Gossip Should Have No Friends

[February 14th, 2007] CAFFEINE BUZZ The throngs of Albina Press coffee addicts may no longer have to make the trek deep into North Portland to get their fix. Owners Kevin Fuller and Pacific Northwest Barista Champion Billy Wilson are casing a new joint on upper Hawthorne and are hoping to sign a lease in the next couple of weeks, says Fuller. Good news for the neighborhood—unless you happen to own a coffee shop that isn't Stumptown or Fresh Pot.

STICK IT TO 'EM James Bernard Frost , Portland author of the new novel World Leader Pretend, is afraid you'll judge his book by its cover. So he hired sticker artist Dave Warnke to create a new one for him. Here's the story: While Frost, a former Wired writer, was away on vacation last summer, his publisher, St. Martin's Press, came up with a cover he didn't like. When the company wouldn't make him a new one, he did it himself. Frost says his new cover's better because "it's customizable, you can Magic Marker it; it's waterproof." Sure, Frost realizes he might be biting the hand that feeds him, but he says he's not trying to stick it to his publisher. "The book is about how the Internet has simultaneously connected us with more people, and made us more disconnected with people," he explains. And the mix-up with the cover art is a prime example of just that, according to Frost, because most of his communication with his editor was via email. Nab a free cover sticker from Frost during his reading at Powell's on Monday, Feb. 26, or visit jamesbernardfrost.com to see both covers. 

EDIBLE COMPLEX Local Pamela Springfield is a sucker for a compelling, curious name. Owner of vintage clothier Keep 'Em Flying (510 NW 21st St.), named for a campaign in World War II to solicit clothing donations, Springfield is opening a gallery of sorts named Cannibals next door to her shop come March. Springfield says the shop, whose name is derived from the act of cannibalizing (reusing parts of one thing to create another), will be an "untraditional retail gallery giving people the opportunity to buy art without having to be strangled by what it will cost them." She stresses the idea that "if it's a beautiful thing" she's willing to show it, imperfections and all. Look forward to seeing "corsets fashioned out of vintage coats, clocks constructed from old pieces of linoleum and large outdoor garden sculptures re-imagined from automotive parts. Mmmm...Cannibals sounds tasty.

BODY OF WORK Is creepy sexy? Judge for yourself as a mermaid demon shares a catwalk with a fleshy re-creation of a 1967 Playboy cover this Sunday, Feb. 18, at the newly formed Music Art Resource Collective's benefit body art show (Liberty Hall, 311 N Ivy St., 249-8888. 7 pm doors, 9 pm show. $12 with vegan dinner, $6 without. All ages). For more info on a few of the dozen artists and their, er, bodies of work—as well as photos of local horror makeup artist Cody Reuwsaat trying to scare the bejesus outta you—check out a full preview at wweek.com.