Day 101/365 - The Raveonettes at the Black Cat

Tonight Pia and I caught The Raveonettes concert at the Black Cat. The Raveonettes are a ? four-piece band (three women and one man) who play moody, slightly dangerous-sounding rock and roll with an early 1960s vibe to it. I love the distinctly unpolished, decidedly unglamorous nature of the Black Cat. It looks exactly like what it is – a no frills rock and roll club. Pia had never been there before and she said when we went inside that it didn’t even seem like we were in DC anymore. She said it felt more like Philly in there.

The crowd was mostly 30 and 40 year-olds and took a while to trickle in. Pia and I got there when the doors opened, so we were able to snag a seat at one of the very few tables at the back of the room. It was a good thing too because it took forever for The Raveonettes to come onstage. The opening act was a band called Nickel Eye, which took me a while to figure out was probably done to sound like “Nikolai.” They were so-so. They had some good numbers and some mediocre numbers and had a bit of an 80s feel to their sound.

When The Raveonettes finally came onstage Pia and I moved down to the floor to get closer to the action. They played a great set, very lively and earnest with the kind of thumping rock you can feel in your chest. It was a rather short gig, though, and Pia was bummed they didn’t play her favorite song of theirs. Oh well, maybe they’ll play it the next time they come to town.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 100/365 - Brrrrrr!

No more grumbling from me about it not feeling like winter ‘round these parts. It was flat out cold this morning as I was walking to the Metro station, especially with the wind blowing the way it was. It’s the kind of winter weather that will turn your ears into ice cubes in a few minutes if you aren’t wearing earmuffs.

Now if it would just snow.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 99/365 - Curious Case, Great Movie

Tonight I met up with my friend Adriana and we went to the movie theater in Chinatown to see "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button." It was excellent. Although it's a fairly long movie (2:47), it never seemed long and didn't drag at all. The story kept moving and kept you interested in learning what was going to happen next.

In case you are unfamiliar with the plot, the movie concerns a guy who is born backwards in time -- he starts out as an old man with arthritis and cataracts and then grows younger as he 'ages.' It's based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald and although it's a bit of a "high concept" premise, the movie never feels contrived. It's engrossing, adventurous, dramatic, romantic, melancholy, and -- in quite a few spots -- flat out funny.

The performances were good. Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett did a nice job with their parts, but the movie was absolutely stolen by the actress who played Pitt's adoptive mother. The actor who portrays the tugboat captain did quite a good job as well. They also did an amazing job with the make-up and computer animation, so that it never looked fakey as the characters either aged or got younger.

The movie definitely has echoes of "Forest Gump" in that it deals with a boy growing up with the stigma of being 'different' who is very close to his protective mother, who comes of age traveling the world and serving in wartime, who has a star-crossed romance with a woman he's known since childhood, and who fears that any child of his will suffer from his condition. Despite that, though, it doesn't feel like a retread or a knock-off of any other film.

Two things to look out for if you decide to go see this movie -- the guy who pops up occasionally to discuss being struck by lightning and the moment every woman in the theater sighs simultaneously. Here's a hint, it features Pitt riding a motorcycle and seemed to have a pretty universal effect on the distaff portion of the audience (including Adriana). The guys were less impressed. It was a cool motorcycle, though.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 98/365 - Make-Believe Champion

This is the view I have from my desk at work. There are no windows in my office, so I make do with an enlargement of a photo of mine that I like and the sad vestiges of geeky loser glory -- in this case, fantasy sports championship banners and pennants.

Each year my brother, a few of my nephews, and I compete against each other in fantasy baseball, football, and basketball leagues on ESPN.com. It costs about 25 bucks and if you win your league, they send you a championship banner. Or at least they used to, anyhow. Now you just get a cheap, crappy pennant. The banners were much cooler.

So far I've won fantasy baseball twice (2001 & 2008), basketball once (2008), and football once (2005). We were playing in a free fantasy football league the year I won so I didn't get a banner for that one. Bummer. Since I don't have a banner for it, my brother argues that one doesn't count. Of course, he'd take just the opposite position if he had won that year.

He's won baseball three years in a row (and then boasted about his 'dynasty' to no end) and football once. Neither of us did that well in football this year, although he did make the playoffs at least. So far we're both struggling in this year's fantasy basketball season as well, but there's still time to turn it around. Hopefully.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 97/365 - Rockin' Out

This next sentence will sound like it's written by a fourteen year-old rather than a forty year-old. My friend Chris got Rock Band 2 for Christmas for his Wii, so last night I went over to his house and we played it for a couple of hours. It's more fun than the first Rock Band game for Wii was. In this version you can make your own band member and customize their appearance, plus it has more of a story to it. You start out a struggling band with no fans and no money playing seedy little clubs, but as you play more gigs you gain in money, fame, and fans and move up to traveling in jets, wearing elaborate costumes, playing flashy instruments, and performing in huge arenas.

It's pretty awesome. I can't remember exactly what the name of our band was. It's something-something Tree Frog, I think. Chris is on guitar and I'm on drums, which is a bit of challenge given my general lack of rhthym and coordination. Chris' wife Des was our vocalist for the first Rock Band game, but she was out running errands and tending to business last night so we made do with a computer-generated singer. We tried to rope our friend Adriana into taking over the microphone, but she wasn't up for making a fool of herself like we were.

Chicken.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 96/365 - Tools of the Trade

These are my current flames – a Nikon D80 and a Nikon Coolpix S200. I didn’t set out to become a Nikonist, it just sort of happened that way. My first camera was a cheap little snapshot camera that used 110 film. I don’t even remember the manufacturer. The first camera I clearly remember owning was the Polaroid One Shot instant camera I got for Christmas when I was in the sixth grade. At first I had the old school flashbulb strip for it, but later I got the battery operated flash module.

The Polaroid was kind of inconvenient, despite the fact that you got instant prints. It was a bit big and clunky and you wound up having to walk around with a pocketful of photos. After I got tired of the Polaroid I don’t remember owning a camera for a while. I think I just borrowed whatever my parents happened to have at the time. Then in my senior year of high school I took a photography class and had to get my first SLR.

I decided on a Pentax K-1000 because it was cheap and I could get it at the Sears down the road from my house. It was a primitive chunk of metal but I grew to love that camera and took some pretty good pictures with it. In some ways, I think I took better photos with it than I have with any of my subsequent cameras. It had the most basic light meter imaginable – a scale at the side of the viewfinder with a plus at the top, a minus at the bottom, a notch in the middle and a needle that drifted up and down. I had that camera for years until it was stolen from my Jeep while I was in the Navy. After that, I used a crappy little Kodak 35mm point and shoot until I bought a used K-1000 off eBay when I moved up to DC after law school.

It was during a trip to Montreal that I decided maybe it was time to try an automatic SLR. I was sitting beside a trail in Mount Royal Park with some peanuts cupped in my palm as a quartet of squirrels would take turns creeping up and eating out of my hand. That was when I made the brilliant realization that trying to focus a manual SLR one-handed wasn’t easy. I kept leaning forward and backward to try and get the squirrels in focus, with mixed results. I went through a roll and a half of film and got six or seven decent shots. So later after I got home I bought a Nikon N65. I never did get the hang of that camera and I didn’t take very good photos with it. It was a tough camera to warm up to. I only got a Nikon because that was the brand of camera photographers on tv and in the movies were always using.

My first digital camera was a Canon SuperShot 400. It was only 4 megapixels, but it was easy to use and took good pictures. It was too fat to fit easily in my pocket though, so that was annoying. After getting exposed to digital photography I decided to take the plunge and get a digital SLR. I opted for the Nikon D80 because I could still use the flash and zoom lens from my N65 with it. I wonder sometimes if I’d been better off if I’d started down the Canon path instead. They seem more intuitive and user-friendly, but once you pick one and start buying accessories it’s hard to switch to the other and see your investment fall by the wayside. I’m certainly more comfortable with the D80 than I was with the N65 (which I promptly boxed up and mailed off to my youngest niece so she could use it for her photography class) and I think I’ve gotten some pretty good shots with it.

When the memory card door on my SuperShot 400 broke off, I decided to get myself a new point and shoot. I opted for the Nikon Coolpix S200 not through any diehard devotion to Nikon, but because it was really thin and would fit in my pocket more easily than the other cameras at Best Buy. Plus it came in red and I really wanted a red camera. It’s a rather silly reason on which to base a camera buying decision, but still. I took dreadful pictures with it at first and was really frustrated with it. I came close to chucking it and getting different point and shoot, but I kept working with it and I’m finally at the point now that I’m fairly comfortable with using it. It’s a good thing I have it because otherwise I wouldn’t be doing a 365 Project. There’s no way I’d lug my D80 around with me everywhere I go, but with the S200 I can just slip it in my pocket or bag and I’m always ready to shoot.

As for future flames, I’ve been really mulling over the idea of getting a D300. They work well in low light situations and also are good at handling shooting environments that are a mix of shadows and bright light. The D80 definitely has troubles in those situations. Just take a look at Sunday’s 365 entry for evidence of that. My jeans are fine, but the view out the window is overexposed and burned up. There’s no guarantee that shot would have come out better with a D300, but the thought that it might is what keeps lurking in my mind.

I hate missing a shot.

(Taken with both my Nikon D80 and Coolpix S200)

Twice on Sunday Bonus Photo - The Sea Inside

This week's bonus photo from my archives is a shot I took at the aquarium in Chicago when I went there to see the Nats play the Cubs in May 2006 (they lost, go figure). Chicago is a terrific city and a place I wouldn't mind living (although, granted, I've never been there during wintertime).

In this shot, I liked the way the aquarium pool verged on Lake Michigan with (seemingly) only the glass wall to separate them.

(Taken with my old Canon SuperShot 400)

Day 95/365 - Another Naptastic Sunday

For this week's self-portrait we have my legs and feet (and laziness). There are few simple pleasures in life that are better than stretching out on the couch on a Sunday afternoon to take a nap with a football or baseball game playing in the background.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 94/365 - Volunteerism

This was the scene at the Washington DC convention center where training of volunteers for the Presidential Inauguration was being conducted. At this point in time, I can neither confirm nor deny that I took part in said training or that I may be volunteering to help out in some teeny tiny way at the Inauguration.

There may possibly be more details to follow in about ten days. Or not.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 93/365 - Lunch at a Washington Landmark

Despite the fact that they've lived in the Washington, DC area for years, a couple of my coworkers had never eaten at Ben's Chili Bowl. This was a travesty that could not go uncorrected, so today a group of us enlightened these poor, misguided souls by ushering them over to U Street with us for lunch. I'd never been to Ben's for lunch before. Normally when I'm eating there it's because I'm grabbing dinner on my way to a show at the 9:30 Club. Boy does it get packed there at lunchtime.

We all ordered chili half-smokes and then split a few orders of cheese fries. Half-smokes are the only thing I've ever eaten at Ben's. One of these days I'll have to try some of their other fare. In case you're unfamiliar with DC gastronomy, a half-smoke is a small smoked sausage that you eat on a bun like a hot dog. It's a local delicacy and Ben's has the best.

When we got to Ben's we plunked our butts down at a table that we didn't realize had been reserved. The waitress let us keep it though and said they'd just shift the reserving party to another table and besides, they weren't due to arrive there for a half-hour yet and the odds were we'd be done and gone by then. In case you hadn't deduced it, the service is very fast at Ben's. Within minutes of placing your order you're trying not to dribble chili all over yourself as you slip into bliss.

We were just finishing up our lunch when we noticed a group of guys standing over along the wall waiting to be seated. Turns out they were the party who's table we'd bogarted and then someone pointed out that Steve Largent -- NFL Hall-of-Famer, former Seattle Seahawks receiver, former member of the House of Representatives, and current high-priced telecomm lobbyist -- was among them.

Take that, Steve Largent! We just intercepted a table intended for you!

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 92/365 - Put Me In Coach!

Tonight I went over to my friends Chris and Desiree's place to watch the OU-UF matchup in the BCS Championship Game. I wasn't that bothered about the game, really. Mostly I just went over to hang out and support my friends. They both went to UF and are huuuuuge Gators fans.

They did their part to bring good luck to their team by putting on their Gators gear and decking out Chewie, their miniature Australian shepherd, in a UF shirt and bandana. It must have worked because the Gators wound up beating the Sooners 24-14.

I think Chewie really wanted to be subbed into the game at running back.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 91/365 - Delayed Gratification

Today the Christmas presents my sister ordered for me from my Amazon wish list arrived! This year's bundle of boodle consists of a 221B Baker Street mystery board game, a Tarzan movie boxed set (Tarzan the Ape Man/Tarzan and His Mate/Tarzan Escapes/Tarzan Finds a Son/Tarzan's Secret Treasure/Tarzan's New York Adventure), a Gene Kelly-Frank Sinatra movie boxed set (On the Town/Anchors Aweigh/Take Me Out to the Ballgame), a pair of John Wayne movies (The Horse Soldiers and Hellfighters), the last Speed Racer DVD I needed for the full set, and Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. Score!

I've been wanting that 221B Baker Street game ever since I was in high school and now I've got it. Man, I love getting packages. I'm forever ordering things from catalogs or websites. I think it would be great to be a UPS delivery guy. In my head it would be just like being Santa Claus everyday of the year. Not everyone enjoys seeing the mailman given that his daily delivery often consists largely of bills and junk mail, but who doesn't love getting a package? It seems like everyone would be happy to see you if you were a UPS guy. Plus you get to wear shorts to work. How awesome is that?

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 90/365 - You Say You Want A Resolution

I don't normally make resolutions. It's something I've never seen the point of, really. Most resolutions just involve things you should probably be doing already anyhow. I guess maybe packaging them up as New Year's resolutions though does provide an added bit of motivation to help you get over the hump and bust loose from the hold of inertia.

This year I decided to break with my lack of tradition and set a New Year's resolution for myself. I decided to recycle more. For the last several years, the only thing I've recycled are my newspapers. Everything else just went in the trash. Last weekend, however, I took one of my many Bed Bath & Beyond coupons (which don't expire btw, despite what they may have printed on them) off to the store with me and bought myself a double-sided recycling bin to put in my kitchen. Paper on the blue side, bottles/jugs/cans on the green side.

Now I have to rinse out the bottles and cans though before I stick them in the bin in order to avoid a sticky, smelly, moldy mess. That means I'm using more water than I was before. So I've lessened my ecological impact in one regard but increased it somewhat in another. I guess there's no real way to "do no harm."

As ever, life is a series of trade-offs.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 89/365 - Enter Sandman

Borders sent me a coupon good for 40% off one book today, so tonight after work I detoured by the store to pick up the first 'Sandman' graphic novel. I had a couple people recommend it to me yesterday and with the coupon it only came to $12.50, so that gave me two good reasons to get it.

I was pretty heavily into comics and graphic novels when I was in high school and college. When I left for the Navy though I gave my collection of several thousand comics to a couple of my cousins. Since then, apart from reprints of old newspaper strips like 'Dick Tracy,' 'Jungle Jim,' and 'Terry and the Pirates,' the only comics I've read are a few issues of 'Indiana Jones' and 'The Shadow.'

I'm looking forward now to dipping my toe back in the waters of the illustrated world.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Twice on Sunday Bonus Photo - Candle Cage

For this week's bonus photo from my archives we have a shot I took of a candle burning in my apartment. I was experimenting with extended, low light exposures and I liked the way this one came out.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 88/365 - Alter Ego

If I could be any fictional character ever, I'd be Indiana Jones. He's been my favorite ever since Raiders of the Lost Ark came out when I was in junior high school. Indy is a perfect storm of varied interests for me -- travel, adventure, romance, mystery, treasure, history, other cultures, and the 1930s. I love the Indy books, comics, movies, games, and tv show. I'm one of the (apparently) few who even enjoyed the most recent movie. To be fair, though, I probably enjoyed it more for the fact that it gave me a chance to see my favorite character on the big screen again and to buy some new merchandise than for any inherent value it had as a movie.

So what fictional character would you be if you could?

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 87/365 - At the DC Neujahrskonzert

The Neujahrskonzert, or New Year's Concert, is a traditional Viennese performance of the music of the Strauss family and other Austrian composers held annually on January first. DC's version of this tradition is part of a series of coordinated concerts across North America called Salute to Vienna and it's held at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts a few days after New Year's. This year it was held tonight and I went.

I'd never been to this before, but I'd been wanting to for a while. It's not just a classical music concert, it's a sort of performing arts sampler platter. In addition to the philharmonic part (btw, if your last name is Harmonic then I think you should be required to name your child either Phillip or Phyllis), there are arias from Austrian operettas and excerpts from ballets. The Kennedy Center used to stage a similar 'survey class' each year as part of the Kirov Festival, but they haven't done that the last few years. Bummer.

Tonight's performance was held in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall and featured the Strauss Symphony of America, ebullient guest conductor Sascha Gotzel, the Budapest Ballet, and a pair of ballroom dancers. As you can see from the photo, my seat was in one of the stage boxes. I'd never sat up here before but it's very cool and I'm definitely going to keep this in mind the next time I attend something at the Concert Hall. It's kind of like a home plate seat at a baseball game, minus the annoying netting. You're right on top of the orchestra and you can't see much of the rest of the crowd, so it's like they're performing just for you. Plus from that vantage point you can really see musicians' technique and the conductor's facial expressions (*cough* not to mention having a great view of the soprano's cleavage and the dancers' legs *cough*).

I really enjoyed this concert. It was light and joyous and lively and it had a great mix of performance pieces. The part where the conductor conducts the audience's applause during the 'Blue Danube' encore might seem a bit cheesy or contrived, but it's actually quite fun. The New Year's Concert/Salute to Vienna is certainly worth keeping in mind when next January rolls around, especially if you can luck into getting a seat in Box 60 like I did. Then it's just pure awesomeness.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 86/365 - Break Out

I think my 365 Project has been good for me in a couple of ways. First, it's gotten me to play around with my cameras and try some experimental shots that I might not have considered otherwise. Second, it's motivated me to 'get up, get out and do something' on days when I might otherwise have just been content to stay at home. Like today, for instance.

After getting sucked into the 'Bones' marathon yesterday, I nearly got trapped by the 'I Love Lucy' marathon today. I swear, sometimes I think couches were invented by television manufacturers, broadcasters, and snack food companies in order to snare us into consuming more of their products. Or maybe that's just me. I didn't want to shoot another photo of something laying around my apartment today, though, so I decided to go hit a museum and grab some grub. I did stick around on the couch long enough to laugh myself silly at the 'Vitameatavegamin' episode of Lucy, though. That one is one of my all-time faves.

I was debating between checking out either the Newseum or the National Museum of Crime and Punishment, and I finally decided to go with the cops and robbers. I love old gangster and g-man movies. That was one of the reasons I rented a tommy gun when my brother and I went to a shooting range in Las Vegas last winter. Man, those things are heavy.

It costs $19 to go to the C&P Museum. I think $13-14 would be a more appropriate entry fee, but the place was pretty full so I'm guessing they aren't feeling any pressure to cut their rates. The museum was pretty interesting. It covers the history and tools of crime and punishment from medieval torture implements up to modern computer crime. A lot of the museum's display objects are replicas, but they do also have some nice original artifacts, such as guns used by various members of the James Gang, the State of Tennessee's former electric chair Old Smokey (creepy, btw), and one of John Dillinger's getaway cars.

That's it above, a 1933 Essex Terraplane. It's weird how you used to be able to open up the windshield in order to get a breeze while you drove. I remember once watching a documentary on Depression-era bandits that explained why they were almost always able to outrun pursuing lawmen -- they spent their ill-gotten gains on high-power, high-performance automobiles like this one and most local police departments made do with rattletrap old beaters. Ford Motor Co. even took advantage of Dillinger's use of their vehicles as a sales pitch by stating that the police would only catch him once he stopped driving their V-8s. Maybe they were right, because this Terraplane is one of the last cars he drove.

It's a bit odd that I broke out of the soft prison of my apartment just to go and browse a museum dealing with the penal system, but it wasn't a bad day out. Plus it gave me a chance to swing by Matchbox for a late lunch/early dinner. Yum! That's definitely not prison food.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 85/365 - Brand New Year, Same Old Me

The new year got off to a very lazy start in my kingdom of one. I spent the entire day on the couch watching tv and taking naps, plural. Ahh, it's good to be the king.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 84/365 - New Year's Wii

I've never really liked big parties or crowds of strangers, so my New Year's Eve celebrations tend to just involve hanging out with family or close friends. Last year my friends Chris, Desiree and I ordered Thai food, played Yahtzee, listened to music, and watched the ball drop on tv. This year, we played Lego Batman on their Wii, Des made some yummy Venezuelan food for us, and we watched the ball drop on tv.

It bears little resemblance to the definition of "New Year's Eve fun" as put forth by movies and television, but I love it. Why spend the passing of the old year and the arrival of the new with a bunch of random strangers in a ballroom somewhere when you can be in a cozy living room with people you care about and who care about you? That's the way to start the new year off right.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 83/365 - Next to Normal

Next to Normal is a musical with a bit of a convoluted development history. It opened in New York off-Broadway to reviews that were generally positive, albeit with some reservations. It was because of those reservations that the play migrated south for the winter to be retooled and restaged. It's currently being produced by Arena Stage at the Crystal City performance space that was pressed into service to tide them over until renovations are completed on their home theatre on DC's Southwest Waterfront.

I went to see it tonight even though I had misgivings about going. The play is about a dysfunctional family dealing with mental illness, so unlike most fare offered by theatres around the holidays, it's not exactly cheery and uplifting. Generally I'm opposed to paying to be depressed for two hours, but the reviews of the reworked show have been uniformly glowing and Ticketplace had half-price seats available and the theatre is literally a block from my apartment. So, I went.

As far as musicals about mental illness go, I think it's about as good as you're going to get. I don't know whether I could recommend it or not, but it definitely wasn't a waste of time or money. Despite the fact that I was predisposed to not liking it, I found the story very poignant, gripping, and compelling. The songs were serviceable but, with the exception of one that's refrain was 'I Miss the Mountains,' largely unremarkable (judging by the program none of the songs appear to have actual titles, which should be a tip-off as to how memorable they are). The performers were strong actors, but middling singers with thin, easily frayed voices. The orchestra was quite good. Arena's Crystal City performance space isn't terrible, but given that the seating area is pitched at a very shallow angle and the stage is rather low, you spend a good portion of the play watching the back of the person's head in front of you rather than the actors.

So, much like the critics who reviewed the play's first run in New York (who, unlike me, actually know what the hell they're talking about), I'd have to say that Next to Normal is good, with some reservations.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 82/365 - Tourorists

Tourorist (toor-or-ist) noun - a particularly annoying tourist.

It was fairly warm out again today and given that hardly anyone was in the office (and especially given that I really didn't feel like doing any work), I went for a walk on the National Mall. Normally when I do that I just do a loop from the American Indian Museum down to the American History Museum. Today though I went all the way down to the Lincoln Memorial and back. Yep, not a whole lot of work got done today. Well, not by me anyhow.

There were loads of tourists out on the Mall. For the most part the tourists that come to Washington aren't too bad. Generally I only find them annoying when they're getting in the way -- such as when they stand on the left of the Metro escalators or when they come to a sudden stop at the top/bottom of escalator in order to get their bearings, meanwhile the escalator keeps moving and people start piling up behind them. I really hate that. That and when they let their obstreperous offspring treat the poles inside the Metro cars like jungle gyms.

I frequently wonder if the locals find me annoying when I go somewhere on a trip. I try to remember to avoid doing the sorts of things that would aggravate me, but I'm sure I slip sometimes and cause them to shake their heads and mutter under their breath about me like I do about our tourists.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Twice on Sunday Bonus Photo(s) - Special Guest Host

The subject of this week's photo from my archives is Chewie, my friends' miniature Australian shepherd, as he looked last February at their Super Bowl party. And, as a special added bonus for this week's Twice on Sunday feature, we have a photo journal chronicling a day in the life of my friend Desiree -- Chewie's 'mom' and a lawyer turned professional dog walker. Take it away, Des!

"A Day in the Life of Desiree" Slideshow

(P.S. -- If you still haven't gotten your fill of doggie cuteness, the The Littlest Wookie link on the sidebar will take you to Chewie's blog)

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 81/365 - Endangered Species

It's December 28th.

It's 70 degrees.

I'm wearing shorts.

I'll enjoy spring weather when it's actually spring. Right now, I want winter back.

Global warming sucks.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 80/365 - Arty Smarty

The Phillips Collection is by far my favorite art museum in DC. It's one of the few museums or galleries I've been to that has it's own palpable personality, which probably comes from the fact that it's largely just one really rich guy's personal art collection that he turned into a museum. Plus it's housed in his former home (and the townhomes of his former neighbors). As the collection expanded, they bought the adjacent buildings, connected them all, and turned it into one really cool art salon. The Phillips Collection pre-dates both the National Gallery of Art in DC and the MOMA in NYC and focuses on the field of Modern Art as that term has varyingly been defined since the late 1800s.

The Phillips' most famous objet d'art is Renoir's Luncheon of the Boating Party, which now always makes me think of the movie 'Amelie.' My favorite works in the Phillips Collection though are Matisse's Studio, Quai St. Michel and Marjorie Phillips' Night Baseball. The Phillips has also hosted my favorite exhibit since I've been in DC, namely the Modigliani retrospective they did a few years back (although I also really like the National Gallery of Art's Edward Hopper exhibit and the Corcoran Gallery of Art's Modernism show).

So anyway, the reason the photo above is of me in front of a sign for the Phillips Collection is that I went there today. I'm a member now so I get in for free (well, not counting the membership dues that is). I really love going to art museums. It's always one of the factors I take into account when planning a vacation. Going to an art museum or gallery gives me a similar feeling to sitting beside the sea -- both settings provide me with a sense of peace, grace, majesty, mystery, and the presence of something bigger than myself. Plus contemplating art is a bit like Pop Rocks for the soul -- it wakes you up and lets you know there is more to life than just an endless string of mental factory-work.

My taste in art has certainly changed over time. Initially I didn't have any appreciation or understanding of art that was even remotely abstract. If it didn't look like it was supposed to look then I didn't like it. As I've gotten older though I've begun to appreciate art that doesn't just look like a form of photograph. I suppose it has something to do with coming to realize that few things are as they seem to be and that much of life is ambiguous and unclear. Despite that, though, I still really like 'calendar' artists such as Gustav Klimt and Norman Rockwell. I guess a bit of reassurance is always a welcome thing.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 79/365 - Jour de Luxe

Today was a pretty self-indulgent day (so not that different really from all my other days). I hadn't done a photo walk in a while and it wasn't too terribly cold out today, so I decided to make a little outing to Bethesda, Maryland. I ambled about for a bit taking pictures of various things (including a mural that I really love and keep meaning to have my portrait taken in front of) and then I wandered over to Cafe Deluxe for lunch.

It's not really all that 'luxe', but it is pretty good. I sat in a booth and read a back-issue of Conde Nast Traveler while I ate a salad of mixed greens and goat cheese with a cup of roasted tomato soup, followed by a crab cake entree with a corn and asparagus medley on the side and washed down with three cups of coffee. After lunch, I headed to the arthouse movie theater at Bethesda Row to catch a showing of 'Slumdog Millionaire.'

It's an excellent movie and I loved it. It's very dramatic and romantic and powerful, and I came close to getting a bit 'misty' at the ending. It's been talked up for an Oscar and it's certainly deserving of that honor, unlike a lot of movie industry hype. It's directed by Danny Boyle, the same guy who made the movie 'Millions,' and it shares a lot of common thematic elements with that earlier film. Both films focused on a pair of brothers confronted by a threat from the criminal world and dealt with the idea that great money equals great success and great happiness.

I'm not sure whether that precept is true or not, but I wouldn't mind having the opportunity to find out for myself. Given that I was feeling particularly self-indulgent today, after the movie I swung by La Madeleine, a little bakery and cafe, and treated myself to a sacher torte and an Orangina. The torte wasn't quite as good as the ones they serve at the Hotel Sacher in Vienna, but it was still pretty darn good. It had been a while since I'd had an Orangina. I love the little beaker shaped bottles they come in. Drinking one always makes me feel a bit like a mad scientist quaffing some experimental potion.

Far as I know though I didn't turn invisible or morph into Mr. Hyde after drinking it.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 78/365 - Merry Christmas!

Here's this year's Christmas haul of gifts and cards from my family and friends basking in the glow of the tv Yule Log. My parents and my brother got me Starbucks gift cards (yay, more chai and gingersnap lattes for me!) and one of my sisters got me a set of funky martini glasses, margarita salt, and a cool bartending guide (yay, 1000 drink recipes to try out!). My present from my other sister will probably come next week. She's usually a little behind the curve in getting stuff ordered, but she always gets me cool stuff from my Amazon.com wish list.

I think my favorite Christmas present I've ever gotten was the Star Wars Death Star playset I got when I was a kid. It was awesome! It had a trash compactor with foam 'trash' that actually compacted (and that I later turned into spiked death trap for my Indiana Jones action figures), a moving elevator, and a blaster cannon that you could make blow up to simulate a hit from an attacking X-Wing fighter. It kicked ass.

I was always the first one up on Christmas day. One year I got up around 2:00 in the morning and was playing with the toys Santa left for me by flashlight so as to be sneaky and not wake anyone up. Didn't work. My parents heard me having fun and sent me back to bed and told me not to get up again until daylight. Spoilsports.

Merry Christmas to everyone, everywhere "and on Earth, peace -- goodwill toward men [and women]." I still think Linus says it better than anyone:

Day 77/365 - 'Twas the Night Before Christmas...

...and I was nestled all snug in my bed, but it wasn't visions of sugarplums I saw -- it was the Christmas Story marathon on TBS instead!

Merry Christmas to all, and to all, a good night!

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 76/365 - Tag, I'm It

For this week's self-portrait I decided to get in the Christmas spirit and shoot my reflection in one of the ornaments on the tree in the lobby of my apartment complex. Also, because I was tagged on Flickr by Picture Prefect, it's now my turn to reveal sixteen random facts about myself and this seemed like a good occasion to do so.

And so here they are:

1. I was once hoisted up into a helicopter that was hovering fifty feet above the deck of a ship at sea.
2. I used to have two earrings and a body piercing, but I quit wearing them about a year ago.
3. I took fencing and bowling classes for PE credit in college and sucked at both.
4. I love musicals.
5. I once had dinner at a restaurant one table over from Condoleeza Rice and totally eavesdropped on her conversations.
6. I've been through the Panama Canal.
7. My driver's license expired about eight years ago and I never bothered to get it renewed (obviously I don't drive).
8. I once chewed the same piece of blueberry Hubba Bubba bubblegum for three days straight (it turned white eventually).
9. I've skydived and bungee jumped, but social situations scare the hell outta me.
10. Until I was halfway through college, I thought the word 'pseudo' was pronounced 'puh-sway-do'
11. I sat three rows in front of Colin Powell for opening night of 'Mamma Mia' at the National Theatre and didn't realize it until I got up to leave at the end.
12. I'm terrified of dancing but secretly wish I knew how.
13. I used to write short stories for fun in high school and college but stopped (I still think up ideas for stories but never actually do anything with them).
14. I'm really good at building a fire (both fireplace and camp fire).
15. I once stepped on the end of a hoe and the handle swung up and whacked me in the face just like in cartoons and Three Stooges shorts and I wound up having to get stitches in my eyebrow.
16. I'm ridiculously over-organized (you have no idea how much time I put into compiling and revising this list).

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 75/365 - Lunch at Central

I met my friend Verónica at Michel Richard's Central for lunch today. Both of us had been wanting to try out the food there for a while. It had been some time since we'd gotten together. She had been away at a really prestigious fellowship program at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, but now she's back in DC. We'd been trying to meet up for lunch for a couple weeks now but kept running into scheduling issues until today.

I'd been to Michel Richard's Citronelle once before and loved it, so I was really looking forward to dining at Central. Michel Richard is the top chef in DC and he's famous for his culinary masquerades. He'll make a dish that looks like it's one thing, and then you taste it and find out it's something else entirely. My favorite example of this is the lobster cole slaw at Citronelle. It looks just like regular cole slaw, but it's actually made with shredded lobster meat rather than shredded cabbage and it's ludicrously delicious.

Central is the casual counterpart to the more upscale Citronelle. It's a rather smallish space, but it doesn't feel cramped or crowded. It's well-appointed and has the perfect level of noisiness so you can talk without having to raise your voice, but still you don't feel as though the people at the table next to you are going to hear everything you say. And the food is like diamonds from heaven.

For my appetizer today I went with the mushroom risotto, only it wasn't really risotto. It was actually made with pasta pearls as opposed to arborio rice. It tasted like cheesy mushroom tapioca and it was heavenly, absolutely perfect on a cold day like today. Then for my entree I had the fried chicken, which actually was fried chicken. It wasn't like the standard conception of fried chicken, however. This was the fried chicken of the gods. The breading was very light and crisp and it was served over mashed potatoes with a mustard cream sauce and a small mixed green salad on the side. This was comfort food as Michelangelo would have made it had he been a chef rather than a painter.

Verónica opted for the French onion soup as a starter. They brought it out in a little pot and it was bubbling like a vat of magma. It was good, but extremely hot and somewhat difficult to eat. For her entree she ordered the lobster burger, which came with fries on the side. It was very yummy and the fries were perfectly done.

We were both too stuffed for dessert, but that's okay. Now I have an excuse to go back just for dessert and coffee.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Twice on Sunday Bonus Photo - Merry Christmas

This week's bonus photo from my archives is a shot of a Christmas tree in the waiting room of the 30th Street train station in Philadelphia. I took this picture when I went up to Philly for the Army-Navy game in 2004. Merry Christmas!

(Taken with my old Canon PowerShot S400)

Day 74/365 - Nicholas, Patron Saint of Shopping Malls

It's kind of odd when you think about it that we erect shrines to a saint in shopping malls across the country once a year, yet it's done for almost entirely secular reasons. Poor Saint Nicholas -- stuck with cheesy temporary shrines and crying, snot-nosed, greedy little pilgrims. He definitely got the fuzzy end of the lollipop when it comes to the saint business.

I hadn't really thought of it much, but I do miss the excitement of going to the mall and sitting on Santa's lap and telling him what I want for Christmas. That was always a lot of fun as a kid. I'd pester my mom by asking her when we were going to see Santa and then I'd try to figure out what I wanted to ask for and then hope I didn't forget it when he asked me.

This is the atrium at the Pentagon City shopping mall in Arlington, VA. All my Christmas shopping has been done for a while now (gift cards as usual), but today I swung by the mall to grab lunch at Johnny Rockets and pick up an arm band for my iPod in the hopes that maybe that will motivate me to pry my slovenly butt up off the couch and go to the gym in my apartment complex. We'll see.

BTW, I really hate the way the Apple stores are set up. I hate the whole 'no check out line' and roving sales staff thing. When I go there it's just to grab an accessory. All I want to do is pay for it and go, but I'm stuck trolling about the store trying to find someone to take my money. Usually they are all chatting with an endless parade of clueless customers and I wind up ping ponging around trying to find one that is almost done answering questions.

I guess it's great if you actually do have questions, but when I just want to buy an armband or a case I don't need to ask any questions or get any explanations. 'Here's what I want, here's my money, bye'! I wish they had one sales person who was always in the same corner of the store instead of floating about and who was just there to ring things up and not to answer any questions. That would make me happy. It shouldn't be that hard to give someone your money. Bah, humbug!

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 73/365 - At the EagleBank Bowl

I'd never been to a college football bowl game before today. This morning, the Inaugural EagleBank Bowl was played at RFK Stadium in Washington, DC between Wake Forest and the U.S. Naval Academy. I bought my ticket for the game just as soon as Navy accepted the invitation to play.

I'd also never seen a football game at RFK and I hadn't been back to that stadium since the final home game of the Nationals' 2007 season. It hadn't changed much. As soon as you exited the Metro you still had to battle your way through the pushy hordes of ticket scalpers and hucksters selling knock-off hats and t-shirts that were crowding the sidewalk. That's definitely one thing I don't miss now that the Nats have moved to their new digs. The concession stands also ran out of hot dog buns at half-time, just like they always used to do during baseball games. That's another thing I don't miss.

The weather wasn't too bad at kick-off, but by half-time the temperature had dropped noticeably. The stadium was only about one-fourth full. There seemed to be fewer Wake Forest fans there, but they definitely went home happier than we Navy fans did. Navy lead 13-0 at one point, but the offense just never could get going all day and eventually the defense wore down and got picked apart by Wake Forest's passing game. The final score ended up being 29-19 in favor of Wake Forest.

Oh well, at least they beat Army this season. Go Navy!

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 72/365 - Bright Lights, Big Screen

My favorite movie of all time is the Frank Capra Christmas classic It's a Wonderful Life. I've seen it about a zillion times before, but always on tv. I'd never seen it on the big screen in an actual movie theater until tonight. Just across the DC border in Silver Spring, Maryland is the AFI Silver Theatre -- an old art deco movie palace restored and operated by the American Film Institute. It's a lovely old structure with a gorgeous main auditorium and is an outstanding place to see a movie.

I met up with Erin M. in the theatre lobby. She planned this trip to the movies as an outing for the DC Social Group on Flickr, but through the process of attrition it wound up just being me and her there tonight. That was fine. We had a great time anyhow. She thinks it's the best movie ever made as well, so since it was just the two of us we didn't have to deal with any non-believing cinematic heathens pooh-poohing our adoration.

It was very cool to see it on the big screen. The lighting and shading seemed better and I noticed a lot of little details in many of the scenes that I had never noticed before when I watched it on tv -- like the skull and crossbones patches on all the boys stocking caps at the beginning, the little skull carving that was on Mr. Potter's desk, and the way Ernie the cop shot out one of the lights in the 'Potterville' sign when he was shooting at George during the 'alternate history' sequence.

Yes, it's maudlin; yes, it's simplistic; yes, it's far-fetched and full of logic holes -- but it makes me laugh a lot and cry a little and for that I love it. I love it.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 71/365 - A Capitol Christmas

This is the Christmas tree that stands in front of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, DC as mirrored in the waters of the reflecting pool. I set the self-timer on my camera and put it on the edge of the reflecting pool basin and let it do its thing in order to avoid winding up with a shaky, blurry shot. Wish I'd bothered first to make sure I had the camera straight. There were some people there with a tripod though and I was getting in the way of their shot so I tried to be quick about it.

Even though there's only one week left until Christmas Day I still haven't been able to muster up a lot of holiday spirit yet. Once you become an adult you kind of lose Christmas a little and I don't think you fully get it back again until you have kids. You can recapture a bit of it by going home for the holidays, but during those years where you don't go back and spend the day with your family, Christmas just winds up sort of empty feeling.

Tomorrow night though I'm going to see It's a Wonderful Life at the AFI Silver, a really cool art deco movie palace in Silver Spring, and I'm hoping that will help jump start my Christmas spirit. It's my favorite movie ever and I've never seen it in an actual theater before, so I'm pretty excited.

Remember, every time a bell rings an angel gets his (or her) wings.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 70/365 - Lawyers on the Loose

Today was my office's holiday party. We had lunch at Tuscana West and then 'neglected' to go back to the office. Whoops! My six person section decided to go to the restaurant a bit early for a 'meeting' and a few aperitifs. That's how we roll.

It turned out to be a pretty good party. Because we work for the public rather than the private sector, we have to pay for our holiday parties ourselves. This one only cost us $27 each and the food was quite good. You have to get to these parties fairly early so that you can avoid being stuck sitting next to people you don't really want to spend two hours with. Made that mistake once.

Organizing these things is always a bit of a struggle. The tightwad old fuddy-duddy segment of our office never wants to pay much and won't go anywhere remotely non-mainstream. They were appalled the year we went to a Moroccan place and had to eat with our hands. Thankfully my boss finally stopped volunteering me for the party planning committee. Even when these parties are kind of lame they're still worth attending, though. I always just look at it as though I'm buying myself a half-day off. That makes it a bargain at just about any price.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 69/365 - Colbie Caillat in Concert

Okay, I'll admit it -- I really like Colbie Caillat's CD Coco. Everyone has to have their own musical guilty pleasures and I've always had a weakness for treacly, over-emoted soft pop. If you haven't heard Colbie Caillat's music (which would be surprising given that her single 'Bubbly' got beaucoup airplay), she sounds sort of like a cross between Jack Johnson and Belinda Carlisle. Plus she's hot, and that doesn't hurt.

I have a CD player in my bathroom and I like to listen to it while I'm getting ready for work in the morning. So far my two favorite CDs for getting the morning started are Corinne Bailey Rae's eponymous CD and the aforementioned Coco. They're both really pleasant ways to ease into the day. It's tough to be grumpy in the morning after having heard either Corinne Bailey Rae's "Call Me When You Get This" or Colbie Caillat's "Tailor Made."

Anyhow, Colbie Caillat was live in concert tonight at the 9:30 Club in Washington, DC and I went. The shots I tried to take inside the club kept coming out blurry, so finally I just said 'screw it, I'll play around a bit and see what sort of cool effects I can get by slowly moving my camera in different directions while the shot exposes.' The intentionally blurry shots definitely came out much cooler than the unintentionally blurry ones. Turns out imagination can be a fairly effective camouflage for poor technique.

Getting back to the gig, I still really like Colbie Caillat's music but I feel sort of bad that I didn't especially enjoy her show tonight. Her voice was quite good and she seemed really nice, sweet, and earnest -- she was just a rather uninspiring performer. Her on-stage routine primarily involved walking slowly from one side of the stage to the other, with an occasion shoulder dip or shallow knee bend thrown in. Not exactly the most dynamic approach to showmanship. She reminded me of the animatronic robot actors at the old Hall of Presidents in Disneyland. Interestingly, the only times she really seemed to put any oomph into her performance was during a pair of covers -- Bob Marley's 'Turn Your Lights Down Low' and Roberta Flack's 'Killing Me Softly.'

Otherwise she was just sort of unremarkable. Still hot, though.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 68/365 - Elevator Funhouse

I've been wanting to do a self-portrait in an elevator for a while now, but it always turned out that there was either someone in the elevator or I had the angle of my camera wrong and just wound up with a shoot of the elevator ceiling. I'd made a few attempts at this in the elevator at home and the one at work, but no joy. Then this morning in the elevator of my apartment building I finally got lucky -- I was the only one in the elevator and I actually managed to get myself in the picture. Bonus!

Previously I had given some thought to just riding up and down in the elevator until I got an empty one and I got the shot right, but that would've seemed like cheating. It was more fun to just keep trying until I finally got it right.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Twice on Sunday Bonus Photo - Beauty Mark Triptych

This week's extra photo from my archives is actually three different treatments of the same photo. This mural of Marilyn Monroe is high on the side of a building in the Woodley Park section of DC. The graffiti isn't an offical part of the mural, but it does seem to go well with it. It is on the top edge of the wall of an adjoining building and is about 30 feet or so from the mural itself. For the top photo, I used the sepia effect in Picasa, for the middle one I used the glow effect in Picasa and for the bottom one I used the negative effect in an old version of Microsoft Photo Editor.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 67/365 - Pub-A-Dub-Grub

There's a sports pub a few blocks away from my apartment and it serves as my neighborhood hang-out. I go there at least once a week, usually on the weekends. I go to watch the Nats or Broncos games, and if there isn't a game on that I want to see then I just take my most recent issue of Entertainment Weekly with me and read that while I eat. Then when I'm done I always leave my magazine behind on the table and the waitresses take it and read it when things are slow.

Today it was a Broncos game. They were playing the Panthers and getting whupped. As usual, the defense sucked. They were down 27-10 midway through the third quarter when I gave up and went home. Oh well, at least I got to scarf down an order of crab dip and some buffalo chicken tenders with cole slaw, all washed down with Backdraft Brown on tap. On Sundays here they put sheets of plywood over the pool tables and turn them into communal dining tables. That's generally where I sit to watch the game. I pretty much have to go here to watch the Broncos play seeing as how all we get on tv in this area are the games of crappy east coast teams like the Jets, Dolphins, and Ravens. Bleaahh.

Given that I was born and raised in Missouri, I'm not sure how I wound up being a Broncos fan. I suspect I might have started rooting for them just to aggravate my big brother, who is a diehard Chiefs fan. Every season when the Broncos came to town he and I would go to the game and I'd cheer for Denver and he'd cheer for KC. Denver usually won back then so he'd threaten to make me move and sit somewhere else in the stadium or threaten to drive off and leave me stranded in the parking lot. Even now, if my team loses on Sunday he calls me to rub it in and if his team loses I do likewise.

Ahhh, there's nothing quite like brotherly love.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 66/365 - Dinner at My Place

I invited my friends Desiree, Adriana, and Chris over to my place for dinner tonight, which meant I had to cook. I decided to go with a comfort food kind of menu, so I made meatloaf, mac and cheese, peas with mushrooms, tomato and herb bread, and chocolate cheesecake.

I was in the kitchen pretty much non-stop from 1:30 to 7:30. I'm not a very fast chef. The only dish I hadn't made before was the mac and cheese. It's made with penne and gruyere and turned out really good. I love this meatloaf recipe. It's not dry, crusty, and dense like my mom's meatloaf (sorry Ma). It's very light, moist, and flavorful. Even my brother, who hates meatloaf, loves it when I make this.

Everyone seemed to enjoy the meal. After we'd stuffed ourselves, I made a batch of chocolate martinis and we watched 'Wall-E" on DVD. If you haven't seen it yet, it's a great movie and it goes well with both chocolate martinis and chocolate cheesecake. But then again, what doesn't?

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 65/365 - Goodbye, Bettie Page

Bettie Page died last night. She was the all-time pin-up queen and a perfect blend of girl next door and kinky minx. It was a shame her life didn't turn out to be as joyous as she always appeared to be in her pin-up photos.

These are a group of Bettie Page magnets I have on my refrigerator. Normally they're scattered across the surface of my fridge, holding up an array of photos and comic strips. Tonight they're drawn together in tribute to a beautiful but troubled woman who seemed the ideal embodiment of William Blake's Songs of Innocence and Experience.

Good night Bettie, wherever you may be.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 64/365 - String of Pearls

I liked the way these raindrops looked clinging to the branches of the trees growing in the courtyard of my apartment complex, so I grabbed my camera and an umbrella and headed outdoors. It was the first time I'd been out of my apartment all day. I have an appeal response I have to file Monday, so I lugged a bunch of files home with me last night and spent today working at home.

There's nothing quite like practicing law on your couch in a pair of gym shorts and a t-shirt. I'm lucky in that my boss is really cool about letting me telecommute whenever I want. I always manage to get way more done at home than I would in the office. It's partly because of fewer interruptions, and I think partly because I feel less inclined to take a break at home. At work I'm almost always looking for an excuse to take a break.

It's been rainy and grey here for two days now, and yesterday it was uber-humid. It's been more like Spring in Washington state than the verge of Winter in Washington, DC. It's December -- it should be snowing rather than raining. You can't make a rain man or rain angels or have a rain ball fight. I want a white Christmas, not a wet Christmas.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 63/365 - Washington, DC: Nutjob Magnet

One of the downsides to living in the DC area is having to put up with the kooks and crazies that want to come here, get in the way, and air their idiotic viewpoints. Earlier this week it was the tinfoil hat crowd camped out on the steps of the Supreme Court trying to get it to entertain their conspiracy theory that the President-Elect isn't a natural born U.S. citizen. Now it appears that we have yet another demonstration of intellectually bankrupt ideological carpetbaggers coming to town.

They'll show up, mess up traffic, require the District to pay for a lot of police overtime, make themselves feel like they're doing something, accomplish nothing other than irking the people who live here, and then go back from whence they came. I guess this plague of angry crackpots is nothing new, though. This is the same city that played host to a Million Klan March back in the 1920s after all.

We get a few of these buffoon conventions each year and they're all ridiculous. The demonstrations, marches, etc. are never actually for anything. They just rail loudly and impotently against their personal Satan-of-choice: abortion rights, the Bush Administration, the World Bank/IMF, capitalism, and now the Federal Reserve. Apparently the Federal Reserve was the secret puppetmaster behind the invasion of Iraq, the financial sector bail-outs, and the 'inflation tax,' whatever the hell that might be.

Why stop there? Why not also blame the Fed for Hurricane Katrina, the Irish Potato Famine, the extinction of the dinosaurs, and the musical 'Cats' (now there's a crime against humanity). These yahoos aren't even original. They're basically just recycling the same 'evil bankers are controlling the world' arguments the White Supremacist wackos have been espousing for years with their 'Protocols of Zion' BS.

These migratory nutjobs do a disservice to the occasional worthwhile protests that do come to DC and invariably get lumped in with the limpwits. The First Amendment gives you the right to petition the government for redress of grievances. It does not give you the right to be an obnoxious twit who pointlessly aggravates your fellow citizens just to boost your sense of self-worth.

Next month the idiot brigade will spin the 'Big Wheel O' Stupidity' and pick a new cause celebre at which to shake their fists and gnash their teeth. I can hardly wait to see what it will be next. I nominate 'people who clip their nails on the Metro.' That's a scourge I could support eliminating.

(Taken with my Nokia 6133 cameraphone -- because I was stupid and forgot to take my S200 to work with me today)

Day 62/365 - Spoon Portrait

As you can probably tell by this shot, I didn't have much time at work today to think up a cool shot to take and now that I'm home I'm tired and I just want to read for a bit and then go to bed early. So that's how I wound up standing in my kitchen and shooting a picture of myself reflected in the back of a slotted spoon for this week's self-portrait. Ta da!

Why is it that your reflection on the back of a spoon is rightside up, but your reflection on the inside of a spoon is upside down?

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 61/365 - Office Away From Office

We have a Starbucks adjacent to my office building and when I need to really focus on something and blaze through my review of it, I take files down there and work. Today it was a grant announcement I'd promised to get reviewed and returned to the program office by COB. This is my favorite table. There were a couple kids sitting there when I entered, but by the time I got my chai they'd left and I was able to claim my usual spot.

I've always been one of those people who focus and concentrate better when there is stuff going on around them. I could never study in complete silence. My mind tends to start wandering if there isn't something going on in the background. Some people need absolute quiet in order to concentrate and others of us are just the opposite. In school I always had to have the radio or tv on when I was studying or doing homework and even now I listen to music in my office.

It seems counter-intuitive that you'd need noise and commotion in order to avoid distractions, but that's what works for me.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Twice on Sunday Bonus Photo - Blood Orange Blossom

For this week's extra photo from my archives we have a shot I took of a flower I saw at the zoo in San Diego. I have no idea what sort of flower it is, but I think it looks cool. I like shooting flowers for some reason. They're kinda like prettier versions of Rubik's Cubes -- lots of colors and shapes going on. And they tend not to move much, which makes them easy to shoot.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 60/365 - At the BB&T Classic

Well they couldn't quite pull off the double dip this weekend. Navy's basketball team played Virginia Tech in the opening game of the BB&T Classic at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. The temperature inside the Verizon Center was much more pleasant than that at Lincoln Financial Field yesterday, and the subway ride into DC was much quicker (and cheaper) than the Amtrak ride up to Philly.

My seat pretty much sucked, though. I was behind one of the baskets about fifty feet from the court, so I spent a lot of time watching the game on the jumbotron. On the plus side, however, I was right across the aisle from the Midshipmen seating section and they're always a fun and lively bunch. Plus the Navy cheerleaders were right behind the basket so even when the team was playing ugly I had something nice to watch.

Navy led at the half but wound up losing the game to Virginia Tech by a score of 79-70. Navy played hard, but not particularly smart, basketball. They kept playing physical defense even after it became obvious the refs were going to call a tight game and as a result they sent the Hokies to the free throw line far too many times. Also, the Mids were too reluctant to take shots as time wound down and just kept passing the ball around while the clock ticked their chances away. When you're down by ten points with less than four minutes to play in the game, it's not the time to be passive and unselfish. It's time to take things into your hands and be aggressive. Otherwise, you lose.

Oh well, at least I got to see one Navy victory this weekend. Next stop on the Navy Sports Express for me -- the EagleBank Bowl at RFK on December 20th. Go Navy!