"Look, it's a Tall Bike! Look, it's a Tiny House!"

If I wasn't already madly in love with Portland, Sunday Parkways would have won me over. Once a month from May to September Portland shuts down auto traffic on several roads, opening them up to bicyclists and pedestrians. Over 20,000 people cruised along the route in NE Portland yesterday. There were tall bikes, long bikes, and short bikes. There were streamers,  teddy bears, and unicorn helmets. There were bells and whistles, boom boxes and banjos. And everywhere there were smiles and waves. I especially loved seeing a man ride his X-tracycle with his sweetheart on the back playing a guitar. Their baby was in the seat between them.

Part of the afternoon I was helping with the fresh donut stand at Cully Grove with Orange Splot. Making donuts with Eli and Noelle's three year old was such fun! I'm not sure whether she or I got a bigger kick out of it "snowing" flour onto the table (and floor). Every time she'd scamper down from her chair to peek out the window she'd say "ooh! It's a party!" and she'd report the bikes she saw go past.

The groundbreaking ceremony itself was very pleasant with most of the future Cully Grove residents present. The festivities included writing letters and placing them in a time capsule, digging up little jars of dirt so that the families can have a little bit of Cully Grove with them at home while their future homes are being constructed, and, of course, champagne toasts.

I hadn't realized that my tiny house was going to be on the route, so it was pretty cool to see the swarms go past. After the groundbreaking I headed home again and found that there were still oodles of people biking by. I stood on my porch and a man on a tall bike hollered out "Look! It's a tiny house!" I replied "Look! It's a tall bike!" and he grinned. It seemed a quintessentially Portland swapping of novelty. So I decided to host an impromptu open house. For the next hour whenever someone noticed my house I invited them in and showed them around, answering their questions about everything from my RV shower to how often I grocery shop.

One woman turned to her nine year old son and said "It seems she has everything she needs as just one person. Can you think of anything she doesn't have?" He took a look around and said "Yup, no TV!" I told him he was right. "What in the world do you suppose I do instead?" I asked. He grinned and asked, "Do you like to read?" I assured him I do and I showed him my wee library and my Kindle.

It was such a delightful day and it got me thinking a lot about the relationship between community and streets. This evening PSU's Urban Planning Club hosted Enrique Penalosa, former mayor of Bogeta, Columbia. He, too, talked about cycling, community, democracy, and transit. He talked about bus rapid transit and how a transportation network can be transformed overnight by restricting travel lanes to buses. It's given me lots to consider. My favorite new idea is to make all of our diagonal streets active transportation streets. Let's give the cyclists, buses, pedestrians a shortcut and make cars go the long way!

Smart Car + Smart Phone = Smart Errands

The hose I borrowed temporarily had such a rubbery taste that Raffi wouldn't drink the water. Getting a drinking quality hose was a priority today, so I decided to try out Portland's newest public-private transportation option. Car2Go is a car rental program utilizing a collection of blue and white Smart cars that are perpetually scattered across the city by one-way trips. Here's how it worked for me:

• I became a member a couple weeks ago during the trial period while the memberships were free. Yay!  I downloaded the app for my android phone.
• I woke up this morning and decided to see where the closest car was. (I hadn't even gotten out of bed at this point. Thank you smart phone!)
• I made breakfast, tended to my chicken, put on my shoes, grabbed my bag and my shopping list, and walked the eight blocks to the closest Car2Go.
• I held my membership card over the little panel on the windshield and the car unlocked.
• I hopped in, answered a few questions about the vehicle's condition, set my destination on the GPS, and headed out.
• When I got there, I selected the "Stopover" option so that I could extend my reservation while I was in the store and the car would still be there when I returned.
• When I was done I parked the car, answered a few more questions, held my membership card over the panel at the windshield, and went about my day.

My downfall was this: I didn't make sure the store had everything I needed before setting out. Since Car2Go charges by the minute, my first trip ended up being a total waste of time and money. I've decided that Car2Go is a great option for spur of the moment trips since you don't have to make a reservation like you do with ZipCar and Getaround. You also don't have to return the car to the place you found it, which can save lots of time and hassle. But it's worthwhile to use your smart phone prior to hopping into that smart car to make sure that your errand isn't a wild goose chase.

I was after a drinking quality hose and a hose splitter for my water supply and coconut coir for my compost toilet. I'd already been to a couple little garden shops in search of coconut coir blocks and they didn't have them. I'd purchased coconut coir at a big yucky corporate hardware store in the past so I decided to go ahead and go there since they'd have everything I needed. They didn't. I shouldn't have been surprised since I don't think I've ever left that place satisfied! Nevertheless, I had another good reason to support my local hardware store, which I knew carried the recycled rubber drinking quality hoses. Unfortunately, they didn't open for another hour and I didn't want to pay for the car that whole time. So I parked it on my street and finished my reservation. (Couldn't resist pulling the car into my driveway first though for a photo.) Fortunately, no one else got the bright idea to use that particular car so the car was waiting for me an hour later. I was able to get the hose and splitter from my local hardware store and be home again in no time.

I imagine I'll still use my bike for most of my trips, even errands that involve some hauling. But it's nice to know that Car2Go is a convenient option for opportunistic auto-ing.

Hammock Time!

We've had a rather convenient weather pattern of gray weekdays and sunny weekends. There's a joke around here when you have lovely days in the spring followed by another gray day. People start saying, "Don't worry. It will be back. We'll have another nice day in July or August!" It's enough to keep people hoping. Portland is like Seattle in that they don't get dolled up in their nicest weather very often but when they do they're beautiful and everyone gets outside to make the most of it. Glad I was able to soak up the sunshine while I did.

Today my friend Marti who was here for a contra dance festival came over for a picnic lunch

(complete with lemonade!) Afterwards I hung my hammock up and lounged in it while I read a book for the paper that's due today. I've been enjoying reading on my kindle, especially after I figured out two tricks: 1) I can load my articles for school onto it, and 2) I can highlight and bookmark. It's especially nice for reading on transit or outside because I don't need to have a pen or a notepad with me. The pages don't rustle in the breeze, I don't get that funny ache in my hand from holding the book open, and all the paperwork I need is right there on my slim, portable reader.

In this lovely weather my Christmas Catcus finally decided to bloom. That is a nice May Day treat! I think it likes its new spot dangling from the tiny house's ceiling near the skylight.

Route Mapping

My host and some friends of hers built a bike shelter in the yard and we've put it to good use this fall!

Since I don't own a car I get around mostly by bike and public transportation. There are a handful of places I can walk from my house in 10 minutes or less, but since strip clubs, tattoo parlors, and drive-up convenience stores aren't really my scene, I usually take my bike and head on down to the Hollywood District or the Alberta Arts district if I'm going to be grocery shopping or having lunch with a friend. If I'm going further than that I often take transit. I'm glad I bought the student flex pass through PSU. Even though Tri-Met doesn't do a very good job of making their passes more affordable than paying each trip (you need to take transit twice a day at least five days a week to justify the pass), it is much more convenient to have a pass than to keep an two dollar bills and one dime handy whenever I might want to take the bus.

I've decided it's okay to admit that I'm a fair weather biker. Lately, I've been on the bus more than I'd like to confess to my cyclist friends who insist that all I need is better rain gear. And I get it. I do understand that the right gear makes so many things better. That's why I own nice kitchen knives, a fantastic mattress, and merino wool clothing. For several years now I've been intentionally focusing on owning less but better stuff. Living in a tiny space helps reinforce that.

I like my rain pants. I've learned not to leave on my bike without them - no matter how nice it looks or what the weather forecasters say. I'm pretty good at biking when the weather is decent, but when it's not, I give myself a little grace. The way I figure it, if you have a 20 minute bike ride and five minutes in it starts pouring and you're drenched in another five minutes, you only have 10 minutes of misery before you can get dry and warm again. That's totally bearable. If you have a 50 minute bike ride, same situation, you have 40 minutes of misery. I'm just not up for it. So I've given myself permission to take the bus when it's icky. And unfortunately with the days getting shorter and winter approaching, it's happening more and more.

From where I live cycling takes about 50 minutes and transit takes about 55 minutes with one transfer. I have about 8 different transit route combinations that will get me from my house to campus. But they all involve one transfer and take about 55 minutes. I have hundreds of slightly different routes that will get me to campus by bike. I've been trying different ones, tailoring them to my mood: uphills, downhills, flats, old houses, small houses, big houses, parks, waterfront, esplanade, city streets, bike boulevards, cycle tracks, bridges. So many options! Riding my bike is great because I get a work out in, too. I have time to think. I notice things from a different perspective. But I have to plan for time to shower at the gym before class or my internship. Taking transit is a nice option because it allows me time to think. Or text. Or read the news or an article for class or a novel. Or people watch.

I've been riding to campus in the morning, showering at the gym, going to my classes, and then taking transit home (with my bike) at night. It's a bit of a hassle taking my bike home on transit because of the transferring, but I don't feel comfortable riding home at night for 50 minutes just after 9:30pm. Taking a bike on the train is easier than taking one on the bus, but there aren't any train stations close to my house. And unfortunately there don't seem to be any particularly pleasant bike routes to the closest Max station. Besides there aren't any good places to park a bike there and the station itself is a little sketchy. Lately I've been just taking transit both ways, which is really convenient but probably not a good long-term solution unless I figure out another way to get a work out!

I've experimented with options that involve biking part of the way and then locking up my bike and taking the bus at my transfer point. That seems to work okay. It's a way of splitting the difference, using both modes. But if I take a different route home than the one I took to campus or my internship I have to remember to retrieve my bike. Dual mode travel doesn't seem to save me much time and it doesn't really give me a good work out either, so it may be the worst of both worlds!

I figure I can continue to experiment. For now, it's nice having both bike and transit options.

Known By the State of California

The garden hose I'd hooked up burst earlier this week so I decided it was time to hunt for a drinking quality hose. One of the scary things about hoses is that so many of them have a disclaimer that says "warning: contains a chemical known by the state of California to cause cancer." That's the sort of thing that's worth avoiding, so I called around and found that a local hardware store carried drinking quality hoses that are also made from recycled materials. Bingo!

Trouble was, when I stopped by on Wednesday they didn't have them in the right length. So I went back today and picked up the hose they'd ordered in for me. I packed it into my backpack and headed home on the bus. I got it hooked up this evening and it does reach, but only barely.

My host and I have talked about digging a trench to run the water and electricity underground, but for now above ground seems fine. She has decided she might want a drinking quality hose, too, so she'll probably pick one up this weekend and we'll put the two together which will allow us to snake it from the back spigot which can be dedicated for the tiny house. If we get around to the trench later these two hoses can be used in the garden.

So it's taken two full weeks for me to get all the utilities running just right because I've been busy with school and a weekend out of town, but I think if I'd been a little better prepared it would have been a cinch.

The Tiny House Adventure Begins

I woke up at 5:00 am this morning and quickly realized there was no hope of falling asleep again. Today is much too exciting to sleep through! As of tomorrow I'll be one of the people calling a tiny house home. So instead, I am learning how to create a blog...

Two weeks ago today I moved to Portland, OR to begin studies for my masters in urban planning. Over the past two weeks I have:

• sprawled across my landlady's living room floor studying transit maps and memorizing bicycle routes,
• realized that the quantity and variety of food available here is enough to make a foodie like me hungry all the time, and
• enjoyed quality time with the half dozen good friends I already have here, grateful for their willingness to introduce me to this incredible city.

Today I have orientation for my master's program and then I head up to Olympia in a rented F250 truck. Two years ago my friend Brittany built a gorgeous tiny house on wheels and she has agreed to let me rent it from her while I am in grad school. We'll be hauling Britt's Bungalow to Portland tomorrow morning and tomorrow afternoon we'll get the teeny abode settled in the garden. My very first guests will be my sisters Amy and Aurora who are hanging out in Portland for the weekend. (They may become my moving crew. I figure it will probably take the three of us less than 10 minutes to haul my boxes into the house!) Sunday I'll unpack my belongings into the house and Monday my classes begin.

I feel extraordinarily lucky to have found a splendid place to park the tiny house for the year. My new neighbor (and landlady) purchased a house at the end of a dead end street in Northeast two years ago and has subsequently turned it into an oasis of flowers, veggies, berries, and wind chimes. The tiny house will be nestled into the garden between the bamboo grove, the chicken coop, the clover patch, and the cedar fence.

For the past two weeks I've been living in the host house which has been delightful because I've gotten to know my landlady and her housemates. I've also been able to soak up some of the magic of the space she's created. I've taken to sipping my tea in the morning on her covered porch, rain or shine, and watching the birds breakfast on burgundy sunflowers. I, too, have been gorging myself on tomatoes, peppers, kale, zucchini, and broccoli from the garden, as well as helping my landlady plant new starts that we will overwinter. In the evening I like to listen to the crickets and marvel about how it doesn't really get dark here because of the light pollution.

I miss my house, garden, friends, job, and community in Walla Walla, but it's been a relatively smooth transition. I think this will be a fantastic place to live the little life. To me living little means not only occupying a small and simple dwelling but also being conscientious about how I travel and what I purchase and consume. You'll hear more about all of this in time. I look forward to sharing this adventure with all of you!