My First Week

Well, I've come to find out that I'm not going to get bored in this town very easily, or anytime soon for that matter. Between the food, the beer, the hiking, the never dull walks through downtown, and just the general exploration of this city, I should be pretty solid for quite some time.

Just the other day I decided to go for a walk and stumbled on some really interesting things. One of them being the second largest hammered statue in America, Portlandia, second only to the Statue of Liberty. Portlandia greets visitors to the city apparently, not sure about the entire story but it's fascinating nonetheless. It's only about 36 feet but if she were to stand up straight she would be the 50 foot woman.

Learned a few more little tidbits in the past few days as well... Portland was almost named Boston. Pretty interesting since I considered Boston to also be my new home for quite a while. But apparently the two city founders, Alas Lovejoy, who hailed from Boston Mass., and Francis Pettygrove, of Portland, Maine, each were determined to name the new city after their hometowns. The two of them couldn't come to a reasonable decision so they did what any two logical men would do, they flipped a coin, which is now known as the "Portland Penny." Pettygrove won 2 out of 3 flips.

*The "Portland Penny" is on display at the Oregon Historical Society which is host to 85,000+ artifacts from the Pacific Northwest. I'll definitely be going there soon.*

-One more thing... the beer here is unlike anywhere else. I went to the convenience store on the ground floor of the apartment building to pick up a six-pack. Ended up coming back with one of the finest beers known to man.. the Deschutes Black Butte Porter. One of the first Porters to be brewed in the United States.... BTW, the six pack was only 6 bucks... this is my own personal heaven.

-Here's a nice view from the balcony with my beer.