Altered Sound

Hello, and welcome to the first installment of Altered Sound, brought to you live from the Boulier Building in inner southwest portland. I’m your host Lu-Ke-Tan, and you’re listening to pra, portland’s finest pirate music station, streaming online at praradio.com. It’s Nov. 9th, 2006, and the three word title for today’s episode is “rains, hubers, and hazel”.

If you’re listening to us live, call up the station at 503-22BLAST to get put on the guestlist for some upcoming shows. Call at 12:15 to get two tickets to Dr. Octogon at the Doug Fir this Friday. Then, at 12:30 call up, again the number is 503-22BLAST, to get two tickets to Frank Black at the Wonder Ballroom, next tuesday nov. 14th.

Also, in case you’ve been interested in seeing the famous Japanese Gardens but were afraid of plunking down the big change required to get in the door, I just found out this morning that tomorrow, Friday Nov. 10th, is “Free Admission Day” at the Japanese Garden of Portland, hours 10-4, and this includes “Autumn Leaves”, the world-renown Pacific Rim Bonsai exhibit. Maybe the good weather will hold up for it.

It’s nice to look out the window and see sunshine, you know it’s a good day when the rain takes a break.
While not Seattle, almost anyone who’s spent the rainy season in Portland can assure you that we get a fair amount of rain here. It’s not that it rains every second of the day, just when you walk the dog or otherwise desire to step outside.
The latest Public Information Statement released by the National Weather Service came out at 650 this past Tuesday morning:
–cue rains–
…HEAVY RAIN BRINGS FLOODS TO NORTHWEST OREGON AND SOUTHWEST
WASHINGTON RIVERS…

THE FINAL IN A SERIES OF STORMS OVER THE PACIFIC BROUGHT HEAVY RAIN
TO NORTHWEST OREGON AND SOUTHWEST WASHINGTON SUNDAY AFTERNOON
THROUGH TUESDAY MORNING.

OF SPECIAL NOTE IS THE RAINFALL TOTAL AT LEES CAMP…A RAIN GAGE
ABOUT 15 MILES EAST OF TILLAMOOK NEAR HIGHWAY 6 IN THE NORTHWEST
OREGON COAST RANGE. THIS GAGE RECORDED 13.2 INCHES OF RAIN FOR
MONDAY ALONE AND ABOUT 26 INCHES FOR THURSDAY THROUGH MONDAY. THIS
EXCEPTIONALLY HEAVY RAIN RESULTED IN MAJOR FLOODING ON THE WILSON
RIVER IN TILLAMOOK. PRELIMINARY DATA INDICATES A NEW RECORD FLOW
OCCURRED MONDAY NIGHT ON THE WILSON OF ABOUT 38000 CUBIC FEET PER
SECOND…WHICH BREAKS PREVIOUS RECORD FLOWS OF ABOUT 35000 CFS IN
1972…FEB 1996…AND DEC 1998. AS OF 6 AM TUESDAY…SEVERAL RIVERS
REMAIN ABOVE FLOOD STAGE…WHILE OTHERS ARE STILL RISING AND MAY
REACH FLOOD STAGE TUESDAY MORNING. REFER TO ALL FLOOD WARNINGS IN
EFFECT FOR MORE INFORMATION AT WEATHER.GOV/PORTLAND.

All samples played today were caught using my handy edirol r-09 portable recorder. The rain you here behind me was recorded in an empty, used up flophouse with broken gutters in the NW.
–cue out rain–

The best and most often extolled excuse to get off of the cold wet streets of Portland is to get some coffee. If I had my druthers, it would be spanish coffee. And Huber’s is the place to go for spanish coffee(according to the only numbers that I could find, in 1990 they went through roughly 32 cases of Kahlua a month) . Although the serving of spanish coffees didn’t become big until James Louie came up with his unique way of serving the drink in 1975, Huber’s has been in constant business since 1879. First as a saloon giving away turkey sandwiches to entice their customers to come in and drink, then to a restaurant (and speakeasy) during prohibition, then back to a bar. The even continued serving drinks and turkey through the flood of 1894. It’s been in it’s current location since 1911.

–cue bar noise–
The main bar is located in the middle of the Pioneer Building, and it’s a wonderful throw back to another, older age. And a great place to capture the cacophony of voices, with it’s arched ceilings, it’s thick phillipine mahogany bar with the warmth and veneer that can only be achieved with almost a century’s worth of daily polish. It’s never too loud, and never too soft. Dig it if you can, it’s hard not to have a good time there- and don’t forget to tell the bartender who sent you.
–cue out bar noise–

Hazel Hall lived up the street from me roughly a hundred years ago. A literal shut-in, she watched the world through her attic window, heard the rain and the walkers pass by on the street below. She published two books of poetry: “Curtains” in 1920, named after the curtains hung on her window through which she watched the world, and “The Walkers” in 1923, consisting of her perceptions of the people she heard on the sidewalk underneath, and whom she observed through the mirror she had placed on the windowsill to watch while she worked, making money to help support her family with fine custom sewing. A third book, “Cry of Time”, was written in response to a dream Hazel Hall had foreshadowing her death two weeks later. It was published posthumously.
Her poems are sad, intricate pieces. They tell of the sadness that exists between the coffee and the rain, and spell out in sometimes painfully simple, sometimes amazingly complex, the utter bareness of a life spent watching a world through rain-splatterd window panes.

I’ll be reading poems from “Curtains” and “The Walkers”, both of which available at the multnomah county library, and playing altered forms of both the rain and Huber’s sample’s that we’ve heard earlier.

Get out the headphones, listen, and most of all I hope you enjoy. This is Lu-Ke-Tan for PRA Radio.

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