December 31, 2011

Great Falls, VA

December has included a lot of bubbly.

DC Good Eats

One of my favorite subjects in one of my favorite cities....the Washington Post names the 40 Dishes Every Washingtonian Must Try.  Admittedly, I've only tried a grand total of nine of them!  Shame!  Then again, of the forty, fewer than half were in The District proper, and I'm not often outside the city limits for eating good grub - at least not something like tacos.  Perhaps, next year, I'll expand my boundaries.

Shout-outs to a few of my favorite dishes - moules at Granville Moore's, Margherita D.O.C. pizza at 2 Amy's, the Blue Buck pancakes at Market Lunch, and palak chaat at Rasika.  A few treats from some of my favorite venues were also included like Founding Farmers and Sticky Rice.

I've been enjoying some festive meals and drinks over the month December with various friends for various festivities including The Tabard Inn (delicious house-smoked salmon plate with cocktails fireside); Adour at the St Regis (love me some holiday prosecco), Mio (excellent new chef, Puerto Rican-inspired menu); Lincoln (their kale salad is money! and their deviled eggs jar is garnished with caviar).  And last night, I enjoyed The Meal of the Year at Little Serow....shhhhh, please don't tell anyone, it's that special.

#OccupyDC - Action

Today there was some OccupyDC action.  Some planned protests of both the sleepers (those who love in tents) and other Occupy activists intended to disrupt Washington.

Today's demonstration was about 100 or so protesters marching down K Street NW, and blocking the intersection at 14th.  This is a block from my work, so I could see and hear it from the windows, and at some point walked over to observe and take some pictures.

Streets were blocked with heavy metal newspaper boxes, trashcans and chairs, and the Occupiers stood in the boxed intersection in the pouring rain chanting.  Police had all four sides cordoned off with police cars, horses and ultimately a wall of police facing off.  It was pretty non-confrontational - protesters chanted and sometimes taunted, police watched them stone-faced and sometimes took the bait.  There were easily an equal number of protesters and police, and an even greater number of spectators taking pictures with their phones.  But you can't block traffic forever, and eventually police began clearing media and bystanders to sidewalks, and then told protesters to also clear the street or face removal.

At this point, as I understand, police rode a bunch of horses slowly into the center, scattering a good number of protesters who did not enjoy facing off against a large imposing animal.  Soon enough the protesters played their role and lay down in the street.  And the police played theirs, giving them warnings, and then began removals and arrests, as protesters again played their part resisting arrest in acts of civil disobedience.   I checked Twitter a few times - #OccupyDC - to see how the scene was described, and I was a bit disappointed to see the tweets, while overall accurate, seem more sensational than what I had witnessed,

I'm quite proud of my city in the handling of OccupyDC.  There hasn't been evictions of the tent cities.  McPherson Square park (and Freedom Square a few blocks away) have codes of conduct posted by the protesters, including how to interact with police and respect the park.  Likewise, park police have posted signs of what is and is not allowed (generators must be cordoned off, for example).  DC's mayor and  Council has expressed support - as long as health and public safety are not threatened.  So far there has not been pepper spray, raids or helicopters as in Oakland and Atlanta.

The methods are a bit fringe-y for me, and the messengers far too scraggly to be effective.  But the principles of the movement speak to me - even with my iPhone and Starbucks and desk job.  Long live Occupy!

Occupy: Great Graphic Design

This, and many other fabulous graphic posters available at www.occuprint.org

Occupy DC

I am an avowed sympathizer of the Occupy movement.  Some people question it's coherence and challenge its lack of clear objectives.  Fair enough criticism, but I'm quite clear about it.  The income gap between  rich and poor is widening, and the super rich are becoming richer by orders of magnitude, while the middle class stagnate and fall behind  Foreclosures, upside-down mortgages, and student debt prohibit decent hard-working people from getting ahead, but these ills were in many ways created by the large financial institutions that are reaping record profit, with the managers of said institutions rewarded with massive bonuses.  And all the while, fiscal policy is structured to save, if not reward, these structures.  That is the 1%, and the rest is the 99%.  The tail is wagging the dog.

The Occupy DC site is in McPherson Square in view of the White House, and about 3 blocks from my office.  Over the last month, I've made it a point to use the Metro exit that allows me to walk past and through the tent city.  I've enjoyed watching it grow and take shape.  It now consists of about one hundred tents - residential sites - pretty much right next to each other in the center and southwest of the square.  The northwest section has grown to become a community hub, complete with medical tent, kitchen, community library, media tent (with solar panels and generator) and message boards.  The south end of the square seems to be loosely organized around social and community affairs - frisbee playing, spontaneous (or not) musical performances, and a meeting area.  Urban planners could not have done better - and this Washington Post article makes some interesting organizing and planning observations around that.

Who says they're not organized?  Check this out!

DAILY SCHEDULE
11:00 [Scribble unclear] Outreach 102
12:00 pm Political education discussion
12:30 p.m Announcements
2pm De-escalation training
5:00pm Newcomer orientation
5pm Roots of the Crisis Workshop
6:00pm General Assembly
8:00pm Committee Meetings

NEEDS
juice
cooking oil
PLATES
Water
Round table for library
Sleeping bags
Tents
Giant coffeepot

This photo shows the library about 2 weeks ago, back when the request was out for a round table.  I passed by again today, and I wish I got a picture.  The library tent is gorgeous, complete with a round table, about four to six chairs, and at least four bookshelves brimming with over 800 books.

Other organic and spontaneous community innovations have taken root.  There is  a "Human Mic," where when announcements are made.  A person says "Mic," and three to six people around him (or her) echo "Mic" and the announcements proceed from there - a natural human amplification of sound.

And while I haven't fully figured out the kitchen, here's a WaPo article about cooking 3 meals a day every day for 100 to 200 protesters with volunteer labor, and donated foodstuffs.  There's also a steady supply of donated prepared foods - burgers from Five Guys (it's not clear whether the store donated or a citizen sympathizer bought and donated), day-old pastries from the Starbucks across the street, and Cherry Garcia ice cream served by Ben and Jerry themselves earlier this week.

This year, we witnessed an Arab Spring, in which long-standing, firmly entrenched and protected government structures were toppled from a more or less spontaneous uprising of civil society.  No one would have bet on it a month earlier.

I have no idea was the Occupy movement will bring.  I am disheartened, disappointed, and disillusioned by heavy-handed confrontations by police on Occupy protests in Oakland and Atlanta.  The Occupy message and the objectives are not concise; and discredited because those messages are expressed by a relatively disparate group of fringe progressives.  Winter is coming.  Attention wanes or gets diverted by Michael Jackson, Justin Bieber,  and Joe Paterno.  Yet still I remain impressed with Occupy DC's stamina, growth, and organic organization.  Thus far, there has been minimal police intervention and confrontation in DC.  I'm pleased for both the protesters and the police.  Occupy movements in other cities continue to form and grow.  They just may be another American Revolution ahead of us.

Fall Tabletop

City Love

Over the weekend, Dear Daughter and I biked our neighborhood for the Renovator's House Tour.  We hit 5 of the 8 homes on view, and she was one to point out to me this lovely green mural in view of the back yard of one of the homes.  So sweet.  I love this pic - especially the color blocks that come from the lines of the telephone wires, the wall color, the small white-framed window, the charming heart-shaped foliage, and the clear blue sky of a gorgeous fall day.

The Renovator's House Tour features homes that have been creatively renovated and restored in our historic urban village. The thing I love about this particular tour is that it often showcases how families can make a go of city living, and how small spaces can be transformed in big ways by using space in efficient and innovative ways, and making rooms multi-functional.  Even more impressive, the tour is open to the public, and raises $20,000 for the local public school.

Nice life. 

Watch this!

[Long time, no see...but I'm alive and well.  :-) ]

Want to know what English sounds like to foreigners?
This short film is in "fake" English, and gives an idea of what that's like.  It's really trippy.  I could tell what was going on, could get all the intonations and inflections, and it sounds "just like English," only I couldn't understand a word.  Check it out...



With thanks to A Cup of Joe for the discovery

Happy Birthday CaBi!

Shamelessly lifted from www.capitolbikeshare.com

After one year, Capital Bikeshare is thriving.  They clocked their millionth ride, and one recent fall weekend, casual riders (1 and 5-day membership) took more rides than regular riders (1-month and annual memberships).  The program is wildly popular - a red and yellow CaBi bike was definitely the accessory of the summer for urban men and women.  Another symptom of its popularity -  stations have had issues with re-balancing, being all empty or all full, and thus not in circulation for either rentals or returns - a phenomenon I myself have experienced no fewer than three times at less popular stations at non-peak times.  In all honestly, while annoying, I'm secretly completely tickled by such success.  Growing success, that is, additional stations and bikes are going in this fall...including one station just two blocks from my house (I currently use 3 stations nearby, depending on my route; each one is about 4 blocks from home).

Businesses are clamoring to get (and even sponsor) a CaBi bike station at their doorstep.  Residents are demanding them of their municipalities. Montgomery County - typically cool for the suburbs - wants in; but hat tip to Arlington as the first suburban county to go in, edging our MoCo as the hipper, greener, more innovative, more visionary of the two dueling inner ring 'burbs.  You snooze, you lose, MoCo!  This makes DC - yes, DC! - the proud home of the largest public bikeshare system in North America.  It's nice to be the cool one everyone else wants to be for once. Like NYC wants to be us, too.  They just announced Alta will be their contractor for the new bike sharing program of the Big Apple.  Welcome, New York, glad you could join us.  

I'm particularly proud to be a founding member - one of the first 1000 to join CaBi, I have a black commemorative bike fob, rather than the usual red.  I'm not one of their super users.  I tend to use the bikes a few times per month for quick neighborhood jaunts from Point A to Point B, rather than walking.  Each time,  however, I feel super virtuous - clean, green, active, urban, and hip.  I even handicap my cool factor, because I'm over 40 and a mom.

Nice job!  It's only been a year, but I can't imagine life and DC without it anymore.  Happy Birthday, CaBi!!!

Heads up!

There is a 1 in 3,200 chance of getting hit by space junk now hurtling toward Earth this week.  The falling satellite, UARS, is the size of a school bus, and will likely hit Earth on Friday (give or take a day) - somewhere between the northern Newfoundland and southern South America latitudes. Or more precisely, but less dramatically, between 57 degrees N and 57 degrees South, and thus could hit just about anywhere around the fattest part of the planet.  While it is expected to break into pieces in a fiery light show, and rain across a path of up to 500 miles, with the largest debris estimated at about 300 pounds.

Scientists say it is not likely to hit a person.  The planet is well-covered with water, and even on land, we are relatively sparsely populated, except in places like New York City and Dhaka.  In order to take appropriate precautions, I will be walking around in my bike helmet starting Thursday at noon.

DC school metrics

Here's an interesting ranking of the DC's public and charter elementary, middle and high schools that looks at students achieving "advanced" scores in math and reading, rather than just "proficient." This study combined the percentage of students at each school who scored "advanced" on standardized tests.  The thinking behind this different analysis is twofold.  First, proficient just isn't good enough. But, more importantly -  because, of course, some kids at Lake Webegon will just have to be average - what are these schools doing right?

Of course - and unfortunately - poverty and privilege, have something to do with it.  So the ranking also includes the percentage in the school who are eligible for free and reduced lunch.  With this additional insight, it's not all that surprising that Janney Elementary and Key Elementary - with 0% eligible for free and reduced lunch - have very high performing students, with combined advanced math and reading scores around 80% or better.  Both schools are in tony Upper NW DC - or Upper Cupcake, as I sneeringly refer to it.  Both schools are about 70% lily white - though in the grand scheme of things, that is still pretty diverse for fanciness.

It seems that the more interesting success are in those highly ranked schools, with a signifigant percentage of kids eligible for free and reduced lunch - or poor kids.  I'm told by a reliable soucre that a school with  fewer than 40% poor kids is pretty much a middle class school.  So which schools did well against the odds - those schools that made the top 25 ranking for advanced reading and math scores and have 40%+ poor kids?  Here they are below - # is the rank; bold represents the combined percentage of students achieving advanced on math and reading standardized test; the plain font number is the percentage of poor kids; italics means it's a charter school.

#6.  Banneker High (magnet): 54, 776. 
#12 D.C. Prep Charter Middle: 77, 55
#13 Capital City Charter (elementary): 41, 49

#14 KIPP KEY (charter middle): 76, 47

#17 KIPP College Prep (charter high school): 83, 42

#18 Wilson High School: 42, 41

#19  Haynes Charter (3rd-8th): 69, 40

#20 Height Community Charter Butler (elementary): 100, 40

#21  Ellington School of Arts (high school): 42, 39

#22 Stuart-Hobson Middle: 40, 37

#24 KIPP WILL (charter middle): 82, 36

#25 Ross Elementary: 40, 36

What's one to make of all this?  Well, this education policy novice, metrics aficionado, involved parent of a DCPS second grader, and amateur blogger has a few observations to ponder further.  

First, charter schools are doing a decent job of educating poor kids.  Well, that and their engaged parents are smart enough to get them out of their failing neighborhood school, find a good charter, get them enrolled (often by winning the admission lottery), and get them there everyday.  Theese parents are also probably the same ones who check on homework and go to parent-teacher conferences, and place value on education.  This is one of the biggest criticisms of charter schools - it robs the failing schools of the good kids and parents that can lift the rest up.  See City Paper artcile "Has the Black Middle Class Given up on Neighborhood Schools."

Second, not much is happening in the way of decent elementary schools - public or charter.  Ok, maybe that's a bit unfair. There are plenty of good schools - elementary, middle, and high school - where there are dedicated (and tired) teachers, good students, and engaged parents who are scoring proficient on the tests.  This ranking focuses on high-performing "advanced" students.  Let's not throw the baby out with the bath water!

Third, only Banneker High is in the Top 10, and it's a magnet school.  Self selection is self-selection - of course, they'll do well.  But here we have a self-selection of poor kids who are high-performing, and the school is serving them well.  There is something important happening here.  Personally, I think that self-selection at the high school level - college prep, magnet schools - that start culling to make sure those students get what they need to prepare them for when they graduate as 18yo adults is just fine.  And full disclosure, I'm a product of such an inner-city, highly diverse, highly socially-economically integrated magnet school.

Fourth and fifth, and a few more observations...Standardized tests are't the greatest measurment tool of a good school.  They're also not always the best test of a student's learning and abilities.  But it's what we've got, and I'm a big believer that we have to measure something somehow - we just need to know the trade-offs we're making in that measurement.  Stuart-Hobson Middle School is my local middle school - doing fairly well, and serving good a diversity socioeconomic backgrounds.  I've got my eye on middle school for Dear Daughter - just four years away.  My own analysis and assessment will include these thoughts and many others. 

And finally, and completely unrelated, I was originally pointed to the Jay Matthews Washington Post article and school rankings through the fabulaous WaPo local politics blog "District of deBonis, " and I have a secret crush on its journalist bloggerMike deBonis :-).

Missoni for Target Hits It!

Guess I''m not the only one psyched about the Missoni collection at Target!

Target's New Missoni Collection Brings Down Site  :-)  Shame on Target for not being better prepared.  I mean you'd think they'd've realized when the pre-opening pop-up Missoni for Target store sold out in a night last week.  And when the preview for fashion editors last fall left the shelves in a "mild ravage."

Admittedly, all this rave and rage makes things more difficult for me.  Of course, I haven't had a chance to make it to Target yet, and now at best, I'll be there on the weekend with the masses.  Can't wait to see it in person!

Simple. Beautiful. True.

If there is to be peace in the world,
There must be peace in the nations.


If there is to be peace in the nations,
There must be peace in the cities.


If there is to be peace in the cities,
There must be peace between neighbors.


If there is to be peace between neighbors,
There must be peace in the home.


If there is to be peace in the home,
There must be peace in the heart.


-Lao Tse

OMG. MIssoni for Target! Can't wait!

Missoni - the Italian design house of richly textured geometric patterns, fabulous stripes, earthy (but punchy!) colors, elaborately-woven knits, all with a 60's vibe, - has designed a limited edition line for high brow/low price, accessibly hip/mass market store Target.  Finally, some Missoni I can afford.  I've spent so many years window licking at the boutique and drooling all over the pages of Italian Vogue.

The line of 400 items includes fabulous sweater dresses, funky tights, awesome ballet flats, cool kids' style, luxe bedding, bold dishes, and even a rad bike (perfect for a very gutsy someone).  Some nice men's stuff - socks, scarves, a refined sweater - for a handsome guy.  The full lookbook is here.  It will only be on sale from September 13 to October 22 or "while supplies last" - and given the buzz within the fashionista underground which is just fueling the mass media hype, I think that last phrase is key.  I'm already staking out Target in unhip areas  - as in not Columbia Heights - to have a fighting chance.

I'm imagining an awesome holiday outfit for G, those flats for me, and maybe a cool brown-striped cardigan, a couple of pairs of tights, a hat/scarf set, a quilted coverlet, and some cool serving pieces.  I'll have to hold back a bit though.  Head-to-toe, wall-to-wall, floor to ceiling Missoni might make me dizzy.

First Day of School

Birthday

Marine Biology - Sunset (amazing light)

Marine Biology

 

yourpet

FY12 Workplanning

Mexican Night

Corn Tortillas with Queso Blanco

Black Bean Salad

(black beans, corn, avocado, tomatoes, cilantro with a squeeze of lime)

Beer

College Night

Buffalo Wins (homemade)

Ranch Dip (homemade)

Carrots & Celery

Black Bean Dip (homemade) & Salsa (not)

Chips

Beer

Vespa Ride, Nighttime NYC

Arcade

Brazilian Feast (OMG)

Great people, great music, celebrations. 

Caipirinhas

Arroz com feijao

Lombo com farofa

Churrasco

Salada de Palmito

Tribute to Cy Twombly (1928-2011)

Perfect summer evening

Our neighbor gave me a eggplant from her lush summer garden, and I prepared this gorgeous recipe from the NY Times. Served with oven-warmed pita, and thick, tangy Greek yogurt, it made a delish veg meal - perfectly accompanied by a nice glass of Spanish red for mom and seltzer with lingonberry syrup for Dear Daughter.

Later, we took our bikes to the new gelato place near Eastern Market, where I had a mix of Sicilian almond and chocolat noir, while she chose chocolate chip and strawberry.

Just about every part of this post has something I love about my life. Neighbors, garden vegetables, good food, Turkish-style braised eggplant, anything from Turkey, yogurt, anything from Greece, the New York Times, eating well, red wine, anything from Spain, lingonberry syrup, anything from Sweden, Dear Daughter, bikes, Capitol Hill, cities, ice cream, gelato, anything from Italy, almonds, chocolate, local, community, summer light,  and summer evenings.  Bliss.

Desert Design Nirvana

Sigh...I love the desert.  While I generally thrive in the urban habitat, I think the desert might be my favorite landscape.  I find total beauty in its starkness.  I love the big sky, the limitless terrain, and its muted colors.   I love that it is quiet and empty, and the way life springs up in such inhospitable conditions.  Some of my favorite outdoor moments among a long and wonderful lifetime have been hiking in Red Rocks (Nevada);  exploring in and around Santa Fe, New Mexico; marveling at the striated hues of time - thousands of years of it - in the Painted Desert (Arizona); making day trips to Joshua Tree National Park, and riding on the back of those cute Peace Corps boys' motorcycles to the top of the buttes in Niger's moonscape.

And this amazing house built in the middle of the desertscape somewhere in Nevada featured in the New York Times.  Somewhere in Nevada is actually Scotty's Junction, about 125 miles north of Las Vegas on the edge of Death Valley.  But even with all that orienting, it's still Somewhere, Nevada to me.  At 1200 square feet, its relatively small footprint is sparse, simple, and efficient. It reminds me of some of the fabulous pre-fab, eco houses built and highligted in the Solar Decathalon,  This one, Lumenhaus,  I wrote about in a previous blogpost.


The NYTimes slideshow is gorgeous.  I can walk into every picture, and imagine myself writing by the window...soaking in the spring fed hot tub...sitting on the porch looking at the sky change....cooking in the kitchen (or just getting lost in my thoughts while gazing out its window)...taking a shower in the sage-green tiled bathroom....or watching the planetarium spin its show outside the corner bedroom windows while drifting off to sleep...x

The owner and family is Italian, and the design aesthetic shows.  Their personal style sense shows, too, here in the family shot (hello, Grandma!)  But the furniture is functional and affordable from Ikea and CB2.  In fact, the overall house is affordable, custom built for $290,000.  With a bordello and an abandoned chapel as the nearest neighbors, I'm imagining that it is not prime real estate either...yet.  My increasingly green sensibilities are offended by the energy it must take to drive in and out of here - car-dependent to the max.  But I'm comforted by the fact that there is no air con, just ceiling fans, and presumably smart window placement and indoor and outdoor shades.

I do wonder what all that space and closeness means when I take the romanticism away.  Would I go stir crazy there?  Alone?  While often an introvert, too much time with myself makes me batty.  Together, would we drive each other crazy?  Would it be disturbing at first, only to turn more blissful with each passing day?  Or the other way around?  I'm willing to try it...are you?

Composing a great meal of good food

One of my favorite summer diversions has become composing delicious, usually cool, more-veg-than-not,  meals made with local summer bounty.  All the better if it is inspired by and can evoke a place, time, and mood.  Someplace we'd rather be...anywhere, but here.

Here are some recent menus for Summer 2011:

Ciao Italia:  Tonight's dinner included roasted red peppers; farm tomatoes & garden basil; fresh buffalo mozzarella; sliced pepperoni; white bean salad with garden sage; spinach wilted in olive oil, garlic and a squeeze of lemon; crusty bread; and a bottle of wine.  Later, we enjoyed homemade cherry-vanilla ice pops.  Yummy, cool, and so easy!

Simplemente Mexico:  Last week, I used up a host of leftovers and re-created them into something totally new and easy.  I sprinkled a mild, white mexican cheese on corn tortillas and broiled them to just enough to crisp the tortilla and melt the cheese; a light pico de gallo sauce on the side; and served with a black bean, fresh corn kernel, avocado, cilantro salad with a squeeze of lime.  Cold beer made it lively.

Grilling in Greece:  One recent warm night, I grilled some lamb rubbed with garlic and rosemary, and served it with homemade cucumber tsatsiki, crumbled feta, olives, and flat bread.  The charred lamb was such a lovely accompaniment to the simple sides.

One Night in Nice:  Dear Daughter will tell just about anyone her favorite food is a Nicoise salad - much to my chagrin - it sounds so precocious!  What she really means is she loves La Nouvelle Observatrice's composed Nicoise with lightly steamed green beans, fresh garden tomatoes, boiled eggs, some briny olives, boiled new potatoes tossed with olive oil and chives, and tuna (if it's in a tin, I use the Italian brand packed in oil, and mix in some fresh parsley).  I usually whip up a lemon-dijon vinaigrette, and drizzle it over the colorful platters.

Crunchy-punchy Caesar:  This one is an American classic - originating, they say, from the Brown Derby in Hollywood, also ubiquitous at steakhouse menus - actually pretty ubiquitous on any American menu!  I do love the effect of the crisp cool hearts of romaine on a summer day.  The weekend's stale bread makes the homemade crusty croutons.  The aged parmesan reggiano is nutty, and procured during a weekend outing at Eastern Market.  I make my vinaigrette with extra punch - lots of lemon, lots of garlic, lots of dijon (extra forte).  Grilling even just one or two chicken breasts gives us enough protein for a few people - more people than breasts can - for once - work out here.

More Inspiration than Perspiration:  Salmon burgers have become a regular go-to meal around here.  Being pressed for time, a little lazy, and taking more credit for the inspiration to eat fresh and healthy, than the actually making of it, I buy pre-made salmon patties at the fish store or Whole Foods Market, grill them up, and serve on whole wheat burger buns, with a spoonful of 1000 Island dressing, some romaine (See Caesar - regularly in my fridge in the summer months), and a slice or two of tomato (see other recipes - perfect in July and August)

Late July Harvest Show-off:  Pasta primavera was featured recently on this blog.  A quick sautee of  summer squash, sweet onion, corn, tomato and basil - no need to be saucy about it.  I serve it over a small portion of pasta - the pasta-veg/sauce ratio is no more than 1-to-1.  Aged parmesan is grated over our bright yellow-red-green dishes right at the table.  Yum.

Don't forget the power of good, cold craft beer, chilled white (or even pink) wine, bubbly seltzer (add a dash of cranberry juice or a flavored syrup for fanciness), lemonade (with or without pureed raspberries), and homemade ice cream (just 20 minutes, plus freezetime in the ice cream maker) to get credit for being a domestic goddess.  Nigella, my luscious, eat your heart out!

Pasta Primavera

Summer Vegetables: zucchini, tomatoes, corn, basil over rotini, sprinkled with parmesan

Sauvignon Blanc

Weekend

Summertime, and the living is easy.

I'm not sure if it's because of the season.  Or because things at work are at a slower pace.   Or because even though my new boss is super-charging our workload and raising the bar big-time, I feel motivated at work and able to define my life and my schedule (which in June meant, I took every Friday off, and today meant that I worked from home in the morning, ducked out for G's performance, and then headed to the office at 1:30, but proceed to work 'til 7pm...on a Friday,...in the summer).  But at any rate, I'm feeling pretty chillax.  And I'm looking forward to a weekend that is mixed with lazing about, doing chores, and being lightly social - or "social-lite."

Tonight was "Book" Club - hardly about books, and hardly a club - but a bunch of irreverent urban moms who like to host good friends, cook great food, eat it well, accompanied by choice beer and wine, and proceed to talk and laugh until midnight or so.  Our bike commutes converge as the blocks get closer in, so one biker, turned to two at my place, where we caught up with two others a few blocks away, and half a block from our host's house found the other three biker contingent coming from the north end of our neighborhood.  I'll spare you the (delicious) menu (there are so many damn food blogs out there these days) and the topics of conversation (to protect the innocent, and because you had to be there), and skip to the end, when my ride home with two others took us the long way to better revel in the cool (in  DC July!) air, the clear black sky, the round bright silver moon,  and the car-free city streets.

Tomorrow's chores include a grocery shop, picking up my computer back-up drive, a trip to the library for returns and pick-up of the books I've reserved online.  It also involves some cooking - a Mexican bean salad and some homemade ice cream (can't decide how I'll top last week's ginger peach, but I'm leaning toward strawberry almond or cinnamon blueberry).  I'll swim in the newly-discovered 50m (Olympic-sized) DC pool that feels simply tremendous in the glorious sun and blue sky and experienced by my working, churning body.  There's a plan with G - perhaps some recreational swimming, and a night in with gameboards (she's learned Sorry!) or cards (Skip-bo, by the makers of Uno).

Sunday will find us at church, followed by brunch with friends...and then we must encamp somewhere for the Women's World Cup (USA!), before heading home at the very last minute for visiting with G's godmoms and kids.

It may very well turn into the Perfect Weekend.

La Nouvelle Observatrice

New York City Food Tour

Mmmmmmm...just back from a delicious four-day trip to New York.  All fun, no work!  Here's a meal-by meal account...

Balthazar - First stop after the train, a quick lunch in SoHo.  This spot is known for the rich and gorgeous, and this Sunday was no exception.  Instead of the sit-down, expensive, tres chic brunch, we opted for the take-away counter - a gorgeous patisserie - where a jambon-fromage sandwich on a crusty baguette and a fresh mint-lemonade on the bench outside while people-watching was simply low-key perfect.

Motorino - Later in the Deep East Village, we had to try to best pizza in New York (at least according to the New York Times).  OMG.  Heaven.  The fennel salad was impeccable. The well-balanced mix of fennel, orange, olives, capers, and parmesan had a lovely fresh, salty, minty, citrus-y pop - perfect for a summer evening.  The Margherita pizza (the true test of the best) met expectations - yeasty crust with just enough black char and a creamy fresh buffalo mozz was delish (though I found the tomato sauce a bit soupy).  A simple glass of Nero d'Avola- my summer favorite in Italian wine was a perfect complement.

Shake Shack - New Yorkers line up for this local chain serving burgers and shakes (now also in Dupont Circle, DC).  I haven't tried either - but I did did a kick out of those stylish hipsters lining up fro them in the summer twilight of Madison Square Park.  We hit the B-line (no hot food, no shakes) where with no line, no waiting, I soon had a sweet corn ice cream cone in my hand.  Another park bench served as a perch for fabulous people-watching and eavesdropping.

Tom's Restaurant - In the morning, it was off to Morningside Heights, my old stomping ground at Columbia, for a little walkabout.  First stop, Tom's - the 24-hour diner institution of Seinfeld and Suzanne Vega fame - for a greasy spoon breakfast.  Sadly, a bit of a disappointment.  The place has been refurbished, and lost it's dive-y charm.  The egg and ham sandwich on an English muffin was lackluster, and the coffee was weak.  I think coffee expectations have changed over the years from Folgers to Brooklyn Roasters...and Tom's is still with the former.

Petrie Cafe at the Metropolitan Museum - The gorgeous summer afternoon hopping between art museums and Central Park beckoned us to the Petrie Cafe at the Met.  The setting was perfect - cooled from the mid-day scorcher, but the wide windows to the courtyard presented the tall green shade trees and the Central Park scenery as if we were immersed in it all.  Here, desperate for vegetables, I had an early summer bounty salad of asparagus, peas and fava beans, and four glasses of NYC tap water.

Eataly - A surprising number of our first choice bistros were closed for the July 4th holiday, but we finally found one good option open.  The Italian food emporium is a huge warehouse of Italian groceries and food purveyors - shelves of pastas, aisles of olive oils, butcher, dairy shop, cheese, incredible espresso, a gelato store...and five sit-down restaurants, each with a specialty - fish, meat, vegetarian, pizza and pasta.  We opted for the pasta - actually the pasta opted us, as all the others were fully booked. A simple antipasti dish - pickled cremini, roasted beets (with crumbled pistachios - yum), shaved asparagus with pecorino, and olives - started us off.  Then, we enjoyed two simple pasta dishes - an earthy, rich ravioli stuffed with prosciutto and gran padano in a brown-butter sage sauce and a lighter, fresher cavatelli with cherry tomatoes and arugula.  All al dente... A good bottle of Italian red - what was it again? - completed the meal and the day.

Bagels - Poppy seed with cream cheese and a coffee from the corner take-out.  It was excellent - and so great to be amidst all the New Yorkers getting the same order as they headed to work.

PJ Clarke's (not worth the link) - Not surprisingly a food disappointment, but we weren't there for the meal, we were there for the New York Harbor view in the Financial District. Some sailboats heading out and Lady Liberty standing watch were five-star all the way!  My Maine lobster roll was bursting with sweet meat...but the iced tea was weak, the coleslaw bland, and the service abhorrent.

Paradou - After a walk on the High Line - my new favorite place in New York, though my recent discovery of Madison Square Park with the luminescent sculpture of a girls' face (Echo, Jaume Plensa) is a close second - we ate dinner in this little bistro in the Meatpacking District,  We ordered our most decadent meal of the trip, and it was hit and miss.  An insanely rich, curated foie gras was incredible - served with macadamia nuts drenched in Lillet! -  started the meal.  This was the highlight of the meal.  A medium rare steak was well cooked, but a poor cut- chewy and fatty.  However, its accompaniment of potato gratin -  finely slivered potatoes, layered with a nutty cheese and a dash of allspice - was heavenly.  The tiny pile of greens on the plate added lightness, but its lackluster flavor was not worth the effort.  A nice bottle of Cote du Rhone kept it all very French in the elegant courtyard garden.  While the overall experience was quite pleasant and warm, the meal itself was merely fair and tepid. Next time, I think I'll go back to exploring the West Village.

Bon appétit!

New York for Marriage Equality

A Marriage Equality vote is going to the State Senate soon - likely next week - as they try to catch up with DC's enlightened ways.  It's close, but it looks like it's just one vote away from passing, and that Senator remains undecided.  And in getting to that threshold, recently, Republican State Senator, Roy McDonald crossed party lines to state he planned to vote for it.   He was quoted as saying:

"You get to the point where you evolve in your life where everything isn't black and white, good and bad, and you try to do the right thing.

"You might not like that. You might be very cynical about that. Well, f**k it, I don't care what you think. I'm trying to do the right thing."  

Way to go, Mc Donald.  Here's to evolving.  Her's to not seeing life in black and white.  Here's to doing the right thing.  And while, I'm at it, here's to TMZ.com, the celebrity gossip site for covering it and standing on the side of love.

Sweet Mango Armpit

Fragrance in body products have always annoyed and amused me.  While I don't always get unscented products, I do seek out the lightest, most natural fragrance for my hair, body, and laundry.  Recently, it seems like the scenting has gotten out of control - "Cherry Mischief" Clear Gel Deodorant by Secret (wow! - that's practically a porn flick) or "Va Va Vanilla" also by Secret. I really don't want my armpit smelling like a bakery.  It seems rather ridiculous.  But while I steer clear of such frou-frou scenting, at least they make some scent sense.

This morning, however, I was shaving in the shower with Skintimate Extra Moisturizing Shave Gel for Sensitive Skin.  I must have bought it on sale - it would not usually jump into my shopping cart from the shelf.  The lather was bright pink, and smelled sickly sweet like strawberry-mango cotton candy.  I looked down at the label to figure out what on earth I had purchased....

"Cashmere Rain" it said on the label.  What?!?!  Is that like a damp sweater or a muggy summer rainstorm?  Is it soft fuzzy raindrops?  Or wet velvet?  At any rate, it's the dumbest marketing I've ever seen in my entire life.  I can't believe no one caught that in the focus group.   Jeesh.

Radio City Music Hall, New York

Cool! Life's lessons in data form

Yet another amazing interactive data graphic at the NYTimes.  This one is a measure of the frequency of key words within this season's commencement speeches.  I am, as usual, particularly enamored with the data presentation.  The list of colleges and universities (organized by private, public, and military) with the commencement speaker name, affiliation, and link to speech on YouTube runs along the left column.  Key word (and by extension themes) run across the top.  And the circle size represents frequency of word use. So much information, so clearly presented at once; it can be looked at as a whole ("world" ran across nearly every speech), or disassembled in its parts (Sheryl Sandberg, COO Facebook sure said "Facebook" a lot, but it was a popular refrain across the board).

The themes tell us something about our times - "world," "economy," "Facebook/Twitter" - but also reflect the grandiose and seemingly limitless horizon that "commencement" provides -"change," "service/responsibility," "joy/happiness,"  and "love/passion."

I think I would enjoy Jonathan Franzen's address about the importance of going beyond "Liking" a la Facebook, but to take a boldder, braver, more purposeful step of "loving" and embracing.  And I find it interesting that Bill Clinton, the world's statesman, told NYU's graduates, "You should strive to find happiness every day and not believe that it comes at the end of the journey." - a lesson he surely learned on a visit with the Dalai Lama.

And back to Sheryl Sandberg - a woman who has made more money than God paving our new roads of human interaction through social networks and digital media.  She wisely told the group of undergraduates at Barnard College, a women's college in New York City:

Women almost never make one decision to leave the work force. It doesn’t happen that way. They make small little decisions along the way that eventually lead them there. Maybe it’s the last year of med school when they say, “I’ll take a slightly less interesting specialty because I’m going to want more balance one day.” Maybe it’s the fifth year in a law firm when they say, “I’m not even sure I should go for partner, because I know I’m going to want kids eventually.” These women don’t even have relationships, and already they’re finding balance, balance for responsibilities they don’t yet have. And from that moment, they start quietly leaning back.

So, my heartfelt message to all of you is, and start thinking about this now, do not leave before you leave. Do not lean back; lean in. Put your foot on that gas pedal and keep it there until the day you have to make a decision, and then make a decision. That’s the only way, when that day comes, you’ll even have a decision to make.

Wise words, indeed! 

Take this evilsayers...

Here's one of those feel-good stories when all that evil hate is deflected to good. Lisa Lampanelli * told the nasty homophobic Westboro Baptist Church that for every one of their protesters at her KS show she would donate $1000 to a gay charity.

Now, Gay Men's Health Crisis (NY) is $50k richer.


* Who is she? Not sure, but she must be famous-ish because I found this story on the celebrity gossip blog TMZ.com, that I indulge in on a regular basis despite having no idea who they are talking about.

The struggle

I'm struggling these days, weeks, months to keep my perspective.  For whatever reasons, it feels like the wind in my sails has died, and I am dealing with all sorts of self-doubt, second guessing, and a massive crisis of confidence.  I'm not sure exactly where I left my mojo, or who took it from me.  But I do know that I was in a much better place 6 months ago.  I know I am the same person, living the same beautiful life, in the same enviable circumstance.  I'm not ungrateful, far from it, in fact.  And yet, I can't seem to shake the feeling that I am less.  Sometimes it feels like loss.  Sometimes it feels like disappointment.  Sometimes it's a feeling of being overwhelmed by my current circumstances, while underwhelmed by the alternative.   My inner peace suffers discontent.  My creative spark is gone; and my energy is zapped; my optimism is crowded out by resignation; my passion, by apathy.

There are many things that lead me to believe that this is a temporary condition.  I have my faith that this, too, shall pass.  I'm aware that in some ways my time feels so dreadfully slow and stagnant, but so much happens over the course of a day, a week, a month, a year that I both don't see the progress, or recognize the inflection points until they become retrospective.  I know that a good swim can clear my head in 20 minutes (though these 20 minutes are few and farther between these days.  I know that my church can fill my soul with exuberant  joy, profound peace, and deep aches simultaneously in the best of all possible ways.  I know the best thing for me would be to let go, and let it be.  That my self-loving voice will serve me better than my self-critical one, but that ironically, that self-love must includes self-acceptance that embraces that inner critic.  I know that happiness is a practice.

But for now, all that shit is not kicking in and here I am...struggling...  

Old Boyfriend Tour

Yesterday morning, I had to drive from someplace to somewhere on I-495 - the 10-lane ring road that surrounds Washington, DC and connects its first-tier suburbs. As I whizzed passed the exits - Takoma Park...Silver Spring...Kensington...Bethesda - at nearly 80 mph, I thought of the once-boyfriend who lived there.  Our good times and our endings flashed through my mind; some sour feelings, but mostly warm ones washed over me.

And then a nerdy, bad pun entered my head, and the Old Boyfriend Tour screeched to a halt with a groan..."Notches in my Beltway"

OBL - Metrics

Osama bin Laden was killed this week by US forces.  I have many thoughts about this and other things - some blog posts rattling around my head that may never find this outlet because I'm busy and living life fully!  But I did appreciate this interactive, graphic, polling tool from the NYTimes that plots both significance of his death in the war on terror and emotional response response of the event.  Neither scientific, nor representative - it does allow for some additional insight of the pulse of readers.

Cool tool!

This is so AWESOME, it's SICK!

When I found this data graph for DC's awesome Capital BikeShare, I became nearly giddy.  I've been playing with it for the last hour or so, and I'm like a kid in a candy store.  My heart is aflutter - for real! All my favorite things!  I love metrics.  I love cities.  I love interactive real time data.  I love bikes, and more so bike shares.  I love CaBi. so proud to be one of the founding members (as one of the first 2,000 members with a free t-shirt and commemorative keyfob....(geekster grin: Geek + Hipster = Geekster!)).  I love public transport, and more so if it's extra-green and innovative public transport.

Here's the link again...now let's play!  So much data depicted on first click.  First, the overall view of the CaBi program is the homescreen.  Larger circles denote larger stations with more bike docks.  The color of the circles show how full/empty the docks are - blue is emptier, deep red is an completley full station.  The graph is realtime, and the lower right hand corner gives usage stats.  Right now, pretty late on a Thursday evening, use is a low, sleepy 3%.  The max simultaneous usage for today was 173 bikes, in use, or a respectable 20% of all available bikes in use (more about this later).  That lower right hand info box has some pretty cool extra features.  You can show or hide a ticker which tells you bikes going in and out of station realtime.  It also shows usage and distribution imbalance datagraphs for the day.  Around 5pm, today the fewest bikes were in docks - or conversely, the most were in use.

Even more fun...there is an animation button where we can see those station circles go from blue to red and back again in a neato timelapse run.  See how, people head downtown, and then back to residential districts over the course of a day.  Sounds like a commuter city, until you realize this is by bikes, not crawling on the Beltway!  Mixed-use zones - shopping/residential/business like Dupont Circle and Capitol Hill get used all day.

Then, there's a little thrill ride here...Click on a station, and see it's dock stats for the last 24-hour period - the peaks and valleys of rush hour, the sharp zig-zags of frequent use.  For example, 16th and U has a precipitous drop from totally full to totally empty during the morning rush hour, as this high-density, young, urban hipster neighborhood heads out to work, presumably downhill towards downtown.  The Union Station dock does the same, with an opposite effect - all the bikes are taken from this busy transit hub around 6pm and dispersed to other docks within the nearby residential neighborhood.  One of my local stations at 14th and D Streets SE gets decent use throughout the day, but by 9pm, it's docks are full.  This matches my recent experience, when one evening, I grabbed a CaBi bike from the pool toward home, and found no docks at this station.  I had to ride a few blocks farther, though not too much off my path, to return my bike to a different station.  And Eastern Market (8th and Penn SE) and Dupont Circle stations get a fair amount of usage throughout the day.

And that awesome little addictive live data set led me to the supra-awesome blog Suprageography: I see data, I make maps that covers bikeshare data stats for several urban bikeshare programs around the world.  WOW!  I totally [HEART] that Oliver guy!  He recently posted about a big day for bikesharing - Easter Sunday - where he notes there was HUGE usage in DC (in the #1 ranking), Miami, and London - all soaring above 35% simultaneous bikes in use.  In DC 37% of our 872 bikes were in use at about 4 in the afternoon (I'm reasonably sure I had a bike out about that time).  He notes that usage rates above 30% stress the system, and it is difficult to find a bike in many places.  His table shows that not only is DC an amazing bikesharing city, but we have a relatively large program with our almost 900 books, especially with the relative size of our population compared to some of the other bikesharing cities - like London and Mexico City.  And, as he kindly points out so I don't have to be all puffy about it, America is beating Europe!


Yay, CaBi!  Yay DC!  I could eat this stuff all day.  

You know it's a bad date when...

...when he keeps twisting your words to prove his belief that women are bitches
...when you begin to wish you followed him to the bar to order the drinks, in case he slipped in a "roofie"
...when you realize that it is time to clearly, definitively, and immediately extract yourself, and are scheming how to do so without pissing him off
...when you begin to go over the information you shared to figure out if it is enough for him to find you at work or home
...when you look over your shoulder constantly all the way to the metro to make sure he's not following you
...when you leave a voicemail and email yourself with the details of what you know about him, where you met, and what you experienced to help out the investigation just in case you end up dead somewhere
...when you get home you double lock the door, and set the alarm

Yikes, that was freaky!

Sunday Morning

Pancakes 

-with real Vermont maple syrup

Canadian Bacon

Fruits Exotiques

- pineapple, banana, kiwi with honey lime dressing

Juice 
& fresh-brewed French Roast coffee