I had no idea it was seen as taboo to put yourself together in the time of Covid. As a self-employed, WFH person for the last 6 years (!!), I cannot emphasize enough the importance of a routine. It’s not stupid or vain if, every time you pass a mirror, your lizard brain can glom onto some minor semblance of normalcy…

The Ghost of James Madison’s Rage Boner (ha) pretty much covered it. This land is rural (picture forest with one tiny little orange marker every few acres to mark property lines) and I don’t live there. So when he decided to clear cut his land —a damn travesty but his prerogative— his loggers either knocked down the…

Your sister can absolutely knock down that fence and go after them for timber theft. I had no idea before owning this land just how seriously it’s taken and how deep the punishments are.

Oh a lighter note: my BiL bought a different parcel in the area and some dude put a homemade billboard on it, claiming that the old…

I own an untouched rural parcel of land and my neighbor clear cut my old growth trees from the bottom 1/3 of it. Once this quarantine is over, I get to head to the Ozarks and start fighting a man in court about tree stumps and the value of old growth.

(spoiler: if/when I can prove it, he has to pay me 3x the retail valu…

I know many of us have a story like this so here goes:
During my unhealthy-levels heavy drinking days, I came home absolutely wasted and started to make ramen. I passed out at some point in the process and woke up at 11am the next day to an orange, glowing orb on my stove where the pot once had been. The burner has…

Oregonian here. We haven’t even had the chance to vote in this primary.

This primary is an absolute farce.

My friends and I are in Oregon and Montana and haven’t even had the opportunity to vote in the primary. This whole thing is a sham.

There were a bunch of smash and grabs in Portland too before we boarded up. Mostly local boutiques and bars, so it sounds about the same :/

I feel like they’ll give up when they realize the reality of doing laundry on the road.

I have a standing rule that anyone can come to my house (either to just watch TV or stay overnight), no questions asked unless they want to talk. I’ve been in toxic/abusive relationships and am familiar with that terrible feeling of having nowhere to go and/or the dread of being judged if you need to park yourself…

I got really sick in my 20s and it was showing all signs of being cancer. I didn’t have health insurance (pre-ACA recent college graduate) so I applied to my state’s low-income health care coverage. I was working as a waitress at the time so my reported income was juuuuuust low enough for me to qualify but it was…

Not me but something my mother did:
I lived in a remote spot of California growing up. One day on the way to school, we saw the neighbor who lived in the “weird” house walking to town with a suitcase, her dog, and a puffy, red face. Without hesitation, my mom whipped the car over, sternly said “Keep walking, I’m coming…

The first boyfriend I ever lived with invited his brother to stay with us for a week but failed to request any time off from work, leaving me alone in the home with an incel man-child who spent all day drawing really disturbing, sexually explicit manga in my living room. Brother also had zero life skills, didn’t…

My friends and I are all makers/small business owners and our discussion isn’t about stocking up or getting sick: it’s 100% about how we’re going to survive the financial impact of losing outdoor markets, wholesale shows, and retail shoppers.

Tourist dollars account for probably 40% of my income and well, looks like…

Weed + Wyld Peach Edibles (legal here. Thanks, Oregon).

I grew up in Earthquakeville, CA so I always have at least a week’s worth of emergency provisions hidden around my home but I’m going to need my edibles if I want to fall asleep and wake up on the other side of this pandemic.

If you haven’t watched the (in)famous “Leave Britney Alone” video since it originally aired in 2007, I’d recommend watching it again. We all laughed and mocked Chris Crocker for it... but dude was pretty spot on and ahead of the “this person is having a mental health crisis and we shouldn’t be laughing at her” mindset.

To all my 9/11 babies:
You have my sympathy.

Love,
April 20th

The first time I flew with my dog, I tried to be a responsible pet owner and sedated her a bit so she’d be calm and relaxed. Well woowee, relax she did: my adorable air-gulping french bulldog farted incessantly for the ENTIRE flight. If you’ve ever known a pug/bulldog/frenchie, you know that those things burn your…

I am a maker and do handmade markets all the time: If you haggle with any maker worth their salt, you better not throw out an insulting number and you better have exact change in cash (bonus points if you’re the kind of haggler who negotiates a two-fer. I like those). Otherwise, we will laugh in your face and talk…

I once served my my mother a raw oyster that was so large and meaty that she has literal nightmares about it multiple times a year. I was being polite in giving her the best one but I guess the minute it hit her mouth, her brain screamed “garbage slime!!”

It’s been 5 years and I still hear about it often.