![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
My LJ site seems to be having some troubles. Yes, I submitted a support request.
First, four things that amused me this week:
1) Algeria has announced that they are going to end their state of emergency soon. That state of emergency was declared back in 1992.
2) I have talked previously about call signs (i.e. nicknames) that Air Force officers use. Right now I work with people who are called "Salt" and "Chili." I wonder if we should try to persuade our other officer to go by, say, "Oregano."
3) The headline on an article I saw about potential successors to the North Korean leader was "Next of Kim."
4) An Amtrak train hit a bald eagle outside Aberdeen, Maryland the other day. The eagle had, apparently, chosen the wrong time to be nibbling on a deer carcass on the tracks. The amusing part is that the Washington Post reported that "the train arrived at Washington Union Station two hours later with the bird stuck to the locomotive like an emblem." This reminds me that Ben Franklin despised eagles and wanted our national bird to be the turkey.
As for actually doing things:
I was surprisingly productive at work on Monday and finished writing a white paper I'd been futzing around with for a few weeks. I tend to spend a lot of time thinking before doing any writing, so the actual writing goes quickly. I only had to make minor revisions before sending it out for coordination. I'm sure I will get some comments back, but it's good to check off an item from my to-do list. Later in the week, I made some needed contacts for another project. There's still plenty of stuff I am spinning my wheels on, however.
On Tuesday, I finally got to the dentist. Not only did the weather cooperate, so did the traffic and I had time to stop at the good hardware store before my appointment. Unfortunately, I need to go back this coming week, as an old filling needs to be replaced. That's a good thing in the long run as I've had some temperature sensitivity in that tooth, but it means having to drive into work.
Speaking of driving into work, my life has gotten ever so much better since I learned that Arlington parking meters take dollar coins. I still prefer taking the metro, especially since it actually takes less time.
Thursday night, I went to see Anna Deveare Smith's play, Let Me Down Easy at Arena Stage. This is a compilation of excerpts from interviews she did with a wide range of people about health care, with a particular emphasis on dealing with death. Ms. Smith is a good mimic and captures the voices and mannerisms of her interviewees well, with minimal props and costume changes. I did find the entrance of her assistant, with those items somewhat distracting at times, so I understand why the items brought in are not removed. But I also found the discarded props and clothing lying around the set to be distracting. I have no idea how to solve that.
As for the interviews, they are a mixed bag. The funniest is Ann Richards, the former governor of Texas. The most moving are Hazel Merritt, who doesn't want to go on dialysis because of a horrifying incident with her daughter, who was on dialysis after contracting AIDS, and Smith's aunt, Lorraine Coleman talking about the death of her sister and finding comfort in a remembered gesture. Some of the more famous people were the least interesting to me. The piece on Lance Armstrong went on for too long and I'm not sure that Lauren Hutton really had anything to say that couldn't be summed up as "rich people get good doctors." Overall, I'd say the show was worth seeing because of the performance, rather than the material.
The metro was slow getting home, due to long waits for both the Green Line at Waterfront and the Orange Line at L'Enfant Plaza. I compounded my exhaustion by playing around with Seth's new took for tracking which World Heritage Sites you've been to instead of going right to bed. You can see the results at mhnadel has visited 89 UNESCO World Heritage Sites. See them & track yours here!
Last night I had dinner at Teaism with Margaret, who was here for a writer's conference. Good food - in my case, their tuna bento which had an especially notable broccoli salad with some sort of sesame dressings - and good conversation, mostly about art.
And then I came home and collapsed into a lovely bubble bath, followed by a cup of Aztec hot chocolate, a nice spicy brew from the Lake Champlain Chocolate folks.
First, four things that amused me this week:
1) Algeria has announced that they are going to end their state of emergency soon. That state of emergency was declared back in 1992.
2) I have talked previously about call signs (i.e. nicknames) that Air Force officers use. Right now I work with people who are called "Salt" and "Chili." I wonder if we should try to persuade our other officer to go by, say, "Oregano."
3) The headline on an article I saw about potential successors to the North Korean leader was "Next of Kim."
4) An Amtrak train hit a bald eagle outside Aberdeen, Maryland the other day. The eagle had, apparently, chosen the wrong time to be nibbling on a deer carcass on the tracks. The amusing part is that the Washington Post reported that "the train arrived at Washington Union Station two hours later with the bird stuck to the locomotive like an emblem." This reminds me that Ben Franklin despised eagles and wanted our national bird to be the turkey.
As for actually doing things:
I was surprisingly productive at work on Monday and finished writing a white paper I'd been futzing around with for a few weeks. I tend to spend a lot of time thinking before doing any writing, so the actual writing goes quickly. I only had to make minor revisions before sending it out for coordination. I'm sure I will get some comments back, but it's good to check off an item from my to-do list. Later in the week, I made some needed contacts for another project. There's still plenty of stuff I am spinning my wheels on, however.
On Tuesday, I finally got to the dentist. Not only did the weather cooperate, so did the traffic and I had time to stop at the good hardware store before my appointment. Unfortunately, I need to go back this coming week, as an old filling needs to be replaced. That's a good thing in the long run as I've had some temperature sensitivity in that tooth, but it means having to drive into work.
Speaking of driving into work, my life has gotten ever so much better since I learned that Arlington parking meters take dollar coins. I still prefer taking the metro, especially since it actually takes less time.
Thursday night, I went to see Anna Deveare Smith's play, Let Me Down Easy at Arena Stage. This is a compilation of excerpts from interviews she did with a wide range of people about health care, with a particular emphasis on dealing with death. Ms. Smith is a good mimic and captures the voices and mannerisms of her interviewees well, with minimal props and costume changes. I did find the entrance of her assistant, with those items somewhat distracting at times, so I understand why the items brought in are not removed. But I also found the discarded props and clothing lying around the set to be distracting. I have no idea how to solve that.
As for the interviews, they are a mixed bag. The funniest is Ann Richards, the former governor of Texas. The most moving are Hazel Merritt, who doesn't want to go on dialysis because of a horrifying incident with her daughter, who was on dialysis after contracting AIDS, and Smith's aunt, Lorraine Coleman talking about the death of her sister and finding comfort in a remembered gesture. Some of the more famous people were the least interesting to me. The piece on Lance Armstrong went on for too long and I'm not sure that Lauren Hutton really had anything to say that couldn't be summed up as "rich people get good doctors." Overall, I'd say the show was worth seeing because of the performance, rather than the material.
The metro was slow getting home, due to long waits for both the Green Line at Waterfront and the Orange Line at L'Enfant Plaza. I compounded my exhaustion by playing around with Seth's new took for tracking which World Heritage Sites you've been to instead of going right to bed. You can see the results at mhnadel has visited 89 UNESCO World Heritage Sites. See them & track yours here!
Last night I had dinner at Teaism with Margaret, who was here for a writer's conference. Good food - in my case, their tuna bento which had an especially notable broccoli salad with some sort of sesame dressings - and good conversation, mostly about art.
And then I came home and collapsed into a lovely bubble bath, followed by a cup of Aztec hot chocolate, a nice spicy brew from the Lake Champlain Chocolate folks.
