I’ll be taking a summer break and may be posting less than usual to the blog for a while. Our family will be visiting Washington state and Oregon – specifically Seattle and Vancouver, Washington, and Portland and Bend, Oregon. Most of our time will be in Oregon. My sister lives in Bend, and we also want to see the famously “sustainable” Portland, noted for its urban planning and public transit. Coincidentally, my wife’s family has scheduled a family reunion at Mt. Bachelor Village Resort, in Bend, so we can see a lot of people in one visit.

Vancouver, Portland, and Bend are also all designated as “bicycle-friendly” communities by the League of American Bicyclists, so I look forward to seeing what they offer in that venue.

I’ve been reading a Moon Handbook to Oregon (6th ed., 2004) by Elizabeth and Mark Morris. (I appreciated Moon’s Handbook to Northern California when we lived there.) In it I came across this info on bicycling in Oregon:

In the wake of the oil shocks of the 1970s, the Oregon legislature allocated one percent of the state highways budget to develop bike lanes and encourage energy-saving bicyclists. In addition to establishing routes throughout the state with these funds, many special parks were developed with bicycle and foot access specifically in mind. (p. 52)

What are the chances that Minnesota and other states could do the same? I also found this:

Portland has long been known as a bicycle-friendly city. Its nationally recognized bicycle program provides a comprehensive, safe bikeway network to increase the number of residents who bicycle to work, on errands, and for exercise or pleasure. To accomplish this, the city has created close to 200 miles of bikeways (bicycle lanes, boulevards, and multi-use trails). As a result, many more folks are riding bicycles. In 1975 about 200 cyclists crossed the Hawthorne Bridge daily by bike; today, it’s up to 2,400. (p. 122)

On a different subject, I’m intrigued by what I’ve read about another part of Oregon: southeastern Oregon. It’s one of the most sparsely populated regions in the lower 48 states. It borders northern Nevada, an area that has also intrigued me since my family drove through it on Interstate 80 when I was a teenager. These regions – along with Bend, which is in central Oregon – are part of the Great Basin high desert. Bend is home to the High Desert Museum, which I hope to visit.

There’s another Bill Ostrem out there. He’s Bill Ostrem of California, a successful developer, and vastly more wealthy than I, I expect. Among his projects are the very large planned communities, EastLake, near San Diego, and Yokohl Ranch, near Visalia. I’d like to visit and learn more some time.

Reading about his projects and having lived in California myself from 2002 to 2004, I know that development in the Golden State makes developoment in the Midwest look like child’s play. They build big and fast out west. I remember when Elk Grove, a suburb of Sacramento, added something like four elementary schools in one year, probably around 2003.

I believe Mr. Ostrem may be descended from some Ostrems who settled in Illinois, most likely Norwegians like my Ostrem ancestors. I’ll try to find out more.

I used to think I might write humor in the manner of heroes of mine such as Evelyn Waugh, Woody Allen, or Garrison Keillor. Well, somewhere along the way I read too many op-ed pieces and too much journalism and got way too serious.

However, Brendon Etter – a Northfield playwright and blogger – hasn’t forgotten how to be funny. See his blog post, If Suburbs Were Named Based on Reality.” My favorite: Dontwalkfield.

See a post I did on Northfield.org for a description of a visit to Northfield by Steve Rusk, chair of the Bike Edina Task Force and founder of Bike Edina. Steve is remarkably dedicated to the cause of cycling, particularly safe cycling. And he also had pointers for me – such as the observation that I sometimes ride too far to the right, including too close to parked cars, creating the possibility of getting doored.

The last couple of weeks have been quite busy. My many activities have included work as president of our small homeowners association, a position I held for a little over a year. Last night at our annual meeting I stepped down as president and, following the tradition of the association, took the role of vice president.

It was a hectic year for the association, and I was ready to pass the presidency to someone else. While we have only nine units, on August 24 of last year we had a nasty storm that rained down baseball-sized hail. (Some parts of Northfield had softball-sized hail.) You can see the proof in the pictures above.

The result was over $80,000 dollars worth of damage. As president I was responsible for managing the repairs. All roofs and gutters were replaced, and there was much repair work done on windows, siding, trim, doors, and more. We were fortunate that we had the able help of American Building Contractors, Inc., a Burnsville, Minnesota, company that specializes in storm damage repair. Their representative, Josh Moe, did a great job handling our claims and interacting with the insurance company.

It was bad luck to get stuck with this situation as president, but I got feedback that I did a good job managing the repairs. There are two accomplishments as president that I’m most proud of: 1.) improvements to gutters and drainage, which has helped solve some water problems in our courtyards, and 2.) improvements in attic insulation and ventilation. We discovered the need for the latter during our roof repairs; the result should be energy savings and reduced carbon emissions for a long time into the future.

You can see that I have a practical side. It’s something that the men in my family share, this appreciation of maintenance and upkeep. And it’s no wonder that I was tapped to be president.

I can only imagine what it must be like to be president of a large association. No, I wouldn’t want that job, thank you very much.