fishy advertising

Not long ago (before I got the flu), I was at the market shopping for fresh fish for dinner. What stopped me in my tracks was seeing advertising for a television show stuck on the packages at the seafood counter.

There, beneath the weight and pricing information was the face of actor Alex O’Loughlin alongside “Moonlight. Fridays at 9pm on CBS.”

Advertising a vampire show on a salmon steak? Advertising anything on seafood? It had never occurred to me that the packaging around sea scallops would one day be considered billboard space. When she heard about it, a friend joked that maybe the advertisers were trying to target Catholic audiences — fish on Fridays. Really, who came up with this idea?

Frankly, if I’d not already started watching the television show, seeing this bit of crafty promotion would have had me boycotting it. Turns out “Moonlight” is a fun and interesting program, although it suffers from less-than-ideal writing and some big plot holes. I’ll keep watching it, but this advertising campaign left me shaking my head, and feeling more cynical than ever.

When Star Wars II — “Attack of the Clones” — was in theatres, Hayden Christensen commented how strange it was to stop off at the convenience store with his buddies and find his own likeness plastered on bags of Doritos. I can only imagine that finding one’s image stuck onto the side of a halibut fillet might be jarring as well.

(If you’re someone who would benefit from a flu shot, consider getting this done sooner rather than later. Although I made a record recovery from the flu this go ‘round — two weeks instead of two months — it still bit the big green waffle.)

heat

We transitioned into autumn pretty quickly here in Portland. It seemed like one day we had bright, sunny skies and temperatures in the 80s and 90s, and then the next it's dark and damp and chilly.

The weather was one of the reasons I moved to the Pacific Northwest. I like grey skies and rain, so that part suits me just fine. But the temperature seemed to drop more quickly than normal.

I've been sitting here in my home office, drinking hot chocolate and wearing a fleece vest over my sweater, over my base layer of clothing -- and wondering why I'm so chilly. Then I checked the thermostat. It's only 57 degrees (F) inside my house.

No wonder the critters have been so cuddly lately.

As much as I dislike, in principle, the idea of turning on the heat in only the first week of October, I might have to give in on this one.

I-5 Killer in my neighborhood

(No, there's not actually a serial killer loose in my community.)

I was coming home from the library and Trader Joe's when I spotted a camera crew standing in the middle of the road, shooting something that was up in the trees. I looked around for a media van, but instead caught sight of a collection of police cruisers.

Given the drug raid we had here in recent memory, this wasn't a welcome sight.

I lowered my car window, and a nearby officer walked over.

"What's going on?"

"Court TV. Just shooting some scenes for television." He smiled and shook his head. "Don't worry. No crime here today."

I was expressing my relief when another man in a suit called out, laughing, "You want to be on TV?"

I leaned my head out the window. "I'm a journalist. You sure you want me on camera?"

This older gentleman jogged over and introduced himself. "David Bishop." He reached in to shake my hand. "Chief of Police."

He seemed pleasantly surprised to hear that I freelance for the Tribune, then gave me some background on the production. Court TV is doing a program about the I-5 Killer, Randall Woodfield, suspected of murdering at least 13 women along I-5 from Bellevue, Washington, to Redding, California, between 1979 and 1981. Woodfield is currently serving a life sentence -- plus about 125 years -- in Washington State.

"You should write about it," the Chief advised.

"Obviously, this wasn't the original crime scene," Bishop gestured toward my neighbors' homes. "This was all happening over in Springfield. But they're putting together this program for Court TV."

Chief Bishop mentioned that he'd been involved in the original investigation and manhunt, then joked about not looking as young as he used to on camera.

I wished him luck and let him get back to work. All I'd been doing was running some mid-day errands, and ended up with a history lesson on local serial killings and a meeting with the Beaverton Chief of Police. Not bad.