Update-A-Matey!

I'm back. Phew! That's right, after what seems like the longest hiatus ever (though I know it's not) I am back in business. Blogville, Blogchestertonfieldville. And I'm the mayor. Or I'm on the city council or something. Whatever.

Anyway, there are a few updates I care to share. These are some big ones so brace yourselves. My boss quit. Yes, I told you that she would be quitting, and she did. Wait - I should reread the last post - maybe she'd already quit when I wrote last. It doesn't matter, I've now officially had two weeks of work without my boss and it's been insane. I've recited Philippians 4:13 so much to myself I might as well get it tattooed on my forehead. As I mentioned previously, our fiscal year ended September 30th. This means that all the museums are sending us thick packets of gift forms to record in our system, more than we get at any other time of year besides December 30th. Marlene and I have done pretty well holding down the fort, I think, but it's hard not having my boss around to bounce ideas off of or go to with pesky questions that need answers immediately. Now I have to go to her boss and he doesn't always know what I'm talking about. All in all, it could be worse. I haven't drowned in all the paperwork yet, and the only impending moment of possible doom I can see on the horizon will be when we do fiscal year reports. Don't worry, the old boss is coming back around to guide us through the process. But what about next month when she's not around? It takes forever to hire people around here so I'm sure my co-worker and I are going to have to do reports by our lonesome at least until the new year. At least. Yipes.

Big change #2: 925 house will be disbanded by the end of the year. Yes, my landlord and the building contractor worked out a deal. He got the permit from the county to build two houses on the 925 lot and he will be purchasing the house from my landlord. For those of you who never got to see the house, I couldn't be more sorry. It was magnificent. The last person who will ever get to see 925 intact will be my friend Michelle who's coming to visit this weekend. The rest of you will just have to look at pictures from my previous posts and mourn the loss of the thing you didn't know was as awesome as it was. That's right, MOURN. I sure am. So now comes the big annoying part of it all - moving. Gotta find a new place. Gotta move into that new place. Have 90 days to do so. And oh my goodness do I HATE moving. Yes, I used the "H" word and I meant it! But whatever, I'm sure we'll find a great new place to live and we'll make it just as much a home as 925 ever was. Oh horse apples...I forgot about the basement and how much junk is down there that doesn't belong to a single roommate here. All the old ones moved out and left their stuff. Yard sale!

So those are the two big things going on. I'd been planning on doing some job searching and option-looking, but that's all on the back burner right now. Things just got a little too crazy for me to focus on anything else. Except, of course, Fall.

That's right, I focus on Fall because it's awesome. It's finally sweater weather around here and at night we have the heat on. Granted, it's on pretty low but it's still on. I bought a pair of house shoes this weekend. And they're amazing. So, how have I celebrated Fall?

First off, I had a three day weekend this past weekend. Miraculous. Turns out Columbus was kind of a meany and not very culturally sensitive, but at least I got a day off because of him. Thanks, man. Remember the roommate I replaced? Kate? Well she was in town this weekend. And when company arrives, you gotta pull out the big guns. So the 925 girls flew into a Fall frenzy. On Saturday morning we all breakfasted together and then drove off to Breaux Vineyards in Somewhere, VA. Loudon County, I think. LoCo. Anyway, we tasted some wines, feasted on gumbo, baguettes and cheese, and listened to a homegrown band play songs everyone but me seemed to know. It was fun. Then we zipped over to Crooked Run Orchards for some good old fashioned apple and pumpkin picking. We saw people making apple butter, we tried our hand at "Guess-That-Carcass" and I got nothing right. We climbed apple trees and ate the fruit right off the tree. I constantly wanted to burst out into "People Will Say We're In Love" from Oklahoma, but I resisted. That would have been weird.

The rest of the weekend was pretty relaxing. We're trying to figure out what to do with the ungodly amount of apples we have in our kitchen. Kristen and I made a crostata on Sunday, but that only got rid of four apples. I probably need to make about 3 apple pies and that will take care of it. But that sounds like something I really don't want to do. Too bad I don't have a juicer. This is the one time of year I'd use it. Anyway, I'll let you know what other apple thingies I make - or not - before the apples rot.

So there's that! Oh, yesterday I went to the Foundation Center offices downtown to take a "Proposal Writing Basics" class. It was informative. I learned what constitutes a grant proposal and how much time and effort it takes to write one. Juuuuuuuust great. Maybe someday I'll get the chance. Oh, you want to know how I've lived here for about a year and a half and don't know this city at all? I was supposed to exit at Farragut West yesterday, NOT Foggy Bottom. The metro stops are right next to each other, and I was to take the Farragut West stop. Right? Then why did I get off at Foggy Bottom? And why when I got to the street level did I wonder why I was at 23rd and Eye St. instead of 17th and Eye St.? Yup, I walked the blocks to 17th and Eye so that I could slip into the back row of the class about 5 minutes late. Horse apples!!!

Anyway, here's what's to come: my roommates and me looking for a new house, my boss-bosses hopefully hiring me a new boss (no, I do not want that job, ever), me convincing myself that it's not too cold to walk the 5 minutes to the gym so I can keep in shape as it gets colder and colder every day. I just got a flyer from the Washington Ballet letting me know I could get half price Nutcracker tickets right now. So, naturally, I'm already excited about the holidays. But for now, I'm enjoying Fall. And that's your update, matey!

"Hands On The Wall" Project

I had quite a busy weekend. This should come as a shock to those of you who know me well. A busy weekend for me generally means getting out of the house once to go to church or the store or something. It generally does NOT mean trying new restaurants, checking out the night life in my neighborhood, touring Virginia wine country, traipsing around the Tidal Basin with my camera for a house project or taking a rug someone threw out on the street. However, this past weekend I did all those things. Who am I?

This past week was Restaurant Week in DC. Participating eateries establish prix fix menus and the foodies and non-foodies alike flock to these places to sample the city's finest. Friday night, a couple roommates and I headed to Dupont Circle to try out Firefly. Deeeelish! I had some superb heirloom tomato gazpacho, a delectable wild mushroom and summer squash casserole, and finished the meal with a perfectly sweet apple brown betty. After eating such a good dinner we girls couldn't really sit on our laurels and waste a happy stomach, so we went back to Clarendon and made friends with strangers who'd also decided to take advantage of Arlington nightlife. I have to tell you, going out after 10pm makes for some fascinating people watching. Plus, I'm getting too old for this stuff. I can't remember the last time I stayed out till 4 in the morning. I'm not 17 anymore. (Disclaimer - that was a joke. I meant to say I'm not 13 anymore.)

Saturday. We got a late start. Surprised? Don't give me any cheek. Well, we did get a late start on our drive out to Leesburg, VA, to visit some Loudon County (Lo.Co.) wineries. Our first stop was to my roomie B's mother ship, her childhood home. We met her mom, got some fresh veggies and zucchini bread to take home and headed off to Lo.Co. First stop, Fabbioli Cellars. Second stop, Lost Creek Winery. Last stop, Tarara Winery. Lost Creek was my least favorite, just so you know. The other two were great and I recommend them to a friend. Anyway, on to the most important stuff - the post winery Leesburg/Lucketts tour. Immediately after we left Tarara we stopped by a cluster of antiques stores that were just to die for. The furniture was unique, the shabby chic was fabulous and the prices were not astronomical. So I totally splurged and bought this wooden frame. You antiquers know what I'm talking about - you don't NEED it but you'll most definitely find a good use for it in your house...or in the future house of your dreams. Who needs a reason to buy a good antique? Am I right or am I right?

Anyway, we finished up the Lo.Co. tour with a stop at Farmer Johns, a local farmers market with the best fruit, vegetables and homemade sauces around. Farmer John was there and we chatted him up for a while. We got back to Clarendon about 7 or 7:30 and decided the night was still young. Sure, we were exhausted but we'd already had a weekend's worth of spontaneous adventures and that just didn't happen to be enough. We were determined to have a good meal, go pick up a movie and spend the rest of the night lying around. Um...yeahhhhh.

We had dinner, alright. But then as we were walking to the Hollywood Video in Courthouse we passed Velocity Five, this "sports restaurant" with an outdoor dining area. We had already walked past the entrance when we heard the strains of a singer/songwriter strumming away on his guitar. We walked a little closer. Yup, definitely good. Okay, we walked back to the entrance and went inside for a little listen. This guy was good. Jason Masi is his name. We sang along to "Sweet Caroline (Bum Bum Bummmm!!)", chatted him up after his set and finally went to the video store to pick up the classic Cher movie Mermaids. But our night didn't end there. As we were walking back we passed by this Irish pub that usually has a good guitar player slash singer on the weekends. We were in the mood for music, so we ended up going there for a couple hours, listening to a guy named Damien Wolf (?) do his thing and chatting up the locals. No, we never watched the movie. I can't guarantee we'll watch it before it must be returned on Thursday. Oops!

So that was Saturday. Sunday dawned bright and early and I headed to the movie theater for church :). The kids were just wild. I didn't really help calm them down so much as I was giving horsey rides and flipping them around in the air and generally making them scream so loudly that I had to tell them that I was the "quiet monster". I might have holes in my jeans from chasing 3 year-olds on my hands and knees for so long. Sunday afternoon I returned to my domicile eager to change into my comfy clothes and read all day long - maybe in my bed, maybe on the couch or maybe on the back porch. None of the above were to be had, good people. Kristen came home and we went to check out the newest boutique in the neighborhood, Current. It's a chic consignment shop that has my name written all over it. I didn't purchase anything but rest assured that I will be back there with cash in hand as soon as possible.

Anyhoo, on our return we decided that it was time to do little DIY decorating. (Shout out to Laurel.) Above the couch in our living room are five hanging frames. Before last night, in each of the frames was a portrait of an original 925 roommate wearing Groucho Marx glasses. This would be great except for the fact that only two of those original roommates still occupy the house. We'd been talking about replacing the pictures with something else for a while and yesterday we finally did. Our first idea was to take pictures of cool buildings/monuments in DC and replace the portraits with architectural shots. However, Kristen came up with an even better plan. We decided to do a "Hands On The Wall" project. We went down to the Tidal Basin area and walked around to all the top monuments featuring statues. We took shots of the hands of these statues at various angles and used those shots above our couch to make the coolest pictures-above-the-couch thing ever. Here's a sampling of the 200+ pictures we took.

George Mason Memorial

Thomas Jefferson Memorial

FDR Memorial - Eleanor Roosevelt

FDR Memorial

Korean War Veterans Memorial

Lincoln Memorial

The Three Soldiers Statue

(These men overlook the Vietnam Wall - legend has it that they are ghosts, returning to the wall to see which of their comrades has died.)

Vietnam Women's Memorial

Albert Einstein Memorial - National Academy of Sciences

Iwo Jima Memorial

The lighting wasn't great for the final memorial we visited, Iwo Jima, but we got some good shots and the top five ended up on our wall. The winners are (from Left): FDR, Eleanor, 3 Soldiers, Albert and George Mason. I supplied FDR and George, Kristen captured the rest so those pictures aren't on my blog.

Final "Hands On The Wall"

There's another story within this photo project story that involves a rug. Here it is...

Kristen and I walked to Walgreen's at 9:30pm last night so we could pick up our prints for the frames. (We'd already sent them to be printed via the magnificent Internet.) Anyway, on our way to the store we noticed a rug rolled up outside a home. Kristen said, "Do you want this?" I said, "Sure, if you do." We took a look at it and determined that if it was still there on our walk back to the house we'd take it home with us.

It was there. So we carried a rolled up rug down the street towards our house. We even made some new friends out of the deal. It's hard not to draw attention to oneself when one is carrying a giant rug down the street at 10pm at night, after all. Anyway, our plan is to clean up this rug and put it in our living room. With that AND the "Hands On The Wall" wall, our living room will be complete! Huzzah!

Rug we got on the way to Wallgreen's

So there you have it, folks. That was my weekend. In fact, I'm exhausted just thinking about it. It was a blast, all in all. New faces, new places, new food, new friends. Glorious. Now it's Monday and I'm left with the happy memories of a weekend well spent. It's a good way to start the week :).

Violin Nation, President: not me so much

Greetings, travelers. Welcome to the oasis. Parched? Have a tall glass of...I really really really should have practiced more last week! Blerg. Just yesterday I participated in the season opener for the Washington Metropolitan Philharmonic. My performance was, well, less than thrilling. The same cannot be said, however, for my colleagues and peers. Cheers to the WMP! We had a solid first concert, accompanied by chorus. And with the added fan base of the chorus, we even had a solid audience, too. In fact, my weekend was bookended by some great music. Listen well, children, and I will tell you the tale...

The other day, my roomie Kristen and I were walking through a neighborhood park close to 925. We saw, on a telephone pole, a flyer for a FREE chamber music concert performed by the IBIS (I still don't know what that stands for) at the Lyon Park Community Center. The flyer assured us that the theme of the evening was "movie music", and you should know that I can never, ever turn down an opportunity to hear movie music. That settled it. We had plans for Friday night. When Friday came around I skipped merrily home from the metro. No, that's a lie. I would never skip home. How embarrassing. I walked home with a bit of spring to my step, delighted that the weekend was nigh and the temperature was high. Nope, lied again. The temperature was not high, it was more like perfection. We'll say 70s. Soooo, I entered my house, sorted the mail, walked up the stairs with my mail in hand, passed through my doorway and immediately plopped down in front of my new computer.

Here's a side note: I got a new computer. Yes, friends. I am the new owner of Laurel's technologically delicious Mac Mini. It sits primly on a ghetto black coffee table in my room, and it works like a dream. I received the highly anticipated computer package the previous day (Thursday) so I was still working on personalizing it and getting all my settings adjusted to my liking. Oh, I'll have you know that I set it up all by myself. I'm no slouch.

That being said, I spent a bit of time playing on the computer before I took off with Kristen to run some errands before the concert. I would just like to say that every time I drive around Arlington and the Pentagon and the Potomac it just renews my excitement for living in DC. We were just running an errand to Pentagon City and there was the Air Force Memorial, piercing the evening sky. That's probably my favorite memorial, by the way. It's so cool. Anyway, I saw that magnificent feat of engineering on my way to Costco. Costco is not a magnificent feat of engineering. It's more like a magnificent setting for organized chaos. It brought back so many memories of shopping with the 'rents at Sam's Club. Good times, good childhood. Okay, so after some errand running, Kristen and I stopped to pick up some dinner at Noodles & Co. (don't tell my P90X coach) before heading to the community center. We didn't think it would be a good idea to eat our smelly pasta dinners in the community center, so we sat at a picnic table in the park right outside and scarfed down our meals in the dark. We walked into the community center, found a seat near the back, and were promptly transported to a dream world of magic. Well, I certainly was.

IBIS is made up of 6 musicians: a string quartet, flutist, and harpist. All the musicians are employed either by the Kennedy Center Opera Orchestra or the Boston Esplanade POPS, or something like that. They're all professionals - that's the point. I heard a violin duo piece, string quartet pieces, a flute/harp duo, a harp solo (lovely piece by John Williams from Angela's Ashes), and a quintet arrangement of Mischief Managed from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, also by John Williams. I LOVE JOHN WILLIAMS! Ahem. Anyway, it was great. It was free, it was musically sound, and it was creative. Me likey.

The rest of Friday night and Saturday passed in a blur of sleep, movie watching, computer playing-onning, and birthday partying. Sunday I arose for my first WMP orchestra. No, I wasn't nervous. I was too sleepy to be nervous. Plus, I sit at the back of the second violins. Not too much pressure there. However, I am pleased to announce that we had a good first show. The violins were a wee bit skimpy, seeing as how we were missing two of our first violins (that's what happens with a volunteer community orchestra), but we pulled it off. I heard nothing but good things from the audience members. The Hymn of Praise for chorus and orchestra, written by F. Mendelssohn, was really lovely. It's murder on the violinists to play. We have practically no breaks and consistent brush strokey 8th notes for pages on end. It's very exhausting. But I made it, sleep deprived as I was. And we get a second chance to make it even better when we perform the show again this coming Sunday. The WMP's season is comprised of 5 different programs. Each show is performed twice, once in Alexandria, VA, and once in DC. So this Sunday is the DC Sunday. After that, it's back to rehearsals for our Christmas concert. My favie! :) I mean, just yesterday I was making sure that all my Christmas CD's are in iTunes to make for the best Christmas playlist this town's ever seen.

By the way, it is very difficult to rebuild one's playlist when one's iPod has gone to iPod heaven. Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if my iPod was in purgatory with as much trouble as it gave me at the end of its life. I had some great music I'd downloaded from my brother and sister's computer and now it's all gone cause I never had the songs in my own song arsenal. Fool of a Took! Oh well, I'll build it back up again. No worries. That's what the iTunes store is for.

So that's that. I'm enjoying my new computer. Trying to find a Mac compatible webcam + mic so I can Skype my sister like it's my job. Oh, and I did get a call from the Alexandria, KY Police Department. "Oh, sorry about that. You can just disregard that citation. It shouldn't have even been mailed to you. Our systems were down that day so the officer wasn't able to verify the license plate at the time." All one big misunderstanding, folks. Happens to the best of us.

So this week I'm holding down the fort at the office, preparing myself to be a stellar volunteer at the Smithsonian's national board meeting this Thursday and Friday, and trying to finish my book for book club next week. Cheers, y'all!

Three-day Weekend

Yesterday I stayed in my pajamas all day. All day long I was in my pj's. Yesterday was Saturday, today is Sunday, and tomorrow...is Columbus Day. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Columbus for discovering land that eventually became this country. Without his dedication and hard work, I wouldn't have a holiday from work tomorrow. Boy am I glad for good ol' C.C. and his 1492 greatness.

As you might have guessed based on previous posts, I've had a fairly busy summer and fall. I've spent my time getting adjusted to life in DC/Arlington, and I've been fortunate enough to see some friends and family in the short time I've been here. Well, what with all the social activity I've had (cut to me, tooting my own horn) I needed a nice long weekend of doing nothing. What a delight it was yesterday to stay in bed all day, reading a book and watching movies and episodes of Friends. Oh, and occasionally going downstairs to get a chocolate chip cookie from the kitchen. But I'm getting a bit ahead of myself. I'll start with Friday.

My boss made my day on Friday when she told me I could slip out of the office early to start the weekend. I left at 4, much to my delight. I took the metro to Clarendon and realized I had enough time to stop by the post office before it closed. I'd planned to run this errand on Saturday, but since I was already out I figured I'd get it taken care of. I walked to the post office, crossing my fingers and hoping that the certified mail I was picking up was my stimulus check from the IRS. (The first one they sent me got lost in the mail during my move.) I walk up to the window and wait quite patiently as an employee rummaged through the postage bin. I opened the letter she presented me with, a bit surprised to see the return address, "Alexandria, KY, Police Department." According to the APD, I owe $50 for a parking citation I incurred on August 16th when I parked my green Dodge Dakota in a no-parking zone. Hmmmm. I definitely do not, nor have I ever, driven a green Doge Dakota. For my entire driver's life I've had my trusty little black Nissan Sentra. Also, I was not, nor have I ever been, in Alexandria, KY. Ever. I certainly wasn't there on August 16th. I was in DC. In a polite panic, I left a couple messages on various voicemails begging the administration in the police department to call me about this erroneous parking ticket. Bah! I anticipate that these good government people will have Columbus Day off, as I do, so hopefully Tuesday will be the day of reckoning when I take the Alexandria PD to task for its grave mistake.

The rest of Friday was peaceful. I watered the mums, I went through the mail, ate a giant homemade chocolate chip cookie and watched the series premiere of The Starter Wife. Brilliant! So then Saturday came along. I finished "The Sweet Far Thing" and was terribly disappointed by a cheap ending to an otherwise entertaining literary trilogy. I watched "Caramel" and was surprised at the mixture of Lebanese and French the characters spoke. Don't even ask me what I did with the rest of my day. I have no idea. But it was awesome.

Today I had orchestra rehearsal. We rehearsed with the chorus for the first time ever, and our first concert is a week from today. Yipes! It was a good rehearsal, though. Mendelssohn's Lobesgang (or something like that) is a really nice piece, though dreadfully long. My arms are aching by midway through. We had so much to go through today that we only had about a 7 minute break during our 3 hour rehearsal. Now that works out the arms. I came home from orchestra, and did what I normally do on Sunday nights: I got something to eat, talked to my roommates for a little bit and then put my last load of laundry in the dryer. I came upstairs and started preparing for slumber when I realized that I really don't have to do that. I get to sleep in AGAIN! Mwaaaaaahaahhahahahaha! So here I am at 11:30 on a Sunday night, still awake. Shocking, I know.

Tomorrow is supposed to be a beautiful day and I intend to take advantage of it. I might play some horrible tennis, maybe I'll go for a walk. There is this great island called Roosevelt Island (I think) on the Potomac River - it's a great place to go for a nature walk and enjoy the fresh air. Remind me to take you there when you visit. Anyway, there are numerous possibilities and I will explore all the options. Weee!

For those of you who don't have a 3-day weekend...sorry for your loss. For the rest of you, I wish you the best in all your endeavors. Hopefully they'll be as fun as mine. HA!

Labor Day Weekend

Virginia Beach. Oh the sand, the surf...and the seaweed. Kid you not, even yesterday I was brushing the stuff out of my hair. Not awesome. Nonetheless, I was one of the lucky few--er, lucky thousands--who got to spend the holiday weekend at the beach with friends.

The two young ladies you see with me traveled from Lexington to VA Beach to run the RocknRoll VA Beach 1/2 Marathon. Sadly, Julia (right) broke her foot and couldn't participate. So she and I cheered on Elissa (center...oh wait, nope) and Julia's brother (far left, no, farther, no, farther), who ran in her stead. I met up with my old pals to hang out with Julia's family in Portsmouth, VA and enjoy the ocean.

Julia's brother, sister-in-law, and two nephews live about 35 minutes away from the beach, so I got to have a nice pleasant weekend without having to be smack on the dirty shores all the time. No offense! I got to play trains, cars, eat good home cooked meals, play bounce-the-ball-off-my-bum with 4 yr. old kids in the park (their idea, not mine) and take relaxing neighborhood walks. I watched a little Thomas the Train (or is it Thomas the Tank Engine?), a little Ocean's 11, and some Knight's Tale. Eclectic, no?

I had a great time catching up with my buddies from Lexington. I got some good sun. Oh, and I attempted the art of body surfing. By day 2, I became fairly adept. I'm guessing that's why the seaweed stayed with me for so long. The icing on the cake was cheering those dedicated marathoning souls who push their bodies to the limit for the glory of my praise. No, that wasn't it. Oh right - they got free foot massages afterward.

The beach was super crowded, but it was still great to be in the ocean again. I haven't had much opportunity to play mermaid in my life, but I still have a heart for the sea, matey. I'm going to credit my Trinidadian roots with that one. The water was cold, but after several squeals and wave splashes my friends and I were comfortable enough to swim out to the best body surfing waves. For those of you who don't know, when you body surf you have to wait for a good wave to come up right behind you. Then, right before it breaks, you start swimming away from it. The wave chases you, if you will. If you've timed it right, you only have to take a couple strokes, the wave breaks, and the current carries you to shore. Now, this can be a problem when it carries you so far that your hands and elbows are scraping the bottom of the ocean and your suit bottoms are filling with sand. Don't worry, those minor details don't dampen the spirits of the true Oceanites. Yeah, I made it a word.

It's been hard to come back to work this week, actually, because I had so much fun away from it. It wasn't too difficult to get back in the sleep routine that I keep during the week, fortunately. I credit a 2.5-year-old and 1-year-old boy with that. Their hours were pretty much 8-7 every night, so my hours were about 9:30-7. Hey, not my usual vacation/weekend schedule but it gave me enough time during the day to really enjoy the sunshine. Were I to have practiced my normal routine, I would have been sleeping between the hours of 1am and Noon. Quite fun, I assure you, but not the best when you're wanting prime beach hours and sunlight. In short, I couldn't have planned a better weekend.

Now it's almost another weekend and I'm trying to figure out how productive I'll be. I've put off getting my VA license for 3 months, so I should probably do that. Uh huh, grocery shopping, post office...prolly should get a haircut. Just talk to me next week. I guarantee you I'll have only read, slept, ate and watched movies all weekend. I love my life.