See what prompted me to get off the 20 bus on East Burnside last Saturday

An enclosed tricycle. What do you think of it? While I think it is so cute, I myself cannot imagine being out in regular traffic in it--even with bike lanes--mainly because I cannot imagine riding a bicycle or a tricycle in traffic, period. Someone parked it here, beside the bike rack--that blue bar--so someone rode in it.



Once I walked across East Burnside onto NE 16th, I stopped to take this photo. Now I see that the enclosed trike is in between two bike racks; I wonder why it is not locked to one of them? Hmmm. Look ahead on the sidewalk and you'll see a bicycle waiting for its rider. I wonder if it is locked to a bike rack? Oh, one more thing to notice in this photo that I took in Northeast Portland. Beyond the green street sign and the yellow one with the arrow on it, see what looks like a tall building? That is the Big Pink which is on the west side of the Willamette, a mile and three tenths away! So cool to find the unexpected in a photograph!



Closer view of the back of the trike. It's an interesting piece of machinery.

Seen in the neighborhood, rotating sign #1

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Franz! Too bad I cannot post how good it smells when the breads are baking!



United States Bakery, better known as Franz Family Bakeries, is located in Northeast Portland within walking distance of my apartment. Franz Bakery itself was founded in 1906.



In collaboration with E. E. Franz of Franz Bakery, W.P. Yaw of the former Yaw's Top Notch Restaurant invented the 5-inch (130 mm) diameter hamburger bun in the late 1920's. Though others are credited with creating a bread product to use for the first hamburgers known to the world, Franz is credited for inventing the hamburger bun in its current worldwide accepted form.



Franz! Like I said, too bad I cannot post how good it smells when the breads are baking. Sometimes when I walk part of the way to work, I get experience that pleasing aroma.

Would the scooter guy appear so calm if he realized an art van followed closely?

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Saturday, April 27, not the first time I've seen this van. I took these photos in Northeast Portland. The van has evolved quite a bit since I first saw it in July, 2007, when I was set up to try to sell some of my arts and crafts at Last Thursday up on NE Alberta. A man in clown face drove it and had a chimpanzee puppet sitting up front with him, looking out the driver's window. You can see versions of the van from 2009 in some photos at the bottom of this post. The owner has rearranged some of the accoutrement.



Here's a closer view for you. No clown face for the driver on this particular ride--I looked closely at the photo in its original size, just to check it out so I could let y'all know.
 

Pay close attention to the position of the hand on the back window.
 

Pay close attention to the position of the hand on the back window.
 

Pay close attention to the position of the hand on the back window. Yep, it's waving bye-bye!

Here's what I found online, by Googling Portland art car van clown, posted August 31. 2011, at Neighborhood Notes Dot Com:

• The Never Never Van Driven by Extremo the Clown (a.k.a. Scott Campbell) 
•  For many years, Extremo the Clown drove the most noticeable art car in the city of Portland. Extremo—the professional artist Scott Campbell—is known for wearing distinctive clown makeup, driving with performing puppets, singing karaoke, and laughing manically. “Scott has a little bit of a compulsion,” Emily Hall says, “and the compulsion is clown face.” Besides his work as Extremo the Clown, Campbell is a successful and prolific graphic artist. His primary form of artistic expression, and income, is painting advertisements in the windows of local businesses. “Anywhere you go in Portland, you’re going to see these goofy window paintings,” Hall says. “And he makes a really great, straight living off that.” Extremo the Clown maintains an active presence on YouTube, which hosts videos of his local television appearances, and has shown all types of unique art around town. Extremo’s well-known car, the MSV, no longer runs. The Never Never Van, his current work in progress, is based on the story of Peter Pan.   

These next photos were taken downtown Portland, April 25, 2009. The van had not completely become what you see in the photos above. Still interesting, though. Looks like the ladders he uses to paint ads in store windows are up on top of the van, inside that red metal rack.

   

The van is heading west on SW Morrison. The MAX Blue Line is heading west to Hillsboro, Oregon, a suburb of Portland.

 

Two more photos, taken the same day.

 

There's the Never Never. See in the photos that I took last Saturday, the Never Never is gone from the bumper.

 

One last one from April 25, 2009. I wonder if the change in adornment facing vehicles driving behind the van came about because this seems so high as to be a detriment in traffic. Maybe I'll run into him sometime and get to ask.

Seen in Northeast Portland

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Actually, this is one half a block inside Northeast Portland. The street behind the man is East Burnside which is the street that divides Portland's north from south. The street on the left of the photo is NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. I took this photo on December 8, a Saturday. I was out and about, walking and looking and taking photos on a dry-at-the-moment Saturday morning--before I ended up at Tuba Christmas at Pioneer Courthouse Square.

Since this is where on my morning commute I change from one bus to the other, or from one bus to the streetcar,  I am thankful that I've never before seen this man feeding the pigeons.