New Car!

I'm working on getting down to one car these days. We are selling our Trusty Volkswagen Van, and our Subaru, and buying a used 2003 eurovan. I bought it from the East coast, and it was delivered, in an icestorm! The Local Interstate without any cars on it is a interesting thing:


So anyway, I'm selling the Subaru to CopperWest, the Real Estate Comany, then we'll convert that over to a Biodiesel Mercedes sometime next year. Since the restaurants put put about 30 gallons of fry oil a week, I'll have plenty of B-100 to use to drive clients around.








Now if only I could find a Diesel Eurovan..........

















Oh, and here's all our UPS drivers doing the daily "package exchange" down at the port. Kind of a funny regular occurence this time of year.................

TV Crew!

Celilo got some good press a couple weeks back.......................

http://www.wweek.com/story.php?story=6855&SOURCE=RSS

And that prompted Japan TV to come and shoot our customers having Dinner..........

Let's see..........

In No particular order.........

Jay Kepoikai Meyer (Nathaniel Kepoikai's namesake)
Being all Metro during a visit.......


Nathaniel, on a trip to the Coast. Lazy Susan Breakfast


Our Most beloved, Eric Sanford, being his usual, Dorky self.........


Nathaniel's Train from some boxes and the mixer bowl..............


Kepoikai, on our inaugural flight. Bought the plane, Demoed it in about a half hour.....


Uncle Jeff (Jay's Brother) Getting out the Hoses during Nathaniel's fire station visit....................







Interiors of Celilo just after the timbers got placed................


Detail of the Tenon construction. Kenny Ezzell was pretty amazing on this job.




The Yasui building, still fully scaffolded.


During the Fall, a trip to the Hood River Fly in. Nathaniel, Sean Arpag and Niko Swihart, next to the West Side Pumper Truck.................


Here's a couple of Photos from Nathaniel's Birthday Party. Lots of guests, A great cake (again) and sushi, Treasure Hunts and the like........





Here's me later that same day, cleaning out the guest bath cupboard and seeing if I can check my Blood Pressure.........


The Mayor of Hood River, Getting a ticket

Catching up!

Well, well, Looks Like I've fallen and can't get up. (Or caught up, anyway.)

Let's see. I'm blogging quickly back to march, and through the Summer....Yikes-


Basically, Mayhem. From Start to Finish. The Two major events of this year are.

1. Julia!
Isn't she a looker! Our little girl has been nothing but a trooper and Mom should be cannonized. Julia has been a treat fromt he word go.

2. The New Yasui and Celilo










We got the Restaurant open after a bunch of challenges (No Power, Feuds with the City, Blah Blah blah......) And have been going gangbusters ever since. Here's some photos of the Restaurant Celilo.



And some more of my Copper West Brokerage office..........





And now, it's winter, and we are tucked away in our new building, broke (seriously) but stabilized. All in all, a very rewarding year. Nathaniel continues to grow up and Julia figured out how to talk last night.......and so she did!

Nathaniel Time!

A rare day with Nathaniel! How much fun is that. Jan took a day in Portland to visit with a friend of ours who is having her first kid, and Nathaniel and I got to hang out for the day.........

First, we had breakfast at Bettes......

Nathaniel insisted that we put our shoes under the table. I managed to keep it together for about half an hour, but after a bit, he just started goofing off.......

After that, we checked out our building, picked up some nails, Visited John Hart at the Kayak Shed, had some coffee at Dog River and then headed back home.......



I wanted to go up the valley and check out the Pine Grove auction, but Nathaniel went on strike!

We had to stop and refuel.......



Then we went up and checked our the Pine Grove Fire Station! This is Nathaniels favorite engine. Every year the Frie Department has a pretty cool auction and raises money. It was really busy, and after an hour or two, we got hungry....Since we were up the valley, we stopped at Panorama point for a picnic.........






And then.......Nathaniel took a nap.....Fun!



Sunday.........Friends over for Breakfast! Patricia and Walther just had a new kid, Wyatt. Their daughter, Peyton and them came over for breakfast.....Lots of doughnuts and coffee!





Later, Nathaniel and Jan did some gardening......I had to do an open house....

Bettes-

Ok, so there's lots of great things about Hood River, but probably nothing more "Hood Rivery" than Bette's, the town restaurant. (Turkey and avacado Eggs benedict)

Yes, there is a Bette, but she's been gone for awhile, Her daughter, Gae, runs the show these days. Gaes' husband when he's not working construction, manages the cash register, and they have a crew of some of the best waitstaff anywhere. (Did I mention Eggs benedict with Turkey and avacado?)

It's so rare these days to find people who are working a career in the hospitality business. In America, we treat those who serve us so poorly. We pay them terribly, and we look down on them, and make what is a honorable job, serving people, being of service to people, into some menial task that can only garner minimum wage and some tips.

Ok so Bette's......is........well, just real. Genuine.


This is Bev, guess how old she is? 60? 65? try 74. Waiting tables three days a week.


This is Sherri. Everyone things she's Gae's daughter. She isn't, and she's sick of people asking if she is or not, but she handles it pretty well. I've met alot of people with more "status" who can't handle what Sheri does in your average shift.

This is Gae- It's a terrible photo, I'll admit. Gae threatened to get back at me if I published this photo by "feeding my kid a whole plate of candy!"

This is Drea. She's new to the team, and a hell of a waitstaff person.

One more of Bev.......

More on Bette's later......

Johnson Dunn...........

Back a bunch of years ago, whe I was the bartender in my restaurant, Hood River was a bit more colorful. The town had it's legions of fun characters, and one of them is Johnson Dunn.

Johnson was (is) from Georgia, It think. He's got that great southern Lawyer thing going on, Accent, cherubic/bookish/boyish southern, under-the-oak-lets-have-a-whiskey-while-we-talk-about-the-war-and-daddy's-exploits kind of guy.

I mean really, honestly. I think he even wore a bow tie for a bit.

My favorite Johnson story (other than the one I'm going to relate now) Is when, during a Hurricane in the South, oh about 15 years ago, Johnson burst into my bar, and demanded to see the news. "Is it true?!" he shouted, way too loud for the bar......"did it hit Avery Island?! oh god I hope that's not true!"

Avery Island is the home of tabasco sauce, and our county prosecuting Attorney was deathly afraid of what a future without McIlhenny might bring.

What a relief when he found out they made th sauce in other parts of the country. "I was sweating it there for a moment...." he later said.......

Johnson left us for a bunch of years, but now he's back, and he and his new wife, are expecting a baby. He still makes the news every once in awhile........ Here's an excerpt from the current Hood River news.....

(Johnson has spent over a year trying to get this kid into court. The Kid has refused counsel and is trying to defend himself, and in the process has made a bunch of accusations questioning Johnson's professionalism.......After what appeared to be a listing of complaints, Johnson replied to the Jury......)

"....With God as my witness I say to you now, sue me, just sue me,” “I’d be happy to stand in front of a jury and answer every charge made by this gentleman.”

Gotta love that testimonial flair he's got.

Gooooo Johnson! Welcome Home.


Johnson, later that evening, having dinner at Abruzzo's

More Buildings and Hood River stuff.......

The Skin on the Yasui building is done. Here's what it's going to look like! Yippee....



We kanoodled with the colors some more today. Windows are going in next week and sheetrock (actually shearwall assembly) begins on monday. It's not that far until we can start our finish of the building. I'm very happy.

I'm also working on another project, as the owner's rep. This one has a nice view too. Somehow, I'm blessed with working with nice views.



This one was for three lawyers. It's been tough, and it has the entire crew nervous. On top of that, it's a infill project, which is just asking for trouble. Try slipping a new building into a hillside in an old town with three lawyers looking over your shoulder........

But the weather is great and we are out of the ground on both projects. Better lucky than good!