This past weekend was my birthday. My partner and I celebrated by camping at Cape Lookout on the Oregon coast. We had dinner at Willy’s in Oceanside. Run by a husband and wife team they serve Japanese comfort food in a beach town nestled on a cliffside. The Oregon coast is an unbelievably special place to me. It feels otherworldly. It is one of my most expected pleasures since moving to the state. Wide, often empty beaches, shrouds of mists crawling over groves of pine. The chance at glimpses of sea lions or even whales. My favorite moment was our sunset campfire on the beach. When the sun finally fell beneath the horizon the distant dots of other camp fires were the only indication you weren’t utterly alone in the emptiness. Things I liked this week From Things to Click, “Ghost Words, Part 6." A list of haunted words. My favorite: Ghost Newspapers: “Most towns still have a local newspaper, but they don’t cover their communities any more.” From Tent, “how do you tell the difference between a jetty, pier, quay and wharf?" I understood this list of words at best as “descriptors of areas near the water” and have dutifully avoided using them without having been prompted by someone else’s usage. This post cleverly lays them our in a memorable way. From the Port of Hood River (email received), “EMERGENCY BRIDGE CLOSURE” From Behind the Bastards, “The Origins of Terror in Palestine” (parts 1 and 2) Robert Evans' podcast is usually focused on a single bastard. This two parter, where he is joined by Palestinian political scientist and author Dr. Dana al-Kurd, instead explores the origins of terror in Palestine.