…if you head out to see the new Warren Miller film this season, you’ll get to see the rippin’ snow that is Bend, Central Oregon, and Mount Bachelor.

Here in Bend (and I’ve heard elsewhere as well), the Warren Miller flick at the local movie house is sort of the unofficial opening to the ski season, which if POWDR Corp. follows through on its promises, could be a good (and cheaper) one.

The Oregon primary is over, and Sen. Barack Obama (not surprisingly) won the Democratic race.

For reporters, like myself, it was incredibly stressful. In fact, afterwards I almost had to take a trip to the East Coast to give myself some rest.

The one redeeming thing about the primary season, was the opportunity it provided for me to provide some Oregon coverage to a national audience.

For NPR’s political desk, I covered the Oregon senate race for Morning Edition. And then this week, for the national desk, I got to report on a spate of Oregon political resignations for All Things Considered.

The especially fun part of both of those stories, were they were my first appearance on each show. As a professional aside, each new show a reporter can appear on is looked as an accomplishment.

For one thing, there are a lot of Ugg boots, for another a lot shady real estate and investment deals.

But my favorite parallel is the lifestyle magazines in both places:

Bend Living and Newport Living.

(For the Bend media-niks out there, the subhed to this post is: ‘Kevin Max and Julie Cooper — separated at birth?’)

Oregon Considered, the local news show for which I’ve been filing most of my OPB feature stories since July, will be canceled at the end of the month.

As a reporter who wants to get on air, you’d think I’d dislike the decision. But, as a reporter, I also like it when people hear my stuff. And not enough people listen to local-only news anymore. They will listen to local+national, and thats the model we’re going for now.

WNYC, New York’s NPR station, and KPCC, LA’s big NPR news station, went to this model a few years ago, and it has been both successful and well-liked. So I think we’ll see how people really feel about the switch in a couple months.

The New York Times only seems to report a story on Oregon when its about how “funky” we are. Look at us with our cute spotted owls, our assisted suicides, and our bikes.

At least this week’s bike story focuses on some actual, tangible numbers. But you’d still wish the Times had mentioned the recent deaths of bicyclists (and the controversy surrounding it).

Okay, so I’ve been on the air for about four months now, rocking the Oregon airwaves. Also done a bunch of national stuff.

And feel like I am still getting up to working and filing multiple stories a day. Still, I do have some favorites thus far.

Without further ado:

Portland’s major daily newspaper, The Oregonian, has been losing circulation in Portland ever since the NY Times went national and started morning deliveries in the city. (Obviously, most papers have seen those same declines — and not because of the old, “Gray Lady” — but its probably most felt in well-educated Democrat-heavy cities like Portland).

Its coverage is sometimes thin, and doesn’t have the resources necessary to cover the international and national news without mostly relying on wire stories.

But this week was especially bad for the newspaper.

First off, it angered thousands of its readers when it endorsed Republican gubernatorial candidate Ron Saxton.

And then the New York Times reported on a controvery brewing at Macy’s, that all the local TV stations went with, but the Oregonian dropped the ball.

And Times’ reporter Andrew Adam Newman made a point of the Oregonian’s lack of coverage.

Especially considering it ran an ad for the department store — and it’s back-to-school clothing, which as you see in the picture to the right, wasn’t entirely “age appropriate.”

…ran today.

Its my first non-tech feature in a while, on how politicians are using films to create public policy change.

The close-up in today’s story is health care reform, and Oregon’s former governor, John Kitzhaber.

I actually travelled to Portland to interview him — and I also talked to several other politicians and activists doing similar things. Including Robert Greenwald, the director and producer of those guerilla documentaries for progressives.

UO-Camp-11

Originally uploaded by Sbocaj.

Ahhh, the beautiful power of the Internet. I stumbled upon a former an old friend’s flickr page, where he has posted photos from when I was a counselor at…wait for it….Computer Camp.

Here I am, at karaoke night.

Remind me again why everyone doesn’t live in Portland?