Category — Interesting People

Spring events are in full force now in Southwest Washington. Here are a few ideas to get you out the door:

May 3 – The 39 Steps – Columbia Theatre for the Performing Arts in Longview. This 2008 Tony award-winning play “The 39 Steps” is a madcap romp through one of Alfred Hitchcock’s finest films. Adapted for the stage, it became one of Broadway’s longest-running comedy thrillers. With a cast of 4, this show has more than 150 characters to keep you on the edge of your seat.

May 7 – The 28th Annual Ride Across Clark County (RACC) sponsored by the Vancouver Bicycle Club WARNING! This event may be sold out. Check the Web site for availability of this scenic and popular day-long ride. Four loops to choose from – 18, 34, 65 and 100 miles

May 7 – 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. National Train Day, Historic Train Depot, 210 Railroad Ave, Centralia, WA National Train Day commemorates the anniversary of the transcontinental railroad’s inception. Special displays and events will be in the Historic Railroad Depot in downtown Centralia.

May 14 – 8 p.m. Al Stewart Concert at the Columbia Gorge Interpretive Center in Stevenson. Remember the Scottish singer-songwriter’s 1976 hit Year of the Cat? Skamania Performing Arts Foundation, 541-400-9792

May 14 and 15 – Vancouver Symphony Orchestra conducted by Salvador Brotons. Concert times are 3 pm on Saturday and 7 pm on Sunday. Last regular concert of the season. The program will feature Concerto for Horn by Brotons. Roman Festivals by Respighi and Audience Choice (voting now closed).

May 14, 12-4 pm – Cathlapotle Plankhouse, Carty Unit of the Ridgefield NWR, 28908 NW Main Ave., Ridgefield. Artist Judy Bridges, Cowlitz basket weaver, will demonstrate basket weaving techniques. Visitors will have the opportunity to view examples of her basketry and ask her questions about her craft.

May 15, 12-4 pm – Cathlapotle Plankhouse Carty Unit of the Ridgefield NWR, 28908 NW Main Ave, Ridgefield. Artists Greg Robinson, member of the Chinook Indian Nation, and Greg Archuleta, member of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, will be in the Plankhouse doing carving and Chinookan lifeways demonstrations. Visitors will be able to see some of their beautiful artwork as well as talk to them about Chinookan art and culture.

May 18-19 – Nautical Renaissance The Port of Ilwaco welcomes back Grays Harbor Historical Seaport Tall Ships, The Lady Washington and Hawaiian Chieftain. Self-guided tours are hosted by the crew wearing period costumes. ($3 requested donation). Adventure and Battle Sails are also available. Visit the Web site for prices and other details. From Ilwaco on May 19th guests can book passage to Astoria where the ships will offer tours until May 22, coinciding with Astoria’s opening celebration of its 200th birthday. Contact the Grays Harbor Historical Seaport Authority in Aberdeen (360) 532-8611 or (800) 200-5239 for details and schedules. Go to www.ladywashington.org to track the ships’ locations and purchase discounted price tickets. (Note: There will also be a sail in Ilwaco on May 3rd.)

May 21-22 – 31st Annual Herb and Garden Festival at Pomeroy Living History Farm Thousands of fresh herb and garden plants, many organic selections plus entertainment, farm café, vendors and the herb garden. Admission is free.

May 28-30 – Memorial Day Weekend Clark County Spring Wine Release Visit 11 Clark County wineries in one weekend! See the Web site for details and maps.

May 28-30 – Memorial Day Open House Weekend at Columbia Gorge Wineries Visit more than 30 wineries and tasting rooms on both sides of the river. Details on the event Web site.

Wow, what a May! This is just a small fraction of what is scheduled. See you out there in Southwest Washington!

You have to love a small town that offers an all-day writing workshop to benefit the local library. Bravo, Kalama! The community organization Envision Kalama is offering its third annual workshop featuring marvelous writers of fiction, non-fiction, poetry and memoirs. The workshop will be held on Saturday, April 23 at the Kalama Community Building, 126 N. 2nd Street in downtown Kalama.

Word Catcher starts at 9 a.m. with registration, coffee and scones.

Morning workshops, from 10 a.m. to 12 noon will feature:

The Secrets of Great Storytelling with Jack Hart, author of upcoming Storycraft and A Writer’s Coach (and this writer’s first journalism professor at the University of Oregon decades ago)

Voice: More than Me, Less Than Me with Mary Lyons, former member of the Richard Hugo House in Seattle.

Poetry for Everybody with Doug Marx, writing teacher and finalist for the Oregon Book Award (This workshop is perfect for April’s National Poetry Month.)

All Hail the Mighty Verb! With Cathy Zimmerman, Features Editor at The Daily News in Longview.

Author Brian Doyle - Photo by Jerry Hart

Brian Doyle will be the featured author at lunch. Brian is the award-winning writer of essays, nonfiction books and novels and the editor of Portland Magazine at the University of Portland. He will read from his work, followed by an open mic.

Afternoon workshops from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. will include:

Serious Fun at Writing with Robin Cody. Registration is limited to 11. Participants were to submit writing to Robin by April 9 so this workshop may be closed. Winner of the Oregon Book Award, Robin is author of Ricochet River and Voyage of a Summer Sun, among other books.

Reading for Writers with Brian Doyle. Brian will read from his novel Mink River and encourages participants to bring pen and notebook.

Story Spinning with Alan Rose. Alan will discuss the creative process of spinning a story. Alan is the author of The Legacy of Emily Hargraves and Tales of Tokyo.

All Hail the Mighty Verb! With Cathy Zimmerman (see morning listing).

(Note: This blog normally provides book links to Powell’s Books. The venerable bookstore’s Web site was down for maintenance at the time of posting so Amazon links are provided. Please support your local bookstores and libraries!)

In addition, the photo exhibit “Pictures Worth A Thousand Words” by Kalama photographer Dan Roberts will be on display.

Cost is $15 for one workshop or $25 for two. Boxed lunch is available for $8 (advanced order is requested). Here is the Word Catcher complete schedule and registration information.

Support Kalama and its public library, improve your writing and meet authors. What more could you want? TELL YOUR FRIENDS, register and head to Kalama on April 23rd!

Wine and cheese are ageless companions, like aspirin and aches, or June and moon, or good people and noble ventures.
M. F. K. Fisher

Looking for a reason to gather your friends for a unique evening? What about an evening of wine and cheese tasting?

Our co-host, Jim

Friends Jim and Joyce recently hosted an educational, tasty and increasingly jovial evening that featured nine wines paired with matching cheeses. Thank you to Jim, Joyce and all the other participants! Here are some tips gleaned from the party:

1. Start with a wine steward. Jim and Joyce worked with Ernie, the sommelier at their neighborhood Fred Meyer, to choose the four whites and five red wines featured for the evening.

2. Coordinate with a cheese specialist. After choosing the wines, our hosts worked with Berry of Trader Joe’s in Vancouver to pick the cheeses that best matched the wines.

3. Create a fact sheet about each wine. Jim shared information about each wine including the winery location, vintage and a description of the wine. Fact sheets were on the table and available for guests to take home.

Fact sheet for the Argentinian red

4. Label the cheeses. Each cheese was tagged by type with its matching wine.

Asiago with rosemary - paired with the Chardonnays

5. Provide wine glass labels. I, for one, always lose my wine glass. No one could do that with Joyce’s special paper wine glass labels, which are available online at Wine Compliments No more misplaced wine glasses!

Where is MY glass? No more lost glasses with these paper labels

6. Start with the whites. (Our hosts had a light white wine, Oisly-Thésée Les Gourmets 2009 Sauvignon, available to all upon arrival. This gave us something to drink while waiting for all the participants to arrive.) You want to go from dry to sweet whites, and light to full-bodied reds. Provide new glasses when switching from whites to reds.

Serving the cheese

7. Provide a pitcher of water and a dump bucket. The water will allow tasters to rinse glasses between tastes. The dump bucket? It speaks for itself but, frankly, I couldn’t bring myself to toss out good wine and it was ALL good wine!

8. Serve more food after the tasting. To avoid sending guests who have been consuming fabulous wines out into the driving public, serve food, coffee and conversation AFTER the tasting. Our hosts served us wonderful quiches, salads and coffee.

Salad and quiche

Perfect post-tasting dinner

What wines did we taste? Here is the delectable list in serving order:

Mezzacorona (Italy) 2009 Pinot Grigio

Vino Noceto (California) 2010 Pinot Grigio (award-winning, fruity, sweet, my favorite white)

Peachy Canyon Winery (California) 2008 Zinfandel

Blackstone Winery (California) 2008 Zinfandel

Davis Bynum Winery (California) 2006 Chardonnay

Gordon Brothers 2006 (Washington State) Chardonnay

Don Tiburcio Bodega Benegas Winery (Argentina) 2007 Red Wine

Estancia Winery (California) 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon

Jones of Washington Estate Vineyard (Washington State) 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon

The final, nearly empty line up

The best wine? Personally, I would move to Argentina for Malbecs so I loved the red wine of Don Tiburcio Bodega Benegas Winery. All the wines were excellent. This is the one of the group that I would take to my final picnic.

I confess. After about the fifth wine, I lost track of the cheeses. Best idea: pick your wines and then talk to your local cheese buyer for pairing suggestions. Joyce and Jim wisely used their consultant at Trader Joe’s.

Want to do this party on a budget? To preserve your checking account, create the wine list and then assign a bottle to each guest to bring. Ask each person to put together the fact sheet and give a brief lecture on the wine. This WILL generate a FUN evening!

A votre sante!

Writers Carolyn J. Rose and Mike Nettleton live in Vancouver with two dogs, a peekaboo view of Vancouver Lake and the wafting scent of corn chips. They have co-written five novels along with four mysteries by Carolyn. Recent titles include Hemlock Lake, Sometimes a Great Commotion and The Big Grabowski.

Mike recently retired from a 40+ year career in broadcasting, most recently at KEX in Portland. Carolyn teaches novel writing and founded the Vancouver Writers’ Mixers. More information is available at their Web site and their blog, which is allegedly co-written by Bubba and Max, their dogs. They (Mike and Carolyn, not the dogs) are also flamboyant Scrabble players. We spoke at the Hazel Dell Tully’s in Vancouver.

Carolyn Rose and Mike Nettleton

What brought you to SW Washington?

Carolyn: We were living in Portland and I was working over here and after commuting for five years I said to Mike, okay it’s your turn to commute because I worked for a little news station here and we kept covering stories about the revitalization of Esther Short Park and I said really this is the place to be so we came over here.

We moved here in October of 2000 and immediately in January of the next year, I lost my job. They just folded the whole little TV station. By that time, we had discovered all the great greenbelt trails and we would be sitting out in the hot tub and the geese flying over and Mike said, “I really like this.”

Mike: I really enjoyed the move. We have never been sorry that we moved over here.

What do you love about SW Washington?

Carolyn: I really like the Farmers Market and Esther Short Park. I really like our neighborhood (Northwest). It’s older and established. You get to know your neighbors. If you can stand on our deck on your tiptoes, you can get a view of the lake.

Mike: She’s not telling you the whole truth. The real attraction about our house, what she really likes the most is the aroma drifting up from the Frito-Lay plant.

Carolyn: When they fire up the Doritos and the air is just a little moist and still and we walk the dogs…

Mike: Remember the cartoon dog from the Huckleberry Hound cartoons when he would get a dog biscuit and go “ummm” and levitate? That’s Carolyn.

Carolyn: I think I gain five pounds when I walk. For my birthday, I want a tour of the Frito-Lay plant.

Mike: It’s funny, at work I dealt with a lot of people in Portland who asked, “You live in Vancouver? Where do you eat?” like we don’t have any restaurants. We have great restaurants in this town. There is a whole attitude kind of thing from Portlanders. I just got to the point where I thought “You don’t know.”

Carolyn: We have lived in small towns growing up and it has that feeling on the west side.

What do you think is the best kept secret of SW Washington?

Carolyn: There is so much here – the water, the trails, that riverfront walk is absolutely gorgeous.

Mike: The art walks. There are some great little galleries downtown and some really talented people.

Carolyn: And of course the new library is going to be stunning!

What is your favorite place to relax around here?

Mike: We are both beach rats. We love the beach towns. We go to Long Beach sometimes but usually we go to the Oregon Coast. Every once in awhile, especially when people come to town we go to the Gorge. The Washington side in some ways is every bit as pretty as the other side. I play golf and I love Tri-Mountain Golf Course because on a clear day you can see Mt. St. Helens, Mt Hood and Mt Adams.

Carolyn: My favorite place to relax has got to be the Marshall Center pool. I can work out and relax and it is one of the few pools with a really deep water section so you can do deep water aerobics. The instructors are terrific.

Mike: I work out in the gym part. I’m a drowner not a swimmer.

Carolyn: He has negative buoyancy. He’s a total sinker. He has so much muscle mass.

If you didn’t live here, where would you live?

Carolyn: Maybe Newport, Oregon.

Mike: Yeah, we really like Newport. It’s about the right size. It has some cultural things going on. It has a theater…

Carolyn: …lots of good restaurants.

Mike: The other place I really like is Ashland but trying to afford living there… the cost of housing is obnoxious. A lot of the places were student housing when I went to school there were old rundown Victorians that they had divided into apartments. Now they are million dollar houses. A lot of them are B and Bs.

What’s coming up that you are excited about?

Carolyn: I’m going to independently publish a book (The Refuge) and see how it does. The whole publishing scene is changing so dramatically and I have this book I wrote three or four years ago that I sent to just about every agent on the planet and they yes it’s a good story but we can’t see this being #1 on the New York Times seller list. I believe in democracy. I think readers should decide what they are going to read. They way the system is going now, you could put it up there and you do a little marketing and they decide. I write because I want people to read it.

Mike: It’s a terrific book. I’m not just being a proud husband. Of everything she has written, it is probably my favorite. Somebody really missed the boat.

Carolyn: I’m hoping it will be out in May. It will be available on Kindle and Nook and I will get it into CreateSpace for people who want it as a paperback book. You can go through our Web site to Amazon to buy it.

Mike: I’m going to do Shakespeare in the Park — Lovejoy Fountain park in downtown Portland – The Tempest with Actors Ensemble. I am playing Gonzalo. Carolyn says the reason I got the part was they needed someone old, portly and loud. Hey, whatever it takes!

Carolyn: It’s the man at the moment.

Mike: It’s not a major part but there is a fair amount of memorization and I’m on stage quite a bit. It will be interesting. It will be fun.

What would surprise people to know about you?

Carolyn: As much as I love the great books and movies, I’m addicted to thrillers with a high body count. I love Lee Child’s Jack Reacher series and Stephen Hunter’s sniper, Bob Lee Swagger. I also never miss CSI or Criminal Minds. I never go to “chick flicks” and it’s far more likely that Mike will cry at a movie than that I will.

Also, I once had a job in a grocery store (two miles from Woodstock) and every afternoon, I sold a pack of cigarettes to Bob Dylan.

Mike: I can’t really match that. I did play softball in Albuquerque with Wild Cherry, the group that did Play that Funky Music, White Boy. They were nice guys. Whatever town they came to, they would play against a radio station.

Carolyn: But you have the nude volleyball!

Mike: Oh, yeah! I forgot about that. I was working in Eugene at the radio station and I saw a little blurb in the paper said that the Willamettans (“largest nudist club in the Pacific Northwest”) were having their open house that weekend. I said (on the air) “It’s a little known fact but, at KUGN, we have probably the premier nude volleyball team in the Northwest. The phone rings and the social director of the Willamettans says “I dare you to put me on the air.” Then he says, on the air, “You have the premier nude volleyball team in the Northwest? We’re playing Saturday. Game is at 11 a.m.”

Now I have to go around the radio station and recruit to go up against the Willamettans. We recruited enough people and not only did we do the nude volleyball game, we broadcast the game on the air. Holy mackerel! Volleyball is the nudists’ game. I’m still removing volleyballs from various parts of my anatomy.

“As far as I am concerned, a painting speaks for itself. What is the use of giving explanations, when all is said and done? A painter has only one language.” ~Pablo Picasso

Picasso may have it right, but meeting the artist AND seeing the art makes for a rich evening. Vancouver’s First Friday Art Walk always proves that point.

The evening was definitely worth enduring the Niagara-like rain storm. A sampling of the art and artists:

Gallery 360, in its spacious new location at 111 W. Ninth Street, featured a “Cut and Paste” exhibit of mixed media as well as oils and other art from members.

DaBat at Gallery 360

Connie Cleaton at Gallery 360

Dorene Steggell at Gallery 360

Skip Enge’s bright-hued floral portraits gave energy and a longing for spring to the wet March evening at Aurora Gallery at 1004 Main Street.

Skip Enge at Aurora Gallery

North Bank Artists Gallery at 1005 Main Street showcased The Seven Deadly Sins Exhibition. Kaori Freda illustrated “Gluttony” with her Cupcake Diet drawing.

Kaori Freda at North Bank Artists Gallery

Up the street, Angst Gallery at 1015 Main Street celebrated the 25th anniversary of the Inner Light Photographic Society with a group exhibit.

Photographers Chris Eagon, Al Flory and Linda Freeland in front of photos by Chris at Angst Gallery

Last stop was Art on the Boulevard, 210 W. Evergreen Blvd. for the rich oils by Ridgefield artist Oleg Ulitskiy. The exhibit included work produced during a recent trip to his hometown of Odessa, Ukraine and from Northwest locations.

Oleg Ulitskiy with his favorite painting at Art on the Boulevard

As always, the First Friday crowd was patronizing downtown restaurants and bars. We chose Woody’s for margaritas and excellent seasonal quesadillas just steps away from Art on the Boulevard.

The exhibits will be up through March 26. Plan a personal Art Walk to see the creative work of our local artists!

Alan Rose of Woodland is the author of two published novels, The Legacy of Emily Hargraves (2007), a paranormal mystery, and Tales of Tokyo (2010), a modern quest novel based on his years of living and working in Japan.

He organizes WordFest, the monthly gathering of writers and readers in SW Washington and is the host of the KLTV program, “Book Chat.” He is also one of the organizers of Word Catcher, the annual literary festival in Kalama.

Alan is also the Director of Community Relations and Development at Lower Columbia Community Action Program (CAP), the largest private non-profit social service organization serving Cowlitz and Wahkiakum counties. A native of the Pacific Northwest, he has lived in Tokyo and Melbourne, Australia.

We spoke at Lava Java, coffee house at the I-5 Ridgefield Junction.

How did you come to the Pacific Northwest?

I lived the first 18 years of my life in Vancouver, then did my undergraduate work at Willamette University in Salem and from there I went to the School of Theology at Claremont, California, for my post-graduate work and where I also worked with two churches.

I returned to the Pacific Northwest and spent a year by myself in my parents’ trailer up on Lake Merwin, where I began writing fiction.

After emerging from the wilderness back into the world (I much prefer the wilderness), I served a church outside of Seattle and from there had the opportunity to teach English as a Second Language in Tokyo. From there I went to Australia and traveled around the Pacific Rim, finally returning to the Pacific Northwest 12 years later.

If you didn’t live here, where would you like to live?

Three of my favorite places I have visited and could live are Niigata Japan (in the Japan Alps), the south island of New Zealand and Tasmania. All remind me of the Northwest — lots of mists and mountains.

What’s special about the Pacific Northwest?

Its mystical quality–clouds, mists and mountains. I expressed this in my novel, Tales of Tokyo, where after months of the extreme heat and humidity of the Tokyo summer, the refreshing rains of autumn arrive:

He walked back through the soft rains to his aparto. Leaving the light off, he fixed himself some Market Spice Tea and sat by his open window, inhaling the freshness of the air. A reflective hush and quiet contentment settled over his little world of Fudo-Mae, and he sat a long time in the dark, drinking his tea and listening to the rains. For a native of the Pacific Northwest, rain possesses an almost mystical quality: listening to it, you learn to go deep; when you were a child, it put you to sleep, its soft patter on the roof lulling you; its misty curtain hung over your world transforming it into a magical realm of friendly spirits cloaked in clouds.

The gentle sound shushed, calmed and quieted his soul. For the first time in months he felt refreshed, at peace, and whole. unrolling his futon, he went to sleep to the whispering rain, dreaming of home.

What is your favorite place to relax in SW Washington?

My hillside five acres overlooking the Lewis River Valley, 10 miles upriver out of Woodland. It is my sanctuary. It is my retreat.

What is one thing that would surprise people about you?

That I am an introvert by nature. My job and my community organizing require me to be an extrovert, but I really am a loner, much more comfortable in my own solitude.

What is coming up that you are excited about?

Greg Mortenson. (Lower Columbia Community Action Program is bringing the author of Three Cups of Tea and Stones into Schools to Longview on March 1st. Details and tickets here.) He has been an inspiration to me and a number of people I know. I think that at this time in our history, we are in need of inspiration and certainly Greg Mortenson can be an inspiration to us with the idea of what one person can accomplish.