The Bad Karma News. All Newspapers Should Have The Same Name.

The Bad Karma News in Portland, Oregon Portland's Most Unusual Newspaper Extraordinaire Lex Loeb Contributor Network . The Bad Karma News appeared in a news rack on the streets of Portland as many as ten years ago. I am not sure how long it has been out there. It used to be a shocking orange news paper vending machine and it popped up in various locations around town. Now after a number of years in service it has become old and gray. It now seems to be a semi permanent fixture on NW 23rd street at Hoyt Street on the corner. Every time I pass by , if i have a quarter, I deposit it and take an item from inside. You never know what is going to be inside. Once I found a banana peel being bayoneted by a plastic toy soldier. Definitely worth a quarter but I would have had to freeze it to keep it longer than a few days since the banana peel was not made of plastic. Another time I found old penny postcards mailed more than half a century ago . Once I found gold and silver rings in there A bargain for a quarter. Most of the objects are containers containing Karma, Evil eyes in captivity, "your after life," reality decoders, old family photographs, old toys, bags of glittery stuff and the unpredictable, like "your very own planets.' For a while I wondered how any of this stuff inside the box could be a newspaper? Just because it's stashed in a newspaper vending machine does not make it a newspaper? A waitress across the street explained it to me. Its Bad Karma news because objects themselves can be news as much as a piece of printed paper. I recently got a "your very own planet" out for 25 cents and indeed the package does contain a small spherical object. It could definitely be a planet if launched into the appropriate orbit -so I guess that is a form of news. Physical object news is what it is. It is not all concrete representation of thing being thing as many of the objects are quite abstract like a 'reality decoder" If I did not put 25 cents into Bad karma News I would not have my reality decoder. Thanks to my purchase I now know what is reality and what is not. It may not tell me if something is real or not but it does decode reality, says so on the label. That is sort of like a "real" newspaper. Most newspapers do not have reality decoding labels but all they do in reality is act as reality decoders. They call it "spin" on fox TV as they spin their own on air reality. At least mine came from the Bad Karma News. Unlike the ordinary newspaper my bad karma news always stays fresh and new. If you happen to be on NW 23rd Street in Portland Look for the Bad Karma News at the intersection of Hoyt, deposit your quarters per item unless you want free bad karma and make your own discoveries., get your after life, Get a box of good, bad or nice Karma, Or grab some McDonald's happy meal toy , a dvd, or one of the stuffed animals often found in the box and live without with guilt for not paying 25 cents if that;'s the way you like it. Bad Karma News has a small but growing fan club. Some days there is a line of people waiting to deposit their quarters , usually at lunch hour,. Some tell me that they just deposit quarters when they pass by to prevent bad karma from stalking them. The machine does not promise anything. It is all open to interpretation. I keep expanding my collections from it. I now have 10 after lives of various forms, one planet of my very own, a reality decoder, and miscellaneous random stuff. Maybe some day I will meet someone who has their own afterlives ready to exchange for one or more of mine? NW 23rd street has increasingly become high end boutique row shopping street. Bad Karma News fits in well as it offers shoppers after live for just 25 cents--That is a wonderful counterpoint to the shi shi materialist shops on the street. More places in Portland and more cities world wide need Bad Karma news to keep up with demand for all things karma. .