Puking in Portland

As is tradition when my friend Chris Renfrow and I get together, one of us ended up puking. That person was me.

After leaving Gresham with a vague idea of how to get to downtown Portland, I followed "Taylor Street" until it led me to my destination, just as the infamous Chris Renfrow arrived. He showed me the saddest apartment that I'd ever seen. I slept in the box second from the left, back wall, (not the one with the GRE study book inside.)

Promptly after arriving, I made a bread, pesto, and salsa sandwhich. Not the best dinner imaginable, but I was ravenously hungry. I also ate one of the Amanita muscaria mushrooms that I had found at the hospital. Advice: don't eat one of these unless you are in the proper mindset, outside, and in a calm environment. When we walked around downtown trying to find a bar, I became increasingly nauseous. The scent of my salad dressing made me have to sit on a toilet for a while, waiting to hurl. I didn't. Then, suddenly, I felt fine and demolished my salad. On our walk back to the apartment, Chris told me how sheep were castrated (I won't go into detail) and the thought of it made me sick. I thew up a block away from Powell's Book Store, as Chris cackled and took this picture:

After emptying the contents of my stomach, I was rather hungry again, and the idea of eating a Voodoo Donut was the best possible thing that I could imagine for the night. In the wake of donut euphoria, we watched a movie called "Forks Over Knives." It's a documentary about how animal products in large quantities (like our typical Wester diet) have a sever affect on our health. When people switch to plant-based, whole food diets, they are able to reverse cancers, diabetes, and other debilitating diseases, and have an overall increase in energy levels and quality of life. Check it out. I might try to cut animal products from my diet soon. We shall see. Chris and I had a great conversation this morning over coffee. We talked about our futures, the future of society, and how to find happiness.

The road was long, windy, wooded, and rainy to Eureka, CA, where I now sit. The Oregon countryside is rather beautiful, and I can see why people traveled in covered wagons to get to this west coast promised land so many years ago. Tomorrow, I'll be learning about the redwood nursery where I'm staying with my friend Steen. He runs this company.