz tasting tickets. About one thousand people were gathered under a series of tents, and there was a strong odor of potpourri and Christmas candles, possibly pumped in artificially. The crowd ranged from somewhat drunk to pretty drunk and were generally young and congenial. Although I insulted the Blazers inadvertently and one dude said, "I didn't know you were a son of a bitch, but I guess I do now."

The level of beer connoisseurship was high to very high and I enjoyed quizzing the people around me in the tasting line about their vote for best in show. I noted some aesthetic crossover between beer aficionados, renaissance faire attendees, and rock climbing-type gear heads. Which makes sense given that the craft beer movement seems to be driven equally by nerdy chemistry innovation and rediscovery of historic processes. The winter beers especially struck a Tolkienesque tone with names like Aegir's Cauldron, Concentrated Evil, and Very Ill-Tempered Gnome.

Here's a sample of some beers I tried, and the notes I took. As the afternoon went on the notes become increasingly arcane, or poetic if you're feeling generous.

Pavlov's Imperial Russian Stout by Lucky Labrador Brewing
"bitter, toast, molasses"

Figgy Pudding, Olde Stock by Block 15 Brewing Co.
"raisiny, strong - almost cloying, fruit-forward"

Bockus by Double Mountain Brewery
"just tastes like beer, caramel candy finish"

Concentrated Evil by Fifty Fifty Brewing Co.
"finishes of banana peel and trash, better after a few sips"

Franc'ly Brewdolph by Lompoc Brewing Co.
"worst name in show, dark and dirty in the best way, soupçon of dried fruit"

Aegir's Cauldron by Collaborator
"unclean and filthy, a sour bitter lingerer, 'you're a filthy boy', dirty dusty and bitter as shit, nigh on offensive"

Blitzen by Rock Bottom Brewery
"the JFK of beers"

Stone Smoked Porter by Stone Brewing Co.
"still drinkable even with a bitter edge, dark and herbally deep, evocative of the Maillard browning process"

My vote for best in show was Papa Noel's Moonlight Reserve by Alameda Brewhouse. It was lively, and didn't taste desperate to prove its potency like a good many of the others did. A surprising number of these breweries are based in Portland, which leaves me optimistic for future tasting endeavors.

Nickeltips

I recently moved to Portland, Oregon, home to the highest strip club per capita rate in the nation. Being unemployed here has had two unintended consequences: I spend a lot of time daydreaming about businesses I could start and I spend a lot of time bemoaning the high cost of strip clubs and my lack of disposable income. Thus, the plan for Nickeltips was born.

It's a strip club whose primary currency is not the tuck-a-buck single, but hardy, unassuming nickel. At twenty to the dollar, a hundo will get you 2000 shiny nickels. All of a sudden making it rain has all the thrill - and danger - of a hailstorm. Imagine a dark cavern lit by the glitter of flying coins. Change machines line the walls, and the usuals sport the official black leather fanny pack with pink embroidered Nickeltips logo, bulging with change, low-slung on the hip. Everywhere the jingle. Holiday songs take on special significance, and "Jingle Bells" becomes a year-round standard. Waitresses wear coin changers on their belts, and all change is, of course, given in all nickels. There would be Buffalo Head night, as well as single-source theme nights where all nickels thrown come from the same mint. Mint juleps would be popular, served in nickel plated julep glasses, with tiny slip-on maple sap bucket covers for protection.



At the end of the night, bartenders and dancers would use snow shovels to scoop up the piles of specie, some two or three feet deep. And through the early morning, the whirr of coin counters will tally the night's take.

- This will be the first in a series of posts on business concepts that I am working through. Expect more items like this one in coming weeks!

Roller Derby

I experienced my first roller derby last week, at the Jackson Convention Center, Jackson, MS. There were about 350 people in attendance, sitting on convention center chairs around a taped-in ring on the floor. The Magnolia Roller Vixens and the Belles n' Bombshells (all female) duked it out in helmets, knee-pads, and hand guards. Aesthetically, this sport owes as much to suburban mall goths as it does burlesque shows of the wild west. There were leggings in a fantasy of baroque patterns, and frilly or embroidered underwear seemed to be the norm.

There were some righteous crashes, but on the whole the competition was pretty amateur. The teams spent some time at the beginning explaining to the audience the rules of competition; I got the feeling some of the competitors were learning as much as I was.

I loved reading the players' names and numbers. Both are selected by the player, evoking the "Pistol" Pete Maravich era of the NBA. Most women chose off-color puns and threatening-sounding circus names, like "Princess Sledge Rammer" or "Lisbeth Von Lush." But more creative players dipped into literary sources, like "Zelda Fistgerald." And one woman ignored the raunchy spirit entirely with the name "Judicious." The numbers too were wide-ranging in their inspiration. My favorite was H1N1.

Possible roller derby names for myself, in keeping with the southern literary tradition:

Eudora Welts

William Fucker

Saltie

This place has been on my mind for months, ever since I first nipped on a Spanish Armada there back in November. Saltie is a tiny sandwich shop in Williamsburg - a few stools and a counter only maybe 10 inches deep - with a calming, oceanic decor. A lot of whites and blues and natural wood, like a Martha Stewart beach house foyer. But that daintiness is cut by the food itself - messy, exuberant, and relentlessly creative. Everything is made in house, from the focaccia and naan that the sandwiches are served on, to the ice cream, to the baked goods in the glass cabinet. Baked goods like a brioche bun filled with chocolate and topped with sugar crystals, and olive shortbread.

The real hook for me here though is what they do with vegetables. So much is made of pork as the food fad of the moment; for all its revelatory pleasures of texture and flavor, I find weaker chefs using it as a crutch, propping up mediocre dishes with its fat and salt. Not so at Saltie, where meat is available occasionally, but never missed. Sandwiches like the Scuttlebutt, with roasted beets and winter squash, and the Captain's Daughter, which features sardines and capers, both flourish without meat. I had a curried lentil soup once that had fennel, onions, cabbage, carrots, and celery, and was delicious with a honey corn muffin. You can only eat so many vegetable dishes studded with pork nuggets before you begin to long for a certain freshness that vegetables have when they're allowed to breathe.

But these dishes wouldn't be as compelling if they were presented as a part of a dogmatic vegetarian agenda, as is so common in vegetable-heavy restaurants. It feels so rare to find a place that puts vegetarian dishes on its marquee without a staunch dose of tie-dye, one earth, "health food" ideology. How about vegetables that are exciting and delicious, truthful and yet unexpected? A place where meat can exist in the food, but doesn't always have to?

From Per Se to McDonalds, most restaurants rely on meat to anchor so many of their dishes. At this time, with the current dismal state of American nutrition, I am excited by an example of American (Nouveau?) cuisine that provides a different model for eating. A cuisine that is so restless and satisfying, but one that I wouldn't be ashamed to universalize. Saltie makes meat an option not a requirement, or rather a condiment and not a foundation for the food. And they do it because it's delicious. It's defensible aesthetically, but at the same time manages to be defensible ethically. It feels so radical. I'm inspired.

We're Back!

This formally represents the reintroduction of "The Party Platter" to the general internet dialogue. Think of the break as something like a two-year sabbatical wherein I pursued some pretty wild side projects, career dabblings, etc, but now I'm back to my calling. Right here where I belong.

Mourning the Loss of One Man's Style

A few days ago the NFL went public with the news that the single-bar face mask would no longer be legal in game play. Not a big deal for most players and a decision that ensures a little more safety, you might say. In fact only one current player in the NFL will be affected by this ruling: Scott Player. But look what the world will be losing. That signature blond mustache, the oft-noted "crime against humanity" will have no clear counterpoint - and it looks tough enough to protect his upper lip already. He'll be lost amidst his teammates on the field, like his mustache among the many bars of his new helmet. At 38, his potency is already waning. The NFL should know that his roguish style needs to be nurtured, like a bird in captivity. Just grandfather him in and let the rest of the league choose for themselves whether or not they want the singleton - no one in their right mind should.