Gossip That Won’t Give You H1N1.

[November 4th, 2009]

• SEX CYCLE: If our city planners have their way, Copenhagen will be the model for PDX’s urban transportation network. But Denmark’s best-known advocate for Copenhagen biking and lifestyle claimed Thursday night that “Copenhagen has no cyclists.” Say what? Speaking, along with Mayor Sam Adams, at a reception for Oregon Manifest’s Dreams on Wheels exhibit, filmmaker Mikael Colville-Andersen said that rather than the self-identified cyclists we see in the U.S., Copenhagen has people who just happen to ride bikes to get where they need to go. To Danes, a bike is merely an appliance, like a vacuum cleaner. When cities approach the bike numbers of Copenhagen, Colville-Andersen said, it transforms them into much more livable places, and even (he winked) improves the gene pool, hence his slogan: “Bicycles are a multivitamin Viagra pill for the urban landscape. ”

• BOOKWORMS: “I love being a public servant,” Oregon Attorney General John Kroger drawled at last week’s 2009 Oregon Book Awards ceremony at the Gerding Theater, as he picked up the award for Creative Nonfiction for his book Convictions: A Prosecutor’s Battles Against Mafia Killers, Drug Kingpins, and Enron Thieves, “but what I really wanted to be growing up is a writer. It’s a precious thing to have a book published.” The Stafford/Hall Award for Poetry went to Portland’s own young gun Matthew Dickman , for his book All-American Poem.

• ROUXVIVAL? Roux Inc. has applied for a liquor license for the “Lucky Labrador Tap Room” in Dwayne Beliakoff’s shuttered Cajun restaurant on North Killingsworth Street. An email to the Hawthorne Lucky Lab confirms a fourth location may be in the works for 2010.

• EXHAUST ROCK: Local whimsical pop trio Nurses has cancelled its national tour with Le Loup due to a series of health issues within the group. According to frontman Aaron Chapman, the band was simply exhausted after two months on the road and needed a break from the hectic touring lifestyle. “It’s hard to make it from city to city when you’re not feeling well,” Chapman says. Back in town, Nurses is resting and working on new material. The band has one show currently scheduled, Dec. 12 at Berbati’s Pan.

• SEW SAD: Crafty Wonderland, the show of handmade crafts at Doug Fir—voted “Best Place to Be Sew Cool” by WW—will shutter its monthly operations after this Sunday’s show (11 am-4 pm Nov. 8 at Doug Fir). CW founders Cathy Pitters and Torie Nguyen say the monthly show wasn’t paying off for the vendors. Pitters also told Scoop she and Nguyen both have families and second jobs and are “ready for a break.” They are transitioning to holding two events yearly, the Crafty Wonderland Colossal Holiday Sale on Dec. 13 and the Colossal Spring Sale, which will take place the weekend before Mother’s Day.