Portland is Sustainably Weird

You know you've landed somewhere weird when people take pictures of the airport carpet. That's just what they do in Portland.

The carpet pictured here is the new airport carpet. The one it replaced, the old carpet, was famous. Go ahead, look up Portland Airport Carpet. Among other things, it has its own Wikipedia page. 

I digress. What makes Portland weird is not the carpet. That's just the introduction to what makes Portland weird. In fact, if you were flying in to Portland from another country, the test at Customs is whether or not you take a picture of your feet on the carpet. If you don't, then you can't come in.

The last time I was at the Portland airport, I saw an emotional support duck. It was a Mallard, to be precise. It was being pushed in a dog stroller (much like this one) only instead of a dog, it was a duck. It was zipped into its stroller but I could see through the mesh. It was definitely a duck. It quacked. 

I wondered if it had been on my flight*. Or, if it had taken a different flight. Did it fly with other ducks? Were they in formation? Did they have humans, too?

Don't laugh. While ducks aren't recognized by the ADA as service animals, ducks can provide emotional support. Well, not to me. But they can to Carla Fitzgerald. She traveled with her duck, Daniel, and became an overnight sensation. 

That was a few years ago. Carla and Daniel are both older now. Maybe Daniel needs more support now than Carla. Maybe it was Daniel in the stroller.

That was weird enough. I didn't even bother to go into the city of Portland. I crossed the river into Washington. It's a little less weird there. 

To be clear, we were in Washington State, not Washington DC. 'Cuz it's really weird there!

*It was not. I checked the website for Southwest Airlines. They only allow dogs and cats on their flights. (And humans.)