a list

Some trip highlights...

* visiting the Chinese Garden, where we ate special little cookies made of cookie dust, ate exquisitely flavored watermelon seeds, ate horse seeds--we also massaged our feet on courtyard stones, saw bat tiles, and looked at lotuses
* visiting the Japanese Garden--both cost $9.50--where there are a lot of stairs and our friend who walks on crutches had trouble--we saw beautiful views of constructed waterfalls and lush plantlife and those Japanese sand garden things
* visiting the rose garden, which is free and crowded, but the roses are very much in bloom right now
* eating at Voodoo Donuts, where I got a huge delicious chocolate-frosted vegan donut called cock and balls which has creme-filled balls, and Ming got a vegan apple fritter, and our friend we stayed with had three donuts!
* visiting the arcade Ground Kontrol where I played my favorite game, Puzzle Bobble, for a little while, after having a hard time finding it
* attending the Portland Zine Symposium both Saturday and Sunday, where I met mail friends and even tabled the second day, because they had extra tables, and I traded for a bunch of zines
* mole tater tots
* delicious fresh grapes
* long drives, and the tape player in the truck doesn't work, so we brought my boom box with batteries
* visiting with two friends I know from when I was a teenager
* pancakes at Black Bear Diner
* sips of Ming's shakes
* vegan cupcakes from Whole Foods
* olive tasting at The Olive Pit
* cold water and pie from Heaven On Earth
* the Kate Bornstein reading at Powell's

For next time: Reading Frenzy, Small World Buttons, and a diner called Roxie