| Poem for Friday |
[29 Aug 2008|12:02am] |
( The Guest House )
It was a dim, rainy Thursday here, as what was left of Hurricane Fay dripped on us all morning and afternoon while Gustav and Hanna moved closer to the south. ![[info]](http://img.greatestjournal.com/userinfo.gif) perkypaduan came over and we went to the mall together to look at naughty Hot Topic Halloween accessories (not very many available yet, but the young cashier was definitely into perkypaduan, heh), then to check out walking shoes and Bath & Body Works, and finally to grab some Japanese food to go. We came back to my house, ate teriyaki and watched Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, having decided that we were in the mood for Alan Rickman since I had just seen Bottle Shock and she was going to see it after leaving. Adam got home and announced that he needed a five subject notebook for science, so we picked up Daniel as he was walking home and went first to CVS, then to Giant, both of which were pretty wiped out of school supplies but we managed to track one down.
( Scenes from Yellowstone National Park )
We had a political evening: watched Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert (the latter had Mike Huckabee on, whom I knew would get me fervently in the mood to listen to Obama), then took a break to watch Star Trek: The Next Generation's "Captain's Holiday" (which I need to review tomorrow, and which I enjoyed a lot more than I expected), then watched the DNC film about Obama before he came out to speak. Adam asked the all-important question, "Does he have a cat?" And though I know from the news that he's been looking for a dog for his daughters, I did not know the answer, and in the course of research (answer: he does not), I found Cats For Obama, which made us all smile. So did Obama's speech; I'm not sure he can put any of those tax or fuel plans in place without a strongly sympathetic Congress and I don't think he can stop a lot of the money-wasting to which even many Democrats have contributed, but he's so strongly positive, not only on things like equal pay and gay rights and ending poverty, but also on international relations and people in general. I love listening to Obama's passion for what I used to think the U.S. would always stand for.
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| Poem for Thursday |
[28 Aug 2008|12:02am] |
( Nocturne I )
This will be a rather cranky entry, I'm afraid. Some of you may recall my lengthy rant some months ago about the idiocy of public school health class requirements and scheduling. When we left things, the administration had promised to set things right for Daniel as soon as they were able, then everyone involved promptly went on vacation and never returned my calls. Fast forward to Daniel's first day of school, when -- big surprise -- he learned that he is scheduled to take health and not chamber choir, even though this may mean that he can't travel with the choir in the spring to the county and state performances and even though it means he has eight solid study courses. He is being a good sport about it -- he apparently had a good first day of school, despite not getting the calculus teacher he wanted -- but I am really furious.
Meanwhile, Adam has been complaining off and on for the past couple of days that one of his ears was bothering him, and this afternoon he came home saying that it hurt. I called the pediatrician, who said she could squeeze us in, so I was not really surprised (though also not really thrilled) to have to wait 45 minutes beyond the appointment time for her to tell us it looked like swimmer's ear, which we already suspected, and to prescribe antibiotic ear drops. What I wasn't expecting was for the pharmacy nearest my house first to put the doctor on hold for ten minutes, then to disconnect her after saying they would transfer her to the doctors-only line, and so on until nearly half an hour later, the nurse who took the phone from the doctor was able to call in the prescription. Then, two hours later when I went to pick it up, the pharmacy from which we have purchased untold dozens of medicines over the years announced that they didn't have our insurance information or address in the system, so I had to fill out paperwork and wait some more for them to adjust the price!
Speaking of waiting for things, here are some of the dozens of signs that lead the weary traveler to Wall Drug Store in South Dakota (all photos taken through the window, so sorry for splotches, discolorations and blur):
( Approaching Wall Drug )
In the evening, after finishing their homework, the kids wanted to watch Jon Stewart's convention coverage, which I must admit was very funny. Then we left on Stephen Colbert, who was even funnier commenting on the Fox TV coverage ("When I make up words to put in Michelle Obama's mouth, I find what she says very offensive!"). Watched the highlights of Bill Clinton's speech -- thought it was great, he said all the things about Obama that the McCain people were insinuating Hillary must not believe because she didn't say -- and I liked seeing Biden's mom, though I really don't like speeches with chant-along sound bites, not that I will complain if Biden's help get Obama elected. If the voting public only wants sound bytes, I'm all for the Democrats coming up with good ones.
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| Poem for Wednesday |
[27 Aug 2008|12:04am] |
( Troy )
Adam started seventh grade on Tuesday morning in the middle school that I attended -- well, it was a junior high school then, but it's still a bit surreal for me that I have somehow subjected one of my kids to three years in that building. He didn't seem terribly unhappy last year, at least, which is about the best one can hope for at that age, I think. Daniel had the day off, as his entire high school building is used for freshman orientation, so I took him out for bagels (his request), then home where I folded laundry and we watched The Fellowship of the Ring, which has kind of been a tradition for him and me on sick days. It's been many months since I've seen it, long enough for me to have forgotten all the things that disappoint me in The Return of the King, and it made me unexpectedly happy. When Adam got home, I spent quite a bit of time looking around the house for school supplies that the school hadn't bothered to put on the summer school supply list sent home weeks ago, then finished sorting out the kids' clothes -- the giveaway pile being bigger than what either son is keeping.
( Faire Tricks )
Adam's best friend brought over Superhero Movie, which the kids insisted on watching -- fortunately it's short, and silly, and once again I got evidence that I am twelve because even though I've seen it before, I was more in the mood for that than all-night DNC blather. While the kids were getting ready for bed, we put on Across the Universe, figuring it would probably be possible to listen without really paying attention to the plot, but there was actually lots more talk and less Beatles than I was expecting...and Bono and Eddie Izzard in awesome cameos, which I didn't know about! The woman playing the sort-of-Janis-Joplin character was terrific, too, though the psychidelic sequences got to be a little much after a while. It's no Hair, which is what it seems to want to be with Beatles tunes, but it's worth seeing once.
The movie ended just as Hillary was starting to speak at the convention, so we got to hear her. I expected that I might be completely out of the mood -- every time I checked my RSS news feeds today, it was all "disgruntled Hillary supporters say they won't vote for Barack" until I wanted to throw up -- but I really appreciated her speech, as bittersweet as it must have been for her to get such an ovation. I wonder whether the news is ever going to cover the crisis in Georgia; right now they've gotten past a bear cub in a tree and moved on to puppy mill rescues. And every time I read something like this, my affection for Harry Potter dies a little bit more.
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| Poem for Tuesday |
[26 Aug 2008|12:01am] |
( The Lost Sister )
Adam goes back to school in the morning -- the whole county goes back then, but Daniel's high school is entirely taken up with freshman orientation, so he doesn't have to be there till Wednesday -- meaning Monday was officially our last day of summer vacation. We went out for lunch after Adam "called" me, pretended to be his father and instructed me in faux bass voice to take the children to California Tortilla. *g* Then we stopped at the food store, because in addition to toilet paper, we were out of Cocoa Krispies. We drove by the pool on the way home and to my surprise it was open -- we'd thought it was weekends only starting today -- so the kids got to swim before working on their summer homework, book reports and long math review packets. I finished the laundry while they finished those.
( Fire at the RenFaire )
After dinner we watched No Reservations, which I didn't expect to interest the kids in the least -- it's also the last night of weekday video games for a long time -- but they both watched it. I've heard it's not nearly as good as the German film it's based on, but I enjoyed it anyway, though the resemblances to Ratatouille amused me, Catherine Zeta-Jones only spoke with a US accent about 2/3 of the time, and the family dynamics were a bit too Disney-perfect. The movie made me very hungry, which usually means a food movie did something right. *g* Then the kids went to bed -- school night hours -- and Paul and I watched Into the Unknown With Josh Bernstein on Discovery, in which they investigated whether there was a historical event upon which the story of Noah's Ark might have been based (conclusion: there's not much evidence for an ark with all the beasts of the world, but some evidence for the flood from the Epic of Gilgamesh where it was only the beasts of the field rescued from the flood).
I only watched the highlights of the Democratic convention, even Ted Kennedy and Michelle Obama; there's only so much political blather I can take. ( Cut for rant. ) Ah well, I see CERN is reenacting Angels and Demons and People is trying to queer Obama/Biden...there is entertainment in the news.
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| Poem for Monday |
[25 Aug 2008|12:16am] |
( Thermopylae )
I had a great day at the Renfaire with my family and dementordelta! When we got there, we saw Barely Balanced's acrobatics, then had fish & chips at the place near the stage while Empty Hats was playing. Then we went to the Boarshead Brawl -- the point of which is always to throw drinks in people's faces, toss people out of second-story windows, knock people into the big tub and make bathroom jokes, so the kids love it. We saw the Renaissance Vaudeville team, which includes their dogs ("this is what you can do with a liberal arts degree") and stayed at the Endgame Stage for the abbreviated version of The Tempest. Miranda was portrayed as a giggly bimbo, which I could have lived with, but they cut both Caliban's "Be not afear'd; the isle is full of noises" and Prospero's "Our revels now are ended" speeches! Grrrr!
After the play, we walked a bit around the shops. At the mint, I had a coin made with the Chalice Well on one side and the Holy Grail on the other. We also stopped in the scriptorium/bookstore, several jewelry stores, the dragon hatchery (where they actually sell baby lizards), a couple of art galleries, the pirate ship armory and the glassworks. Late in the afternoon we went to see Barely Balanced's fire show at the Globe Theatre in which they not only perform acrobatics and juggling, but do so with knives and torches. Next on the schedule was the Ultimate Joust; with the theme this year being a visit to England by Ivan the Terrible and his knights, Russian villainy becomes the excuse for fighting and blowing things up. The Pennsylvania Faire has less serious jousting than its Maryland counterpart, but they always do a big bang at the finale and I really enjoyed seeing the number of women who ride as knights. Finally, we had dinner -- Spanish food (well, really Tex-Mex) for some of us, turkey legs and bread bowls for others. And we drove back to Maryland!
( Pennsylvania Renaissance Faire 2008 )
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| Poem for Sunday |
[24 Aug 2008|12:34am] |
( Descent )
dementordelta is here and we are going to the Pennsylvania RenFaire on Sunday! On Saturday we went to National Geographic Explorers Hall to see China's Forgotten Fleet: Voyages of Zheng He, about the eunuch admiral of the Ming Dynasty who sailed on seven voyages to India, Africa, the Arabian peninsula and many places in Europe, almost 100 years before Columbus set sail from Spain. The National Museum in China loaned National Geographic copies of his maps and the Quanzhou Maritime Museum provided ship models including a 10-foot-long replica of a treasure ship.
( China's Forgotten Fleet )
apaulled made us lobster cakes for dinner while the kids were at the pool and we were watching Torchwood, then dementordelta and I went to see Bottle Shock, which was enormous fun -- Alan Rickman got to make every sneering, eye-rolling expression in his repertoire and Bradley Whitford and Eliza Dushku had bit parts. I liked Chris Pine a lot, too, even though I was trying not to because there is no way I am ever going to see him as Captain Kirk. It's lighter than Sideways and also has a gratuitous blonde love interest, but it's very entertaining. After the movie, we thought about stopping at Gifford's for ice cream, but the line was so long that we opted for going to the grocery store and getting whipped cream, fudge, peanut butter sauce and Moose Tracks. Gronk!
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| Poem for Saturday |
[23 Aug 2008|12:11am] |
( Song )
I had a weird day. Wrote a review of "Allegiance" in between making the kids lunch, sending them to the pool and washing their bed linens. Was all excited to see Great Big Sea at Wolf Trap in the evening; we got there just after the doors opened, sat on the lawn to eat dinner, then went into the house expecting to see Eddie From Ohio open for Great Big Sea; instead Great Big Sea opened, which instantly filled the house. The center aisles were mostly season ticket holders and stayed in their seats at first, but the sides, which is where we were sitting, were full of people with flags and Newfoundland Republican Army shirts who danced through the entire set (they did pretty much everything on the new CD -- "Walk on the Moon," "England," "Banks of Newfoundland," "Straight To Hell," "Company of Fools," etc. -- plus "Ordinary Day," "The Night Pat Murphy Died," "General Taylor," "Consequence Free" and lots of others). But younger son was shielding his eyes from the house lights, and we ended up leaving shortly after Eddie From Ohio came on after the interval, because nothing sucks more than being at a concert with a migraine, as I know. I am so glad GBS came on first!
( Great Big Sea at Wolf Trap )
fannish5: ( Bad costumes. ) I thought SGA was pretty well done until the end -- ( Spoilers. ) Also, SGA was outshone a bit for me by the SG-1 rerun that was on right afterward, which started with a discovery in a cave under Glastonbury -- I didn't realize they'd done an Avalon arc -- so of course I left it on. And then they revealed ( this small spoiler. ) Plus it was a pretty good Sam episode, which I always enjoy.
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| Poem for Friday |
[22 Aug 2008|12:02am] |
( Summer Evening by the Window with Psalms )
We had a pretty quiet last Thursday before school starts; I made the kids try on clothes to see whether they actually have enough to wear, we all had bagels, then I sent them to the pool and worked on uploading trip photos to do a book while I have a freebie from Shutterfly (I actually won one in a Quaker Cereal contest!). My mother took the kids out for dinner so that Paul and I could go to Virginia unencumbered to see Iona...the boys are not always big folk music enthusiasts and we're taking them to Great Big Sea on Friday night, which is probably enough for the week.
Iona was playing for free outdoors at Lake Anne Plaza in Reston, where there are several restaurants, a boat launch, a used bookstore and a community center. I don't dare try to list everything they played, or in which combinations, as they always mix it up; they did "The Highwayman," "Donald MacGillavry," "Darby the Driver," "V'la le bon vent," "Hills of Connemara" (the one where "Barnaby" is the only word anyone remembers to sing along), a funny waulking song about women tired of working with sheep wool, and lots of Breton, Scottish and Irish songs whose names I can't transliterate well enough to Google and find correct titles. It was a terrific concert, though, and during the break between sets we got mocha at the coffee shop in the plaza -- a lovely evening.
( Iona at Lake Anne )
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| Poem for Thursday |
[21 Aug 2008|12:29am] |
( Here the Birds' Journey Ends )
Another day in the lead-up to the start of school next week, we made the inevitable Target run for school supplies and are now the proud owners of new dividers, lined and graph paper, composition books, colored pencils, a compass, and various other necessities (both kids swear they don't need new binders, which means that two weeks from now when Staples and Office Depot are both out of them, we will be frantically searching for one). We also stopped at the mall so Adam could sell back his Petz Catz game for half price and get a used copy of Puzzlequest Challenge Warlords, which apparently pleases him far more and the total was only about $9 more, so that worked out about as well as could be expected. Plus Adam discovered the nightmare that is Owls and proceeded to sing it to me all day, so he was in a good mood. Daniel got new clothes from both me and my mother, yet somehow this did not make him ecstatic.
Oddly enough, in the midst of all this fun, I got a murderous migraine and when the kids finally went to the pool at three, I collapsed on the couch under the influence of Imitrex for two hours. This helped a great deal, though not quickly enough for me to want to go see Jennifer Cutting's Ocean Orchestra even though they were playing for free in Fairfax (we're going to see Iona on Thursday night and Great Big Sea on Friday, so I can't really complain). Instead we stayed home and watched the rest of Amadeus -- not much new material added in the last hour of the director's cut, so it played out pretty much as I remember it from seeing it over and over in the theater my freshman year of college. The kids were extremely attentive, which they are not always during historical epics or classical music, so I felt very gratified.
( Eastern Shore Dragonflies )
Daniel requested Robot Chicken before Olympic diving, so we put on the second season and got to see the hilarious Harry Potter parody with Melanie Griffith as Hermione -- ( small spoiler. ) Plus they did March of the Penguin -- Danny DeVito crossed with Morgan Freeman -- which also cracked us up because we are ALL twelve. Condolences on the cancellation of Stargate Atlantis -- I still haven't caught up on the first season, let alone on this season, but I know a lot of people are very sad!
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| Poem for Wednesday |
[20 Aug 2008|12:02am] |
( The Candlelighter )
I took my kids out to Lebanese Taverna with me and miriya_b, who has gotten a job downtown and won't be able to meet me in Rockville at lunchtime any more. We had lots of fantastic hummus and shawarma and walked around a bit in the stores nearby afterward -- there's a new children's store in the former Tower Records building that has housed the fantastic Halloween costume store the past two years, woe! We stopped in Bagel City to get bagels for breakfast, then came home and I sent the kids to the pool to work off lunch.
( Local Animals, For a Change )
We put on Amadeus in the evening -- the director's cut, which is three hours long -- and though the kids were doing other things when we started, they both ended up coming in and watching, and we stopped it when it was time for them to go to bed so we can all watch the rest when they're awake tomorrow. We turned on the Olympics just as the balance beam competition was starting, so I got to see Shawn Johnson in the last women's gymnastics event of the Games.
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| Poem for Tuesday |
[19 Aug 2008|12:02am] |
( Shells )
Another domestic day broken up by taking the kids to the pool, going to the post office, and various shopping chores. Both kids wanted to go out to spend the last of their birthday money on video games, since this is the last week they can play them on weekdays before school starts: Daniel wanted Final Fantasy IV, Adam wanted Petz Cats 2 which he apparently thought would be like a cat version of Nintendogs. It wasn't, and he was bitterly disappointed and spent the rest of the afternoon unhappy. I didn't know what to tell him, since I always tell them to check ratings and play demos before they spend their money on games. I'm wondering whether this particular game has glitches in it and that's why he can't make it do the things he thought it did, but I don't know enough about Nintedo DS games to have any idea!
( Air Mobility Command Museum Car Show )
I'm completely oversaturated on the Olympics -- we all are -- so in the evening we watched Deja Vu on On Demand, which was a much better movie than I was expecting...I'm not sure why I didn't expect to like it so much, considering it's a great cast and a neat sci-fi hook. ( Spoilers. ) I am worried, though, about the sea turtles that wandered into a restaurant and the baby whale that tried to bond with a yacht after its mother apparently abandoned it. At least there is good news for penguins who want to be knights.
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| Poem for Monday |
[18 Aug 2008|12:41am] |
( Vers de Société )
We talked about maybe going downtown today to see the exhibit on China's lost fleet at National Geographic or the one on Afghanistan's treasures at the National Gallery of Art, but laundry and getting organized ended up winning out. So I have nothing really exciting to report, not even on our neighborhood pool's dessert party, which was scheduled for tonight but apparently got switched at some point while we were out of town. The kids swam anyway and played with Adam's good friend, and I got some photos cropped and answered a pile of e-mail.
( Dover AFB B-17 )
I love that version of the Exodus music that Anna Pavlova uses for her gymnastics floor routine at the Olympics. Does anyone know who did the recording? And whether Pavlova has ever commented on why she chose it? I can't believe her coach, the Russian team coordinator and Pavlova herself (is she related to the dancer of the same name?) are all unaware of the music's origin or what the film and the book it's based on are about.
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| Poem for Sunday |
[17 Aug 2008|12:16am] |
( No Road )
We're home after a relatively easy drive -- very little traffic approaching or going over the Bay Bridge despite the accident earlier in the week -- and a nice afternoon in Dover. I convinced Paul to stop at the beach after we checked out, so I got to stick my feet in the Atlantic one more time, and Adam was excited because there were piping plovers running up and down the sand looking for crabs the big waves were churning up. Then we drove to the Air Mobility Command Museum at Dover Air Force Base, where in addition to the historic planes and exhibits on the Berlin Airlift, Operation Nickel Grass, refueling in midair and the lives of enlisted men among other displays -- there was a World War II veteran talking about his time as the tail gunner on a B-17G that was shot down by the Germans, leading to the entire crew being taken prisoner, though all of them survived the war -- the museum was hosting a historic car, truck and cycle show. We ate lunch in the canteen, then drove into the center of Dover, the capital of Delaware. We visited the Biggs Museum of American Art, which has art both by Delaware artists and related to Delaware history, and toured the 1791 Georgian Old State House.
( Delaware's Capital )
Driving out of Dover, we discovered by accident that Dover has a terrific Pagan store, Bell, Book & Candle, where I demanded that we stop and find a parking space. Then we drove back across Kent Island and the Chesapeake Bay, electing not to stop for dinner till we were home because we knew we'd need a grocery store trip. Paul and Daniel had Jerry's pizza; Adam and I had sushi, really excellent spicy tuna rolls. The cats look like they can't quite figure out what we're doing here and why perkypaduan isn't here, but as long as they have bags to climb in and food in their dishes, they don't seem too stressed out! And yay for Michael Phelps!
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| Poem for Saturday |
[16 Aug 2008|12:06am] |
( My Mother )
It rained all night but the sun was out at 8 am Friday, so we went to the ocean early. The water was a bit rougher and chillier than the day before, but this provided the advantage of an uncrowded beach. The lifeguards were asking people please not to use boogie boards because the big waves and riptides caused accidents with them. The kids dug big pits and built sand castles, and we found mole crabs and looked at their eggs. My parents came down in the late morning and we all went to the pool for a while, then to the seaside deli in the Sea Colony complex.
In the afternoon we returned to Viking Golf because we had promised Adam that he could go on the big water slides at Thunder Lagoon. I stayed with him while Paul played mini golf with Daniel, then we had some of the excellent caramel corn on the little boardwalk there. My parents had dinner plans with friends and we had planned in the evening to go see Mythica, a local Celtic band, in a free outdoor concert, but there was late afternoon lightning that closed Thunder Lagoon and then a hailstorm on the way back to Bethany Beach from Fenwick Island, so instead we had tacos at the beach house.
( Cape Henlopen )
thefridayfive: ( Music )
fannish5: ( First Chapters )
We had a quiet evening packing, organizing and watching the "Return To Tomorrow" episode of Stargate Atlantis. ( Single line spoiler. ) Saturday we're driving home by way of Dover, where we want to visit a wildlife refuge.
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