Spanning the State: Cave Dweller Edition

Carla Axtman

It's always a bonus when a Portlander doubles down on the keeping things weird front. This time it's with Sam Pardue, the brains behind Indow Windows.

Anthony Effinger, Bloomberg:

Now, in an unexpected twist, Indow, is cashing in on a diet craze. A growing number of people are going “paleo” to avoid such health problems as obesity, heart disease, and diabetes, which they blame on eating cultivated grain. Instead they eat like paleolithic humans: grass-fed meat, vegetables, fruit, roots, even bugs. There could be 3 million practitioners in the U.S., says Mark Sisson, author of The Primal Blueprint, a guide to going paleo. Die-hard practitioners don’t stop at food. They sleep in totally silent darkness—or try to—because humans are made to sleep in dark, quiet places such as caves, not in apartments located above neon signs and honking traffic.

In addition to holding in heat or air conditioning, Indow Windows keep out most street noise, a selling point in bustling cities, to paleo adherents or not. In September, Pardue started selling a new model in black (as in blackout), letting in zero light for $250 per normal-sized bedroom window.

I feel like this is the kind of thing best discovered and nurtured in Portland.Hipster cave dwellers and vampires, unite!

And now, let's Span the State!

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::gong!:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Ten years ago, a group of property owners in Florence filed a lawsuit claiming that it was unconstitutional in Oregon for the Governor and native tribes to enter into a compact to build a casino. Last week, they lost in the Oregon Court of Appeals. Interestingly, the Three Rivers Casino & Hotel has been open for almost ten years anyway. Seems like that horse left the barn awhile ago, but the landowners promise to continue their fight.

It's been a busy few weeks for local police in the towns of West Linn and Forest Grove. Forest Grove citizens seem to be having particular issues with items of clothing and unwanted text messages. West Linn..... well...click through and start reading under the "Life in West Linn" category. You'll thank me later.

The City View Charter School in Hillsboro is under some scrutiny this week for not reflecting the "demographics of the city of Hillsboro in race and income level..", as claimed on their website's FAQ. Hillsboro's poverty rate from 2007-2011 was 11.8%. Yet only 6% of City View's students are below the poverty line, according to the Oregon Dept of Education's report card. The school also rated "below average" on the state's report card relative to other schools with similar demographics.

Staying on the school theme: enrollment at Southern Oregon University is down 5.3%. That's the steepest decline of any of Oregon's state schools. SOU President Mary Cullinan attributes the drop to large graduating classes the previous two years along with regional economic issues. It's also reported that SOU has seen a decline in returning students.

Residents of LaGrande seem ready for a deep freeze to hit just to rid themselves of the massive numbers of aphids that have collected in the area. Swarms of the flying critters have plagued the area, with numbers greater than normal. Click through and see the image for this story, too.

By Carla Axtman Nov. 18, 2013