Tag Archive: Portlandia


AVERAGE JOE ON THE RAW  directed by Daniel Hayhurst (USA, 2013)

At the age of 30, Seth Hayhurst was beginning to show the onset of middle age spread but could not by any stretch of the imagination be called obese.

Actually, you would say that he looked in pretty good physical shape. Mentally, however, was another story.

He’d gone through a messy divorce and ,although now in a good relationship, he realized he had ‘anger issues’  and attitude problems that needed to be addressed.  He declares that he wanted “to be shiny again”.

Above all, he felt his life was slipping into a mundane pattern in which he was destined to become just another average American with declining health and lower energy levels.

In the introduction to this documentary, directed by his brother Daniel, he says: “I looked in the mirror and saw complacency. I saw a man settling into normalcy ……so, I could just fall in line with the rest of the people on the assembly line of commonplace OR ….. I could make a push at my limitless potential. I could try to reset my intelligently designed body to heal itself!” 

 His radical solution is to ditch fatty meat orientated fast foods and embark on a 60 day raw vegan diet. Seeing how others who ate like this looked vibrant and alive convinced him that this was the life changing, clean living alternative he was looking for.

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THIS CHARMING MANN

Aimee MannAimee Mann has a new album out. It’s called Charmer and it’s rather charming.

In my review for Whisperin’ & Hollerin’ (which you can read here) I wrote : “I get the impression that if you invited her to your home, you’d soon find her looking for what you’ve swept under the carpet and searching for skeletons in the closet”. 

Perhaps this same thought occurred to the writers of Portlandia since they cast her in the role of a cleaning lady in this sketch:

A SONG FOR PORTLAND

Portlandia

Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein – helping to  keep Portland weird.

My first visit to USA two years ago was to Portland, Oregon. It’s taken a while but I’ve finally caught up with episode 1 of the sketch comedy series Portlandia which was in production at the time of my visit and was first aired in January 2011.

I love the opening song which celebrates the fact that this is an “alternative universe”  where the dream of the 90s is alive and Bush never happened. It’s also “where young people go to retire”, “where all the hot girls where glasses” and where people still go to clown schools as a career move.

I’m hooked already  and it makes me want to go back now to this amazing place.