goofiboy

Flying from Bulgaria to Germany in 5 hrs. Looks like it's going to be another completely full flight.

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Originally published at Tilt-A-Whirl®. You can comment here or there.

Originally published at Tilt-A-Whirl®. You can comment here or there.

Wilhoit Springs, Oregon

Wilhoit Springs is the site of an old cold spring resort in Southern Clackamas County, Orgeon.  The site was “discovered” by White settlers right after the Civil War in the late 1860’s.  By the 1880’s, a resort was in full swing at Wilhoit.  The resort had a store, a post office that operated until 1928,  cabins along a creek, a hotel with a restaurant serving Continental fare, a mineral water swimming pool, and a pump house where one could pump the mineral water into glass bottles to take home.  In later years, a bowling alley was constructed.  Although one couldn’t take the train all the way to the springs, it did go as far as Molalla (10km north) and a stagecoach was usually waiting at the station to take visitors to Wilhoit Springs.  The water itself, which was analyzed by a German publisher, “Deutsche Hausohatz”, was said to have almost an identical composition to several therapeutic spas in Europe.  With this information in hand, the owners of Wilhoit bottled and sold the naturally light carbonated mineral water to stores and restaurants in the Portland and Salem areas for over forty years.  It was said to have been great for liver maladies, skin problems, and rheumatism.

Wilhoit Springs prospered until the 1940’s, around the time that most natural spas in North America started to decline.  The store apparently operated until the early 1950’s, along with the cabins.  The first and second hotels atthe site both burned down.  After the second hotel was destroyed, it was never rebuilt.

Wilhoit Springs Mineral Water Label (circa 1920's)

The site is now owned by Clackamas County and is open to the public.  Although the advertisement below from the 30’s mentions that it’s only an hour’s drive away from Portland, it took me about 90 minutes.   All that remains now are the caretaker’s home (still in use) and the concrete steps that led to the pump house.  There are two springs at Wilhoit, one artesian soda spring (slightly carbonated) and a sulfur spring that is capped but has a manual old-fashioned pump attached to it that still dispenses the spring water.

Artesian Well (Soda Springs) at Wilhoit Springs (2009)

Me Pumping Spring Water

Again, I’ve been slacking when it comes to updating my blog. I guess it’s time to play catch up, eh?

I’ve had a pretty busy summer so far. I’m still working twelve hour days, four days a week. I wish I could say that I spend my weekends being productive or doing something fun, but I pretty much just catch up on sleep on my days off. It’s difficult for me to go to bed within the first couple of hours after getting home from work, so I don’t end up getting much sleep on my days off.

In July I became the proud father of a five year old beautiful half-Egyptian pure white cat name Mademoiselle Cléo. She loves to chase laser beams and roll on the floor. I’ll often wake up to find her lying down on my chest staring at me while purring. She’s a very sweet princess and I’m happy that she’s part of my life now. I had been without pets since high school (for purely selfish reasons—I don’t take the loss of anything well; whether it be via death, abandonment, breakups, etc) and I forgot how much love they can give ya. (Her pics are on my Facebook profile if’n anybody wants to see how pretty she is)

My love and social lives are still non-existent.  I recently discovered that the guy I dated in January-February gained about 50 lbs and is dating someone almost twice his age now. As mean as it sounds, it made me a bit happy that he gained so much weight. I usually go for stocky/chubby guys, as most guys look better with meat on their bones, but he looks horrible. In the recent pic I saw of him, he looked remarkably similar to Chunk from “The Goonies” (a movie which he had never heard of). I’ve never understood cross-generational romance. I find it hard to relate to anybody more than a few years older or younger in either direction. If I mention Debbie Gibson in casual conversation, I expect the person to know who I’m talking about. Most people born in the 80s wouldn’t have a clue who she was.  While I’m on this tangent, what’s up with the recent pandemic plague of bears only going after young twinks? In a way, that’s reverse discrimination. Although ‘chasers’ do exist out there, they’re really not as common as bears looking for them are (i.e. there are more bears looking for chasers than there are chasers looking for bears). Has anybody else noticed this alarming trend? I feel like I’m going to squish a guy if he’s a lot smaller than me. Maybe I’m the weird one in not being attracted to skinny hairless guys? Who knows. Thoughts and dialogue are always welcome on this topic J

I’m going to Albuquerque in a couple of weeks to see my family. I haven’t seen my sister since June of last year, my mom since Oct of last year, and my dad since May. It’s liberating being so far away from family, but at the same time it kind of sucks that I’m not around with them. 

In October, my long-awaited trip to Europe will start. I saved for two years in order to go and still don’t have nearly enough money to do much over there (especially after paying $800 for the plane ticket). I’m flying into Frankfurt, will take a week trip to Bulgaria or Turkey (I love Ottoman history), and then spend a few days in Prague and hopefully a day in Maastricht. I had planned on flying into Kiev and going to the Crimea or Chernobyl (I know, I’m crazy), but just don’t have the time or funds to go that far east this time around.

I’m on break from work right now, so I’m off to work some more. Hope all is well for everybody!

Originally published at Tilt-A-Whirl®. You can comment here or there.

So, I went on a three mile hike today. I didn’t wanna be stuck at home alone all weekend, so enlisted a friend to take a short hike with me to Bayocean. If you search Wikipedia, you won’t find much about Bayocean at all which is strange considering that there’s an entire article about Natalie from The Facts of Life. I had to delve into my small home library to find some information about this town that was washed into the sea mid-century.

By 1911, after much campaigning by the developer, the Southern Pacific/PR&N started service between Portland to Bayocean via Hillsboro. Interestingly enough, this line is still used to transport lumber between Portland and the coast (and vice versa). The line comes within a few blocks of my place and I hear the whistles nightly.

Initially the only two ways to get to Bayocean, or most of Tillamook County for that matter, was by rail or boat. The resort town was made up of an elaborate hotel, an indoor salt water swimming pool slash dance hall, a gas station, newspaper, post office, houses, cottages, and a grocery store. Most of these buildings (with the exception of the indoor pool, were all built on top of a 50 metre (~140 ft) sand dune.

Bayocean Natatorium

Shortly after the town was developed, the US Corps of Engineers agreed to build two jetties at the entrance to Tillamook Bay in order to make the bay deeper to handle ships, as long as Tillamook and Bay City agreed to split the cost. The two small towns couldn’t afford such a giant project. They told the Corps to only build one jetty and they would pay half of the cost. The Corps advised against this, as it would cause the sand on the spit to be carried away and be displaced somewhere else. The two cities eventually talked the Corps into their plan of only constructing one jetty, which was completed in 1917 for $814,000.

Bayocean Hotel

By 1925, the beaches and dunes on Bayocean spit started to erode away, just as the Corps had predicted. When the Corps decided to extend the jetty in the 30’s, the erosion became even more destructive. Residents’ front yards started to drop down the dune into the sea at first, followed by houses and entire streets. After several big storms, the peninsula was finally breached in 1948, turning the spit into an island. The breach was up to a mile wide in some spots. What little was left of the town by this time, vandals would soon destroy. Vandals would take motorboats to the new island and do crazy stunts, like pushing a grand piano inside the hotel down the stairs, breaking all of the fine china, and razing houses and sheds.

In 1952, the Corps moved in and burned down all of the structures that remained standing. They then created a new breakwater to recreate the peninsula.

Bayocean Flora and Fauna

Bayocean

Bayocean Goats

Sources:
Webber, Bert and Margie. 1989. Bayocean: The Oregon Town That Fell into the Sea. Medford, Oregon. Pacific Northwest Book Company.
“Bayocean: The Playground of the Northwest”, Retrieved 14 June 2009. (http://pdxhistory.com/html/bayocean.html)

Originally published at Tilt-A-Whirl®. You can comment here or there.

I’m really hoping I can find time to blog again. I’ve been working 11hr days and spend the rest of my time sleeping or babysitting TC. *yikes*

• My sister got married to a very nice man in June of last year in Mexico. Check out my flickr page for pics under 'Cozumel'
• Met an awesome guy in Nevada in June who has become a good friend of mine and yells at me when I throw pity parties for myself.
• I went to New Mexico, Utah, Arizona, Colorado, and Texas in October.  I soaked in the same hot springs that Oprah and Gail visited in Colorado (Pagosa Springs, for those who are curious. A very special place.)
• Got snowed in for four days in December. My apt complex's parking lot wasn't plowed for almost a week because the snowplow drivers weren't willing to risk the drive out here to BFE to clear the pavement.
• Met a school teacher named Drew from Yakima on NYE who stole my heart, said the L-word hourly, and subsequently broke up with me without any warning after I made the mistake of showing him a gay social networking site where he received a lot of attention. Later I found out that almost everything he told me (name, age, even virginity) was a lie, including the reason he left me.  He just wanted someone to introduce him to the gay community and once that happened, he immediately started looking for someone else. Turns out my suspicions about another guy were right. Sucks too that I gave up a date with someone who was actually more cool than the teacher was, just to be with the teacher.  I wrote several essays about the experience which I will eventually condense down at a later date and post.  I'm not the first guy he's done this to and won't be the last. At least he's done trolling Portland for the time being and has switched to Seattle. It's a shame that tax payers are paying his salary while he text messages like crazy in the classroom all day.
• My bud from Nevada came up in March to visit and cheer me up. We had a good time watching tv, cuddling, and sleeping a lot.
• I went to see my bud in Nevada in early April.  He forced me to go out of my element and be social with his friends (people I had never met). I was nervous as hell, and probably made a gigantic fool of myself.  It's a start though, right?
• Had a very tiring, but much-needed weekend on Vancouver Island a few weeks ago with a friend from Coos Bay who I've known a for a few years. I was up for 39 hrs without even a nap.  No, I wasn't on any crack derivative--solely caffeine. I was a tired boy the rest of the week, but it was worth it.

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Originally published at Tilt-A-Whirl® . You can comment here or there.

Why Helio’s Customer Service Sucks

So, I was trying to pay my Helio cell phone bill online yesterday as it was a day past due. They’re a pretty aggressive company when it comes to late payments. They text message and spam your email every three to four hours until it’s paid.

Does anybody have any ideas on how to handle this chaos? I’m afraid of being evicted, am upset that Helio and my credit union permitted a payment this large to be accepted, and am at wit’s end. Advice? Insight?