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Also I just saw a story on the news a couple of days ago that some more possibly tainted eggs were being recalled. That's a good reason to have your own chickens. (I rarely eat eggs so don't really need to raise them).
I used to take the berry-picking bus out to berry farms in Gresham in the late 50's & early 60's and I have to tell you 82nd was not a dirt road. It was a four-lane highway lined with auto dealers, motels, Fred Meyers, drive-in hamburger joints, etc... It's true that the city limits ended there but none of the roads - Powell, Division, Glisan, Burnside, etc... that went past 82nd were dirt roads. Maybe if you went back to the teens or 20s.
You're totally right, I did mean the 20's. Although south of Foster in the early 60's it was still pretty sparse and mostly farmland. I'm not sure where it changed from two lane to four lane, but there is a picture of an old drive-in on the corner of 82nd and Powell dated 61 that shows it was two lane at that point.
I've lived in both Seattle and Portland for many years - Irvington & Capital Hill which are very similar neighborhoods. Except for Seattle's horrific traffic, both cities are fairly similar - full of PNWesterners. Same mentalities.
You're in for another real let down, Xanathos, because you idealize places & then when reality hits you react like a jilted lover. How can you possibly be an expert on Seattle & Mercer Island when you just moved there?
I lived up here (Seattle) years ago as well. As someone who's lived in both cities, I can without a doubt say the two are NOT similar. They SEEM similar...on the surface. Which is why I originally moved to Portland last year. I figured it would be pretty close to Seattle in terms of experience. Boy, was I wrong. Everything seemed pretty fine at first, but the longer I stayed in PDX, the more I realized just how dissimilar the two cities are, from top to bottom. I admit, I was a bit worried upon relocating that the city would have changed significantly since I last lived here, been overrun by the same types that infest Portland. It was a sigh of relief to find that those fears were unfounded, and this city - aside from some structural changes and some new faces in the politicians' offices, is just how I left it back then.
As I've stated before in numerous other threads, Seattle is truly a "come as you are" type of town where everybody does their own thing and nobody really gets into anyone else's business. Portland is just chock full of vigilante hippies who are out to save the world, and they don't care how many of YOUR (my) rights or sensibilities they have to trounce on to do it. Portland is a city that's generally Bohemian on the fringes of popular society. Seattle is definitely a cosmopolitan type of city. To compare the two aside from geographic markers or weather is asinine.
Someone else in this thread (or one like it in this forum) summed up PDX for me pretty well the other day, when in response to someone saying they were leaving because there were too many whackos there they replied with "Good! Who would want to live in a city that has normal people in it, anyways?" or something thereabouts. Summed it up quite nicely...you have to be into counterculture to really be a good fit for PDX, and if you're not you generally are not as welcome. What was left unsaid in that post, though, was "....but we still want you to stay so you'll pay those ridiculous income taxes we levied on you because we don't wanna pay em ourselves". So openly hostile to people who are successful, yet the first ones to line up at the trough to "redistribute" the wealth of us dastardly types with "normal" personality types that had some ambition. The recent income tax votes in the respective states illustrates a substantial difference between the two perfectly. Portland voted 70% in favor of "gimme your earnings! They're mine! Pay so I don't have to! You should pay your share and mine, too! Gimme gimme gimme!". Seattle voted 70% in opposition to that train of thought. Why? Different mentalities.
Also I just saw a story on the news a couple of days ago that some more possibly tainted eggs were being recalled. That's a good reason to have your own chickens. (I rarely eat eggs so don't really need to raise them).
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Yeah, never mind the fact that there is a much higher chance of obtaining salmonella tainted eggs if you grow your own/buy from a local who doesn't have the proper equipment, rather than buy them from a distributor who follows strict FDA guidelines on how they have to be treated before they are ready for sale. Let's completely overlook that little fact.
Yeah, never mind the fact that there is a much higher chance of obtaining salmonella tainted eggs if you grow your own/buy from a local who doesn't have the proper equipment, rather than buy them from a distributor who follows strict FDA guidelines on how they have to be treated before they are ready for sale. Let's completely overlook that little fact.
Yes, the same strict FDA guidelines that lead to Wright County Egg Farms failing salmonella test for years and being allowed to ship anyway.
Much like every case of food poisoning I've ever had has come from a restaurant and never my own kitchen, in my own tiny flock I control the variables for my chickens - cleanliness, exposure to contaminants, exposure to outside vectors. I know what the chickens have been eating, how they've been handled or stressed (environmental stress, according to the FDA, plays a big factor in how susceptible the birds are).
And sorry to my fellow thread posters for the thread morph into the Wonderful World of Chickens - I'll stop now.
Yes, the same strict FDA guidelines that lead to Wright County Egg Farms failing salmonella test for years and being allowed to ship anyway.
Much like every case of food poisoning I've ever had has come from a restaurant and never my own kitchen, in my own tiny flock I control the variables for my chickens - cleanliness, exposure to contaminants, exposure to outside vectors. I know what the chickens have been eating, how they've been handled or stressed (environmental stress, according to the FDA, plays a big factor in how susceptible the birds are).
And sorry to my fellow thread posters for the thread morph into the Wonderful World of Chickens - I'll stop now.
Yes, and obviously your individual anecdotal evidence completely overrides tons of large-scale scientific studies and statistical fact. More of that counter-culture.
Yes, and obviously your individual anecdotal evidence completely overrides tons of large-scale scientific studies and statistical fact. More of that counter-culture.
There are lies, damned lies, and then there are statistics...
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, salmonella enteritidis -- the strain involved in the recent outbreak -- can be on the outside or inside of perfectly normal-appearing eggs.
How does it get inside the egg? One way is when hens eat contaminated feed. The bacteria infects the ovaries of healthy appearing hens and contaminates the eggs before the shells are formed.
Salmonella can lurk on the outside of eggs when they are not properly washed. But stringent procedures for cleaning and inspecting eggs implemented in the 1970s have made salmonellosis caused by external fecal contamination of egg shells extremely rare, the CDC says.
So basically what PNWGal is saying is true. Having your own chickens, you can control the chickens, their cleanliness, buy them good feed (not the horrible stuff they feed the chickens in the egg 'factories' that contaminates the hens), and your risk of salmonella drops to just about zero. I personally buy organic eggs because I live in an apartment and wouldn't want to mess with having chickens anyway, but that way I can be assured that I am getting safer, natural, more nutritious eggs that come from chickens that are generally treated more humanely than the factory farm chickens. Same with my dairy.
Anyway, now that we've digressed this far, I'm not sure this thread can be taken seriously anymore, if it ever was...
I lived up here (Seattle) years ago as well. As someone who's lived in both cities, I can without a doubt say the two are NOT similar. They SEEM similar...on the surface. Which is why I originally moved to Portland last year. I figured it would be pretty close to Seattle in terms of experience. Boy, was I wrong. Everything seemed pretty fine at first, but the longer I stayed in PDX, the more I realized just how dissimilar the two cities are, from top to bottom. I admit, I was a bit worried upon relocating that the city would have changed significantly since I last lived here, been overrun by the same types that infest Portland. It was a sigh of relief to find that those fears were unfounded, and this city - aside from some structural changes and some new faces in the politicians' offices, is just how I left it back then.
As I've stated before in numerous other threads, Seattle is truly a "come as you are" type of town where everybody does their own thing and nobody really gets into anyone else's business. Portland is just chock full of vigilante hippies who are out to save the world, and they don't care how many of YOUR (my) rights or sensibilities they have to trounce on to do it. Portland is a city that's generally Bohemian on the fringes of popular society. Seattle is definitely a cosmopolitan type of city. To compare the two aside from geographic markers or weather is asinine.
Someone else in this thread (or one like it in this forum) summed up PDX for me pretty well the other day, when in response to someone saying they were leaving because there were too many whackos there they replied with "Good! Who would want to live in a city that has normal people in it, anyways?" or something thereabouts. Summed it up quite nicely...you have to be into counterculture to really be a good fit for PDX, and if you're not you generally are not as welcome. What was left unsaid in that post, though, was "....but we still want you to stay so you'll pay those ridiculous income taxes we levied on you because we don't wanna pay em ourselves". So openly hostile to people who are successful, yet the first ones to line up at the trough to "redistribute" the wealth of us dastardly types with "normal" personality types that had some ambition. The recent income tax votes in the respective states illustrates a substantial difference between the two perfectly. Portland voted 70% in favor of "gimme your earnings! They're mine! Pay so I don't have to! You should pay your share and mine, too! Gimme gimme gimme!". Seattle voted 70% in opposition to that train of thought. Why? Different mentalities.
Xanathos--we should just give you your own permanent thread where you can just rant about how awful Portland was during that year you lived in Beaverton...
So basically what PNWGal is saying is true. Having your own chickens, you can control the chickens, their cleanliness, buy them good feed (not the horrible stuff they feed the chickens in the egg 'factories' that contaminates the hens), and your risk of salmonella drops to just about zero. I personally buy organic eggs because I live in an apartment and wouldn't want to mess with having chickens anyway, but that way I can be assured that I am getting safer, natural, more nutritious eggs that come from chickens that are generally treated more humanely than the factory farm chickens. Same with my dairy.
Anyway, now that we've digressed this far, I'm not sure this thread can be taken seriously anymore, if it ever was...
Geez, now only if that covered the fact that, statistically, eggs from individuals result in more cases of salmonella per capita than eggs from production farms. Go ahead and dig up those statistics. Hint: It'll take you a long time, since statistically raising your own chickens results in higher rates of it.
As I've stated before in numerous other threads, Seattle is truly a "come as you are" type of town where everybody does their own thing and nobody really gets into anyone else's business. Portland is just chock full of vigilante hippies who are out to save the world, and they don't care how many of YOUR (my) rights or sensibilities they have to trounce on to do it. Portland is a city that's generally Bohemian on the fringes of popular society. Seattle is definitely a cosmopolitan type of city. To compare the two aside from geographic markers or weather is asinine.
Someone else in this thread (or one like it in this forum) summed up PDX for me pretty well the other day, when in response to someone saying they were leaving because there were too many whackos there they replied with "Good! Who would want to live in a city that has normal people in it, anyways?" or something thereabouts. Summed it up quite nicely...you have to be into counterculture to really be a good fit for PDX, and if you're not you generally are not as welcome. What was left unsaid in that post, though, was "....but we still want you to stay so you'll pay those ridiculous income taxes we levied on you because we don't wanna pay em ourselves". So openly hostile to people who are successful, yet the first ones to line up at the trough to "redistribute" the wealth of us dastardly types with "normal" personality types that had some ambition. The recent income tax votes in the respective states illustrates a substantial difference between the two perfectly. Portland voted 70% in favor of "gimme your earnings! They're mine! Pay so I don't have to! You should pay your share and mine, too! Gimme gimme gimme!". Seattle voted 70% in opposition to that train of thought. Why? Different mentalities.
But you don't live in Seattle. You live on Mercer Island. That's like moving to Beaverton or Lake Oswego and saying you live in Portland. Visit Wallingford, Ballard, Green Lake, Capitol Hill, the U District, etc... and see how different they are from Portland's neighborhoods. How many "whackos" live in those neighborhoods?
I always heard that "when in Rome, do as the Romans do". A (very) small minority of posters in this thread seem to possess a complete lack of irony in that they continue (in a Portland forum) to decry core values of PDX as "weird", "dastardly" or even "unhealthy". Leaving wasn't enough they feel compelled to associate with current residents albeit electronically and bellyache about their failure to turn Portland into a cookie cutter look and feel violation of scorched earth urban cancer clusters located elsewhere in the nation. I'm beginning to think they doth protest overmuch. True escapees of a hellhole shake the dust off their feet and do not look back. I think, however, we will be seeing at least one of these malcontents again. In the flesh.
H
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