A walk to Modern Domestic

My summer schedule has me walking to work on Thursdays, and I am trying to keep to that schedule during vacations, too.  I needed to pick up some Wonder Tape at Modern Domestic, and I combined that errand with a goodly hour's worth of walking.  As there are many paths to Modern Domestic, my strategy is to set off in the general direction (southeast) and turn onto whatever streets I encounter that look interesting.  Here's what I saw.

Remember how they took down that house?  Well, I can say I'm sorry it's gone.  Before it was a boarded up house that bums sat on the steps of now and again.  Now, it's a foundation and a chimney and a very ugly chain link fence.  I thought they were going to level the lot, but no. This is not an improvement.

However, a local artist has left us some art in the empty fireplace.

Remember that house and lot I loved and had  plans for? Well, now it's four large houses.  One is still for sale if you are interested.  It's very close to Fred Meyer, the Lombard Transit center and I-5.  It also has no yard.

However, across the street I was surprised to see this fella popping up on the long-empty cul-de-sac that I thought would never be developed because half of abuts the Fred Meyer parking lot.  I guess that house in front opted not to have a backyard.

Speaking of that house in front, here's a way to get your sunflowers to behave.  Stick them to the wall with painter's tape.

I love this neighborhood, and wouldn't mind buying a house.  Here's one for $240,000.  (Note that I wouldn't buy this house because the yard is too small and the house is too big.  But there are some candidates on this street.  I have my eye on them.)

The stealthy I-5 crossing.

Which has been decorated by mirrors and someone has added a decoration to one of the mirrors.

At the other end is this very fun traffic mural.

This kid on the bike kind of weirds me out, but I like him.

Nice wrap around roof and brick detail on this cottage.

Look at this compost bin!

I think this makes it harder to get the compost out of the bin, but it sure is pretty.

Nice art.  Made from bicycle parts.

From the compost bin on down were all part of this place, which is a "transit and bike oriented community in N. Portland."

Big tree.  Also with tree house.

This sign pulled me over.  Portland Community College is not far from where I stood to take the picture.

Oh real estate agents.  Not only are your ads rife with misspellings (and yet English Majors abound who would proof them quickly and thoroughly) but you also don't really understand that a home that was built this year can't be vintage for a good fifty to sixty more years.  

Lovely turrets.

In the yard of the lovely turret house, some concrete swans float among some cloth.

This apartment unit seems to be at the end of its days.  There was a house next door that was also boarded up.  I wondered if the Salvation Army, which owns property adjacent, had purchased the lots.

Across the street from each other we have two classic styles of Portland apartments.  The stacked building in a u-shape.  These tend to be downtown (although my former residence, Rosefriend Apartments, was torn down to build "luxury apartments") and major thoroughfares like Williams Street, where this one lives.

Across the street is the one story cottage style which are everywhere.

Massive columns caught my eye.

This looks like a good find.

And oh, my lord, it is!  What a gorgeous house that sits about two blocks off MLK.  I have never seen it before, which is strange because I'm not unfamiliar with this neighborhood.

The light was not fabulous so you can't see what I was getting at, so I will tell you.  I appreciate, since they probably tore down a bunch of houses to build these row houses, that they made them all a little different and used different colors to paint them.

Clad your home in metal?  Why not. This isn't a home, though, it's a real estate business.

The organic hippie in me finds these disgusting, and the lover of any food with cheese inside is intrigued.

Kitten!  This kitten was totally a kitten, constantly ADD-ing all over the place.  

Methinks the pots are too small for the plants to come, but perhaps not.

Look past the graffiti to see the mark of a certain caped crusader.

Just so you know, the world cup is happening.  This bar was open before 10am.

And here is my destination.  Where I not only successfully purchased Wonder Tape, I also helped sell something.  A woman popped in, asking if the dress in the window was for sale.  The clerk said, no, it's an advertisement for a class.  The woman said, alas, she was from out of town.  I said, "you could buy the pattern and have someone make it for you."  The woman left, but returned about a minute later.  I felt successful.