November 22, 2009
UTNE READER

A Year in the Life of Lake Oswego, Oregon

(Page 3 of 3)

May / June 2003
Brian Doyle The American Scholar 
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White parrot found confused on Hoodview Lane.

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Winter

Front porch on Sierra Court meticulously covered with layer of marshmallow.

Teenage boy seen vomiting on State Street. Police determine that the boy and a friend were engaged in a milk-drinking contest.

Complaint: drunken teenage party. Police responding to the scene find ?an alcohol-free multicultural potluck.?

Pushy Jehovah?s Witnesses reported on Preakness Court.

Large golden retriever steals sandwich from a police officer on Monroe Parkway. Dog is last seen headed north.

Police issue a warning to three juveniles to stop posing plastic reindeer in mating positions.

I finally pop into the office of the Lake Oswego Review to find out who writes the police log. Turns out to be a young man named Scott Hammers: Alaskan native, news reporter for three years, previous job selling electric scooters. Hammers gets some 150 police reports a week and looks for serious crime first, drama second, color third. ?Most of the time I just leave the dispatcher?s language, which can be hilariously deadpan,? he told me. His all-time favorite? A duct-tape-wrapped bomb on the high school tennis courts, which turned out to be, after the police bomb squad exploded it, a pile of Penthouse magazines, scraps of which floated down all over town.

Brian Doyle, whose essay ?Leap? appeared in the Sept./Oct. 2002 issue of Utne, is the editor of Portland Magazine at the University of Portland. He is the author of two essay collections and editor of a new anthology, God Is Love: Essays from Portland Magazine (Augsburg Fortress Press). Doyle lives with his wife and three children in Lake Oswego, Oregon. Excerpted from The American Scholar (Fall 2002). Subscriptions: $25/yr. (4 issues) from Box 97269, Washington, DC 20078.

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