Winter Garden

Once again the miracle of a cell phone camera allowed me to snap this shot of a winter garden with some snow and a leafless crepe myrtle tree and a couple of empty flower pots. Once all the bulbs and other annuals die down the rock garden emerges. It's hard to believe, but the giant stones in a circle in my front yard are there all the time but only can be seen in the winter. This is the last of the 2010 snow that we got in December but I feel sure that in February 2011 we'll get a blizzard or two and everything will be completely buried.  I like the colors of winter -- the soft greys and whites and light browns and the textures are very different than the greens and yellow lushness of summer. So, I'm as happy with what God gives us for a garden in the winter as with what we are given in the summer. It changes all the time and is never the same twice!

Google This, Kim Kolchiak!

Well, if Kim Kolchiak can sing a song called "Google Me," then I can certainly post a photo taken in Google's DC office when I was visiting once, using the miracle of my cell phone camera.  I sort of like the fun decor and bright colors and the plant, but you do have to sign in electronically at the nice young receptionist's desk on some great long form that no one really takes the time to read but is probably some sort of non-disclosure thing. There's candy to eat too as well if you like as well as a screen on the wall which gives an electronic picture of where all the Google searches in the world are taking place -- beams of light of higher and lower density coming up from a map of the earth. It really does reveal where or where there isn't electricity on the planet (e.g., there's not that many people googling from the middle of Africa).  Then it sometimes switches to another view, showing all the keywords that people are searching on all across the world in all the different languages. I'd be real surprised to see my name being searched, that's for sure! But I bet Kim Kolchiak gets searched a lot and I wonder if Google likes her new cute song?  Someone told me that the most common things googled for are religious things, like people use Google to search for all kinds of things in the Bible, or when they start looking for God.  Now that's awesome!

Halloween Leftovers

This morning on my way to catch the #G8 bus to work I looked down on the sidewalk and saw the remains of Halloween candy scattered about. Of course this was just the empty wrappers of Milk Duds and Snickers, and a candy carrying bag and not the chocolates or candy that the kids had gobbled up already. At first I was kind of annoyed that the neighborhood streets were littered with more than leaves and nuts and other seasonal debris until I realized that these wrappers were seasonal debris and paper wrappers are just leaves and nuts in different form. So then I thought how great it was that kids could freely walk about in our neighborhood and knock on the doors of strangers and ask for tricks and treats and only get treats. In fact I can easily recall when it was not safe for most of the neighborhood kids to go out on Halloween as the drug sellers and buyers were messing up the streets too much, leaving their litter of little crackie baggies and cigarette lighters and occasional needles and condoms. But that was over ten years ago and seems like ages ago. And so it's a good thing -- that children go out and do this.  I also felt sad that I wasn't at our house to give out candy this year as I had to go out of town unexpectedly. I rather enjoy putting on a witch hat and cloak and opening the door and seeing all the angels, princesses, Spidermen, Supermen, bumble bees and spooky characters that ask for candy each year. So this year we ended up giving all our candy to my neighbor to give away for us. Thank God for little kids knocking on strangers' doors and wearing strange costumes!

Glossy Glassy Buildings

There seems to be a run of an architectural style in DC recently where the building is completely sided with sheets of glass that hang as scales on the frame. There are no walls really, since the walls are glossy gleaming sheets of glass hooked together with some metal latching system. You can almost see into the offices quite easily but light and reflection don't let you get too far. Besides, people put desks and plants up against the glass walls so as to create psychological walls for themselves, or so I imagine. One of these days I'm going to go into one of these buildings and see what it's like to be in one of the street view rooms with just a sheet of glass for the wall. Is that what they mean by transparency? Or do people just hide even deeper what they don't want anyone, even God, to know about themselves?

Park Not Lest Ye Be Towed

As the Route 80 bus wends its way from the corner of the street where I live through downtown it passes the corner near St. Mary's Mother of God church on the corner of 5th & H street. This church has the blessing of a parking lot on H street but since nearby is the Verizon Center they have to be sure no one parks there without permission. Hence the sign "park not lest ye be towed away." But since it's a church parking lot it's easier to lapse into a theological view of this fence. Okay, fine, "park not" means don't leave your car there. Or leave anything where it shouldn't be. Especially valuable things like cars. Or other valuable things, like your heart, or soul. But "lest ye be towed away" is definitely a warning of some consequence if you "park" that valuable thing. And it's definitely about taking away your car if you dare to park it. Like, park it and lose it. But what if you saw this positively, about taking a risk. Drive in, leave your car where you don't have permission to leave it. And it gets towed, taken away somewhere. Like, give your heart up, to something, and it gets towed away. By God. To somewhere you don't know where it will go, unless you risk it.

Fountains are Cool

My neighbor has a fountain in his front yard and I've been thinking about adding one too. Some little splashy thing, perhaps one that birds can also bathe in. The fountains pictured here are up on Capitol Hill and are a delight to walk past in the morning, if my job compels me to go to the Hill in the morning. One fountain is slightly hidden on a plaza between the Senate buildings and the Korean war monument.  I was up there again recently and saw the other more famous fountain with those very nude Neptune and Nymphs boldly splashing in front of the old Library of Congress building. When I got home, the temperature had dropped even more from the 80s into the 70s and it just was so much cooler and more comfortable. There was even a good breeze as well so I watered my plants and the tree in the street and hosed off the birdie doo and flower pollen from the car and generally had a good time squirting water about, pretending to be a water goddess. Thank God for living in a watery zone!

Sounds & Sights of the City at Solstice

You'd think things would have quieted down about 8:30 pm on this summer solstice eve but I just sat down on the porch and listened to a loud assortment of sounds. This is the front porch on this glorious evening in the city. Firstly, there's the dull roar of the NORAD planes up there in the sky over Washington DC doing some drills. Now a helicopter makes its blade-noisy way over to the nearest hospital. A motorcycle just roared by, slowed down by the Fedex truck groaning along looking for the right house. A bunch of birds are tweeting somewhere and a bunch of others are making coo coo noises while a few seem to be cawing and squeaking conversations about the street's residents. They're probably sated from the large assortment of bugs flitting about annoying us humans. Then there's two batches of cicadas grinding and clattering away in chorus at either end of the street. It's always hard to tell which tree they are in or where they are located but they usually all stop at the same time. Quite mysterious. Somewhere in the distance a siren goes off, perhaps it's police or an ambulance and one wonders momentarily what the disaster is, and then, martini in hand, I just forget about it as I'm distracted by some fireflies lighting up the myrtle. And with every breeze -- and there's more than a few -- wind chimes on people's porches are jingling and dingling in the erratic breezes sending soft tinkles out. Closer to where I'm sitting on the porch is the roar of my electric fan -- set up to blow away any flies or mosquitoes that dare trespass in my personal space. Some neighbors have someone banging on their door and the dogs are barking, not recognizing it's the owner's sister visiting. Every once in a while a car does it double toot as the driver locks it up automatically and double clicks the key. A porch door slams tinnily as someone goes out to work the night shift. I can even hear the noise of the TV as someone else watches the World Cup game tonight. Earlier, there were some little girls giggling on their way from the car to their house with their dad telling me how pleased he was that they made it through the first day of summer camp. Thank God for giggling little girls.

Blogging and Ads

I had no idea that this blog could lead to me making money. That is, when setting up this blog there's an option to "monetize" the blog. So I clicked on that tab and filled in my name and address and slam bam wham, thank you God for the ham, I could get paid depending on if people click on things in the right hand column. I'm not supposed to click on them, so I won't. But the question is, why can't I click on the ads I'm serving up to readers too? If I am interested in the product or service or whatever. Oh, well, seems to be one of those blog mysteries. But don't let that stop you from clicking on them all. Don't worry, you don't have to buy anything, it's okay to look. It's because we don't read newspapers anymore. Or watch the ads on TV.

Stinky DC Taxi Cabs

Today was too much. I often take cabs in DC because my back hurts from a slipped disk and I can't take the buses as often as I used to. Today I got stuck with three different cabs, all of which were stinky. The first was a ride to the Hill for my job, to meet with some Hill staff on some policy issues I am working on. This cab didn't have air conditioning, the inside of the passenger door was duct taped together, there were fingerprints and smears on everything and the cab smelt dirty. Worse, the brakes were snatching so at every light or stop, the cab lurched, jarring my spine. I thought I'd get better luck in the cab back to the office, but oh no, even though it had air conditioning, something was very wrong. It smelled of fresh nauseating gasoline, like someone had spilled fuel in the cab or there was some sort of leak. I staggered out of that one practically barfing on the sidewalk from the odor and with the taste of gasoline lingering my mouth. My last cab of the day was to go home. It had air conditioning. No duct tape. Brakes worked. BUT once again this one stank. Of driver body odor, half eaten food on the front seat and a dozen air freshener cards dangling from the rear view mirror. By the time I got home my stomach was churning (again) and I had to lie down to recover. I've had good and new clean cabs in DC but today took the cake! Maybe I should just calm down and thank God I have the means to take cabs. Note: the image above is NOT an example of a stinky cab but is an example of one of the good cabs -- clean, AC, courteous driver.