I just had dinner at Dickie Jo’s Burgers — a new fifties-style burger and shake joint in Eugene. While the food was good, the prices were a little out of whack. I ordered a cheeseburger with a few extras and subbed onion rings for fries, softdrink, and tip — wound up spending $14. You could get a gourmet burger and sides at King Estate cheaper. Plus, like many hole-in-the-wall style restaurants, the focus is on the food and patrons fend for themselves for seating and making it work. Packed house, no seating scheme, aging hippies and pimpled hipsters jockeying for seats — it’s not really worth dealing with that, but there are other opinions out there.

Took Stinky P out into the swampy underbelly of the true Willamette flood plain (which used to stretch for miles and miles between the Cascades and Coast Range). The standing water, Oregon Ash, and grassland were really cool to see. We tried releasing Paulie back into the wild, but he didn’t like it:

Happy to be back with mama, and not the snakes in the grass:

Super cool trek in that you were walking above the bog on a boardwalk. Serious bird nerd place, but probably not middle of the day, summer.

Also, this just in: Nate aced captain school up in Portland last week, 4 tests, 100% on three of them, 93% on the other. So now all he needs to do is get a bigger boat and insurance, prove to the Coast Guard that he’s never been convicted of smuggling drugs, and put his dental history and tattoos on record so they can identify his crab-gnawed corpse. Details… details. But the hard part is over. Let’s hear it for Captain NATE! Katie baked him a cookie cake, like the ones you used to see at the mall when you were a kid.

Great blog post about why newspaper comments (and to that end, semi-pro blog comments) don’t really work. Via Matt Nenzanski’s Twitter. Great video sample explaining phenomenon below.

How many beers before this is a good idea?

Full Deschutes post on the Caddis Blog.

If you’re ready for full-time Paulie-P Cuteness, you need to check out Katie’s new photo blog, Paulie Pic of the Day.

Almost 10lbs!

A couple nights ago, I received free tickets to go see Spamalot from a marketing agency, focusing on Eugene bloggers. That in of itself is kind of interesting… since I don’t write about the arts at all. But the idea I think was to make an impact online fast, and bloggers and Twitter folks (Tweeps) are probably the fastest way to reach a community. Unfortunately, if you’re not interested in fly fishing or seeing photos of my kid, I’m probably not the best choice. Nonetheless, I’m going to do my part and recommend you go see this show. Here is the deal they’re offering:

# $25 Tickets w/ discount code “RABBIT”
# Valid for the following dates & times: 4/30 @ 7:30pm, 5/2 @ 2pm, 5/3 @ 2pm
# Available online
# Discount terms: Discount not valid on previously purchased tickets or combined with any other offer; only while supplies last; only for performances indicated; not valid in top price seat locations; service fees still apply; no refunds or exchanges; additional restrictions may apply – see box office for details.

My take on it? Definitely worth $25. The dialogue/action of the production is kind of like watching your friends re-enact the movie, but the singing and dancing was great. Go see this show, use the discount code, and get me some more free stuff!

Funny aside, my pal Greg is taking out J. Peterman from Seinfeld (aka John O’Hurley, star of the show), out fishing today in his wooden drift boat, and fishing with my pal Chet’s bamboo fly rods. And opening night, O’Hurley gave a shout-out to the Caddis Fly Shop.

The backyard is busting out.

After six weeks on the lam, Buster decided to turn himself in.

For the past two weeks he’d been living under our neighbor’s house, eating sardines. No idea what he’d been doing the previous four. A little skinny, but he seems no worse for it.