Portland with a Deadline

My last week in Portland started on Saturday, so my family is kicking things into overdrive. As usual, we have an end-of-visit to-do list, and it involves everything from breakfast to baseball to lunch to reading to visiting to dinner to movies to drinks...

Just your usual Portland activities.

Today began bright and early (well, if you consider 9 a.m. to be bright and early) with breakfast at Broder. (Broder is always on my end-of-visit to-do list. I go almost every time I'm here.) It's a Scandinavian restaurant, that also serves lunch, not to mention a mean Bloody Mary. I had a scramble with bacon and other goodies such as a side of potato pancakes and walnut toast, with coffee and orange juice. It doesn't get much better than that.

We had summer pudding for lunch, leftover from last night's get together for me to say goodbye to family friends (and hello to those that I hadn't seen yet!). Then we headed down to PGE Park for one last ball game. The Beavers lost to the Salt Lake Bees, 4-2, but the 2 runs were scored on a home run in the bottom of the ninth, so it was not without dramatic flair.

The Beavers don't play great ball, but they're not hopeless. I think a little more fan enthusiasm would boost team morale & will to win. And anyway, nothing beats a sunny Sunday afternoon at the ballpark.

On the way out, I picked up a cap at the souvenir store. I used to think that if I was ever going to wear a baseball cap, it would be a Red Sox cap. But they're just so handy for that windy, rainy weather that you get in fall in the Netherlands, I'm pretty sure they'll both see plenty of... well, not daylight. They'll both get plenty of exposure, anyway.

Dinner was sausages (a gift from friends) with grilled peppers, chard (some of it from the garden), and thin-baked potatoes. One of my favorite kinds of meals. We ate in the backyard, under the grape arbor.

In the evening, my parents and I met up with another parent-daughter group, the purpose being to introduce us girls to another good place to have a drink in Portland. (It's been a trend, ever since we turned 21, for our mothers and sometimes fathers as well to broaden our knowledge of the Portland drink scene whenever we come home.) Tonight it was the Secret Society, a really great little place with an old-fashioned yet hip feel. I had a green flash - white rum, chartreuse and lime juice. (There may have been something else but I've forgotten.)

Then home again, to watch "Leverage" with my mother and sister. It takes place in Boston, where we lived for a year and is a city we love, but it's filmed here in Portland, so what could be a more perfect way to end a Portland day?