fauxklore | Entries tagged with parties

I didn’t get around to writing yesterday because I was too exhausted when I got home from going out to dinner with people from Flyertalk. We went to Bluejacket, which is in the Navy Yard area. There were 8 of us and we were at a high top table, with wooden stools. Unfortunately, the lack of padding on the seats and the absence of chair backs got to me after a couple of hours. On the plus side, the food was better than I expected. I had fish and chips. There was tartar sauce for the fish, and ketchup and another unidentified condiment for the fries, which may have been their idea of barbecue sauce, but wasn’t really to my taste. Most people got beer, but I opted for a delicious cocktail called strawberry gingin, which had gin, lime, ginger beer, and fresh strawberry and ginger syrup.

More importantly, the conversation was lively and, of course, focused on travel. I had met everyone who was there before, but knew some better than others. The organizer was someone who I hadn’t seen in over ten years, as she recently retired and moved back to the D.C. area after several State Department overseas assignments. (The actual instigator was one of the out-of-towners, however.)

By the way, there was a large group there in one of the private areas. We learned later on that they were from a Brown University alumni group. I’m sure it was hard for them to be celebrating given that this was just a few days after the shootings there.

The first of the two trips I took in September was to South Carolina for LoserFest Grand Strand. For those who are unfamiliar with the Loser community, it’s essentially people who are involved with what used to be the Washington Post Style Invitational, which now has its afterlife via Gene Weingarten’s substack page, as well as a couple of related Facebook groups. There’s a lot more information on The Not Ready for the Algonquin Roundtable Society website. There are a number of Loser social events, with brunches roughly monthly and a couple of big parties a year (a post-holiday party around January and the Flushies award ceremony around June). Every year or two, a group of Losers get together to go somewhere for what is called LoserFest. I first went to one in Pittsburgh and have since been to Frederick (Maryland), Niagara Falls, and Philadelphia. My schedule worked out to enable me to go to this year’s LoserFest in the Myrtle Beach, South Carolina area.

Why there? Well, a long time Loser, Kathleen, moved to Surfside Beach a while back and lobbied for it. The primary organizer (known as the LoserFest pope), Kyle, published a “Fungenda,” and people signed up for which events they wanted to go to, including various meals and sightseeing events. He’s very good at finding things to do and I also appreciate that everything is optional.

Anyway, I flew down on Wednesday, early in the afternoon. It was easy to pick up my rental car and a short drive to my hotel, though it was a bit challenging to actually find the front desk since my GPS had outdated directions. (I’d gotten a good deal at the Grand Palms Resort, where am entire 2 bedroom villa cost slightly less than a room at the Holiday Inn.) I had time to settle in and take a short nap before going to Kathleen’s house for an informal dinner. She’s got a lovely little place, with a plant-filled backyard. There were probably a dozen or so of us there and we had the usual lively conversation, while nibbling on various goodies.

We had originally been scheduled to do a dolphin watching cruise on Friday morning, but the weather forecast was unfavorable so it got switched to Thursday morning. We had an excellent breakfast beforehand at the Golden Egg before driving to the Crazy Sister Marina, where we boarded a RIB (rigid inflatable boat). We saw a lot of dolphins, including some leaping right in front of us. Alas, I failed at dolphin photography, which is not surprising since every time I’ve been whale watching I’ve mostly gotten pictures of where whales were. It was really awesome watching them and an excellent start to the day.

Then we drove north to Myrtle Beach, where we had lunch at Margaritaville. That was followed by the Myrtle Beach Pinball Museum, which was fun, even though pretty much all the pinball machines were after my time. I thought the Munsters themed one was the most interesting machine, but most of them were fun.

From there, we went to Ripley’s Aquarium. This was a bit pricy for its small size, but they did have some interesting exhibits, starting with African penguins.

There were plenty of assorted fish, including at least one robotic one. There were also a lot of jellyfish. And sharks. They didn’t have any leafy sea dragons (my favorites at any aquarium that has them), but they did have weedy sea dragons.

And there was an axolotl, a creature I’ve been mildly obsessed with since I learned about it via a crossword puzzle.

That, of course, had me singing The Axolotl Song for days.

We finished the day with dinner at 42nd Street Bar and Grill. The food was good, but rather pricy.

On Friday, we started the day with breakfast at Blue Sky Restaurant. I suggested the Myrtle Beach Art Museum as a substitute for the dolphin cruise which had gotten shifted to Thursday. The museum proved to be small, but very good. There were two exhibits. The upstairs gallery had enhanced cyanotypes by Cora Ennis Morris.

The downstairs gallery was more to my taste, with an exhibition of winners of the Artfields competition. This piece by Brent Afford is titled Remember This as a Time of Day and pays homage to cast iron skillets.

The intriguing thing about this portrait by Stefanie Glen is that it was drawn in one continuous line.

I think most of us really liked Consume by Mike + Patz Fowle.

My very favorite piece was Mexicans in Canada, by Amira Hanafi. This is an interactive exhibit, which you can stop by touching the television screen. You can also start and stop the on-line version to see how clever it is.

We drove up to Brookgreen Gardens, a former rice plantation, where we started with a lovely lunch at the Austin Harvest Restaurant. After eating, we had a docent tour. Unfortunately, the docent started out by standing in one place and talking for over 20 minutes. We assumed he’d seen all the grey hair in front of him and thought we wouldn’t want to walk. But, actually, standing in one place is harder on most of us than walking.

It wouldn’t be South Carolina without a live oak allee and Spanish moss.

The main thing to see is the collection of American figurative sculpture, which is huge and impressive.

Our next stop was at Atalaya Castle. It would have been helpful if the directions had mentioned that the actual entrance is marked as Huntington Beach State Park, instead of claiming that it was “just across the street” from Brookgreen Gardens. The only sign that actually says “Atalaya Castle” is some ways down the state park road.

The castle was built as the winter home of philanthropist Archer Milton Huntington and his wife, sculptor Anna Hyatt Huntington. Frankly, I wasn’t particularly impressed with it. Apparently, they kept bears, horses, monkey, and a leopard in enclosures within the castle, which might have made it more interesting.

I was feeling rather grumpy. And the Red Sox were playing the Source of All Evil in the Universe, so I decided to skip out on dinner at the Gulfstream Cafe in favor of takeout food and watching the ballgame. Which, alas, my Bosox lost.

We had breakfast on Saturday at Johnny D’s Waffles, which had the advantage of being particularly close to my hotel. Then we went back to Brookgreen Gardens, where we did the Creek Excursion. This is a lovely and peaceful boat trip along the creeks of the property.

After that, some of the group went to the zoo, but I’m a lions and tigers and bears (oh, my!) kind of gal and don’t feel the need to look at non-predators. The plan to have lunch at a barbecue restaurant followed by miniature golf and shopping for tacky souvenirs also failed to do anything for me. But Brookgreen had a Gullah Geechee Junkanoo Festival going on and music and dance and, especially, storytelling are very much my sort of thing. So I listened to a singer and a storyteller who had an Anansi story. Then I checked out the art exhibit and sampled jollof rice and delicious pound cake. There are also several recordings which you can listen to which feature local people of Gullah descent talking about their lives.

I finished the day by strolling around more of the gardens and looking at more sculptures. Here’s an interesting one relating to the Pledge of Allegiance.

There was a brief downpour, which started ironically just as I reached Rainey Plaza. I took refuge in the gift shop, but didn’t see anything I wanted. I drove back to my hotel and rested for a while before heading back down o Murrell’s Inlet for dinner at Dead Dog Saloon. We were rather crowded together and the food was just okay, but the atmosphere was fun, with lots of 1970’s music.

My travel home the next day went smoothly.
All in all, it was a fun trip with a lot of interesting activities and, more importantly, fun people (which is really the point of it) and I look forward to the next LoserFest. (I’ve been lobbying for New Orleans, by the way.)

I had some irritating travel experiences in August, which I’ll get to shortly. Other than that, I had a couple of meetings of my on-line crafting group, where I continued working on my Tunisian crochet afghan. I also had my long-standing book club, where we discussed The Wedding People by Alison Espach. And I had a follow-up Physical Therapy appointment, where I got promoted to a stronger resistance band and told that I don’t need to come back.

The first weekend of the month was Geostock, a big party that my friends in Superior, Colorado throw approximately annually. It’s named that after our host, whose username is Geo on the MUD we met on umpty-ump years ago. He and his wife, Momerath, are excellent hosts and, aside from on-line friends, they bring in colleagues (current and past) and neighbors and so on. The festivities start Friday night, so I had planned a morning flight so I would have time to do something touristy and check into my hotel before going over to their house.

Well, you know what they say about the best laid plans of mice and Miriam. United did notify me early in the morning of a two and a half hour departure delay, which I assumed was related to the thunderstorms the previous day. At least it meant I could get a little more sleep. I took the metro to IAD and got lunch at the Turkish Air lounge before going to the gate. But then came an additional 4 hour delay. To make a long story short, the flight (which was supposed to leave at 8:50 a.m. left about 6 p.m. They announced on-board that the delay had been related to TSA at LAX being closed when the aircraft arrived there so the flight crew couldn’t get to the plane and they had to get another plane from SFO. I did get compensation (a credit for a future flight) and the email for that said it was a mechanical delay, so who knows? Anyway, we eventually arrived 9 1/2 hours late. It took me about an hour to pick up my rental car (which is, alas, par for the course in Denver) and road work made the drive slower than normal. But I got to my hotel safely and collapsed.

In the morning, I got breakfast at the Walnut Cafe (a long-time favorite of mine, with excellent blueberry corn bread). I spent part of the morning reading and relaxing. In the afternoon, I went over to Lafayette to get together with a college friend for coffee (well, actually tea) at a cafe in Lafayette. We had 45 years to catch up on! If only I’d known she was in Boulder years ago, since I used to go there on business trips more or less weekly.

I did make it over to the party in the late afternoon. It was great seeing people who I don’t see regularly, some of whom I’ve known since somewhere around the mid-1980’s. There is something wrong with the rotation and revolution of the earth, based on the ages of so many people (and especially friends’ children. How do babies turn into actual human beings?) Anyway, there was the usual mix of good food and interesting conversation. A particular highlight was seeing our hosts’ son show off the euphonium he plays in his school’s marching band. (He plays the slide trombone as well. But that’s not suitable for a band that doesn’t just march in a straight line where you can put the trombones at the front to keep them from killing other musicians. I hadn’t thought about that before and I now find the song “Seventy-six Trombones” from The Music Man vaguely disturbing.)

I also learned that my friend, Marcia and her husband, who have lived in Colorado for a long time (first in Colorado Springs and more recently in Denver) finally got too tired of dealing with snow and are moving to Phoenix. I first met her at a Usenet party in Portland, Oregon and we used to get together in San Francisco frequently to go power shopping.

We used to always go to Le Peep in Boulder for brunch on Sunday morning, but they had the audacity to close. We had made plans for another place, which turned out to be temporarily closed due to flooding. We ended up at Tangerine in Lafayette, which was very nice once I managed to find parking. I got a special that included a delicious omelet with a peach and chili pepper jam.

My flight home went more smoothly. We actually landed at IAD 20 minutes early, but we had to wait 33 minutes for a gate. At least I had five days at home to recover.

The last weekend of May was my 45th MIT Reunion. I flew up to Boston on Thursday. Checking in was quick. I was staying at New Vassar, which is a dorm that didn’t exist back in my day. There was a problem with my room. Namely, the bed had been raised so that the dresser went under it. But the ladder up to the actual bed was placed in a way that was way too hard for me to negotiate. The dorm staff was able to lower the bed, but it took some time. (Staying in a hotel, rather than a dorm on campus would be nicer, of course, but they sell out quickly. And they cost a lot more.)

Anyway, the first event I went to was the Class of 1980 Gathering at State Park Bar in Kendall Square. We had a private room for us, with drinks and heavy appetizers. We also got MIT Class of 1980 baseball caps (in a choice of red or pink). It was a nice opportunity to mingle and chat.

I spent Friday going to various receptions. The Hillel reception had good bagels (and other food), but was notable for my getting to see a couple of people (not in my class) who I hadn’t seen in a lot of years. One of them had been a grad student when I was an undergrad and I’d last seen him when he was passing through Los Angeles and we had lunch at a Yemenite restaurant in Pico-Robertson. The other was someone who I knew from my days in Berkeley. There was also, alas, a lot of discussion of the incident at commencement in which a graduation speaker delivered a pro-Palestine speech. The thing that didn’t get discussed enough in the news stories I saw was that she had submitted an entirely different speech for approval beforehand. I was not at commencement to see this, but the buzz in the room was that the Institute did not handle the situation well.

Conversation at the other two receptions I went to was considerably tamer. The Mechanical Engineering reception was in too small a space, but did provide an opportunity to reminisce a bit about some projects from back in my day. However, none of the professors I'd have liked to see were there. Instead, I did have a couple of conversations about theatre. The reception at McCormick Hall (the all women dorm I lived in while I was at MIT) was entirely unmemorable, though I do remember talking to the former dorm headmaster who ran the Washington summer program back in the days when I tried to find minions, er, I mean summer interns.

After that was the Tech Reunions Welcome Reception, which had some confusion about which tables our class was supposed to be at. Here’s a photo of me (in the red dress) with my friend, Robert, and his wife, Merlie.

Then we got on the buses to Symphony Hall for Tech Night at the Pops. Some friends and I had requested seating together, but were given tickets at three separate tables. We did sort that out ourselves, but it was annoying. The concert had a good mix of material, with a highlight being a sing-along to 1980’s music. There was also a version of “America the Beautiful” which included an MIT chorus. I mention that because, as we were leaving to go back to the buses, someone I know from the puzzle world called out to me. It wasn’t her reunion year, but she had been part of that chorus! Overall, it was a nice event.

Saturday is always Technology Day, which features talks about MIT research. The theme this year was From Lab to Life: How MIT is Advancing Health and Humanity. and addressed two new initiatives. The first part was on the MIT Health and Life Sciences Collaborative and the speakers were Angela M. Belcher on Changing the Optics on Ovarian Cancer Detection and Prevention, Jonathan Gruber on Paying for Health: Insurance and the Life Sciences, Hugh Herr with On Being Bionic, and Bryan Bryson on Breakthrough Solutions for (and from) an Ancient Disease. That last one had to do with tuberculosis, which (as you may know) has made something of a resurgence. The definite highlight of that session was Hugh Herr. I had read about him some time ago and his story is very compelling. In short, he had both of his legs amputated below the knee after a mountain climbing accident when he was 17. He designed improved prosthetics, which there is no word for other than amazing. He can extend the length of his prosthetic legs, for example, enabling him to climb things that nobody else can. Just watching him walking around on the stage, you would never think of him as being at all disabled. He also showed a short film with a woman trying out new prosthetic legs and not needing any time to adjust to them. I swear every jaw in the room dropped during his talk. (I should probably note that learning about the Boston arm, which was one of the first prosthetic devices to connect to the body’s nervous system, was one of the things that drew me into majoring in mechanical engineering in the first place. But other people without that background were also talking about how amazing his talk was.)

The second part was on the MIT Human Insight Collaborative. The speakers were Lily L. Tsai on A Compass for the Digital Age, Caspar Hare on Machines That Want What We Want, David Rand on During Reducing Conspiracy Beliefs Using Human-AI Dialogues, and Eran Egozy on Good Vibrations: The Technology behind Musical Instruments and the Human Connection. I was unconvinced by Rand’s talk. Egozy’s talk was on a subject that is right up my alley, but I hadn’t gotten enough sleep on Friday night so I can’t say that I absorbed much of it. After all of that, there was a fireside chat with MIT President Sally Kornbluth. She touched on the commencement kerfuffle and sounded reasonable about how it was handled. She also talked more generally about life at MIT.

Next up was lunch and the Tech Challenge Games, which we had too small a group for. I did submit a couple of haikus, but neither of them got read out loud. The event I was most looking forward to was the Class of 1980 TIM Talks. (TIM the Beaver is the MIT mascot. He did not actually have a name back in my undergrad days, but it’s cute. Anyway, that’s why we have TIM Talks instead of TED Talks.) One of my friends was on the program committee and asked me to give a talk on travel which is, as many of you know, one of my favorite subjects. The other two speakers were Tomas A. Gonzalez on Remanufacturing and Circular Economy and David Alexander on Making Infinite Connections. I particularly liked David’s talk because he referenced the book Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam, which has been a big influence on my life. It has to do with the decline of social capital in our times and the need to reconnect with other people. David’s examples included things like his involvement with his church, with Toastmasters, and with a book club that reads only one book - James Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake.

My talk was titled Reel to Real Travels. The title, which was provided by my friend, Teri, refers to my being inspired to travel by ViewMaster reels I had as a child.

Basically, I talked about overcoming lack of opportunity to travel (time and money), people who offered helpful advice, my mid-life crisis trip , and what makes me choose specific places to go to. My biggest take-aways were that: 1) famous places are usually famous for good reasons and 2) it’s not a competition though some people treat it as one. I thought it went well. I got some good questions and had some nice conversations at the dinner that followed the TIM Talks.

On Sunday morning, there was a brunch at McCormick Hall. I went back to the dorm to collect my bag and then set off to the airport. Getting home went smoothly. And then I was all ready to unpack - and pack for a trip later in the week.

I also did some things in July. I will spare you details about home repairs and household paperwork.

Fourth of July: Aside from dealing with condo woes, described in a locked entry, I went to a friend’s house for holiday socializing. That incl I uded dinner - and the inevitable smoke alarm going off as the steaks were grilled - and lots of good conversation, as well as sitting out on her balcony to watch fireworks. Lots of fireworks, since Kathleen lives in Crystal City part time for now, though she’s giving up her apartment in October to live full time in her house in South Carolina. You can’t see the DC mall fireworks from her apartment, because part of the building is in the way, but there are a lot of fireworks in Maryland (and some in southern DC) which you can watch. And, of course, there are lots of planes taking off and landing at DCA also. Overall, it was a nice evening, despite my being stressed out over my AC woes.

The Flushies: A few days later was The Flushies, one of the two big Loser parties of the year. (The other is the post-holiday party in January.) There was the typical potluck array, to which my contribution was cheese and crackers (and some leftover hummus) because I was going away right after the party. There was plenty of good conversation, followed by the awards to various people for their accomplishments. Judy Freed won Loser of the Year. Her inkblots included this particularly brilliant take on a bad idea with the book title Self Esteem for Dummies.

Big-D Con: This year’s NPL con was in Dallas. It is worth its own entry, which I will try not to be so bloody slow in writing.

Book Clubs” R.E.A.D. discussed Mad Honey by Jodi Picot and Jennifer Finley Boylan. It was an interesting book with great pacing and, surprisingly, everyone liked it. The Travelers’ Century Club read The Curious Case of William Baekeland by Harry Mitsidis, which has to do with a con man who ripped off a lot of extreme travelers, including TCC members. It was an interesting book, but not particularly well-written, in my opinion.

Speaking of TCC: The book club meeting ended a while before the monthly virtual exploration, which had to do with Fernando de Noronha and the Falklands. I’ve done a fair amount of reading on the latter, but I really knew nothing about the former except for its existence. Bottom line is that it looks very appealing, though it is also expensive and possibly a bit too resorty for my tastes, since I’m not a lie on the beach and do nothing sort of person.

This past weekend was our chapter’s regular lunch meeting. There was plenty of wide-ranging travel conversation. I particularly enjoyed talking with one of the new people, who appears to have similar tastes to mine.

Bad News: My brother had a heart attack. Apparently one artery was 100% blocked, while the other two were 60% blocked. They put in a stent in the blocked one and he goes back to the doctor this week to learn about the way ahead. He said he feels okay and he is home and resting.

Good News: I got some resolution on the household crisis. It turns out that there was a clog in the main drain clog, so it is the condo association’s responsibility to pay for repairs related to it.

Eye Have Really Good News: I had my second cataract surgery last week. It went well. My vision was still blurry the next day when I went in for my follow-up appointment, but cleared up by the next day. Really, these intraocular lenses are quite miraculous. As for the surgery, I remember being more conscious than I was for the first eye, but the only specific thing I remember them doing was cleaning my eyelashes. And there were some purple, green, and yellow blobs, presumably due to the laser dissolving the cataract.

The weekend before the one that just passed, I was home and fairly sociable.

tick. tick . . . BOOM1 On Friday night, I went to see this musical, which was part of the Broadway Center Stage series at the Kennedy Center. That means that the staging is fairly minimal, but they still had a video screen, providing parts of the setting. For those unfamiliar with this show, it was originally a semi-autobiographical monologue by Jonathan Larson and, after his death, was turned into a three person musical. This version (which was directed by Neil Patrick Harris) also had several other characters, with one of them who seemed to deserve as much credit as the three principals.

The plot involves the main character, Jon (ably played by Brandon Uranowitz) , turning 30 and debating whether he should abandon his goal of writing a musical in favor of making money in advertising. His girlfriend, Susan, thinks they should move to Cape Cod. As he says / sings “Johnny Can’t Decide.”

I mostly enjoyed the show, but some of the songs don’t do much to advance either the story or character development. For example, “Green Green Dress” is a fairly generic song Jon sings about Susan. On the other hand, “Sunday” is a brilliant pastiche of the Sondheim song of the same name (from Sunday in the Park With George) and was worth the price of admission alone. And “Why,” effectively summarizes the whole point of the show.

Loser Post-Holiday Party: Saturday afternoon was the annual Loser post-holiday party. My contribution to the pot luck was a mushroom quiche and, since I got requests for the recipe, I’ll include it below. Then there were some awards for people who’d reached certain invitational milestones. And, finally, the singing of various parody songs, mostly with political themes. Plus, of course, lots of interesting conversation, including some discoveries of mutual connections I hadn’t known of before.

Mushroom Quiche Recipe: Since I had requests for the recipe…

Ingredients:
1 deep dish pie crust (I admit I used a frozen one.) Bake in a pie pan according to package directions or recipe if you're less lazy than I was.

8 oz. white button mushrooms
half an onion, chopped
2 T. butter
8 oz. gruyere cheese, shredded (or you can buy cubed gruyere). Do not use smoked gouda.
1 c. heavy cream
4 large eggs
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. pepper
a pinch of nutmeg
2 T. grated parmesan cheese, divided

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Melt butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Salute the onions and mushrooms until browned.
3. Sprinkle the mushrooms and cheese into the bottom of the baked pie crust.
4. Whisk the eggs. Add the cream, seasonings and 1 T. of the parmesan cheese and beat together. Pour the mixture over the mushrooms and cheese.
5. Sprinkle the remaining parmesan cheese over the top.
6. Bake until the top is light brown and the center of the quiche is set, roughly 45 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool about 10 minutes before serving.

TCC Meeting: Finally, there was a lunch meeting of the Travelers’ Century Club DC chapter on Sunday. Lots of good conversation about travel, of course. It also looks like several of us will be in the Azores together.

It’s been a busy couple of weeks. So what else is new?

First, the gentleman with whom I’m conducting the world’s longest running brief meaningless fling was here. Most of his visit is not for public consumption. But we did go to Signature Theatre to see their production of Sweeney Todd. We had dinner beforehand at Carlyle Grand Cafe. Their pecan crusted trout was delicious. As for the show, he had never seen it before and enjoyed it. I’ve seen a few productions of it before (including on Broadway in 1980) and I thought the performances were very good. I was particularly impressed by Bryonha Marie as Mrs. Lovett, who came across as truly demented. However, I disliked the set. They had meathooks, from which they hung various things - bird cages, for example, but worst of all, two rows of body bags. One thing I did like is that they included some of the music that is often omitted, e.g. Judge Turpin’s rendition of “Johanna” and Beadle Bramford’s performance of “Parlor Songs.” Overall, it was a nice night out.

By the way, I think it’s really sweet when old people (a category in which I include us) hold hands in public.

I had two Fourth of July events to go to. The first was a chavurah get together. It was supposed to be a barbecue outdoors, but it was very hot and humid, so we ate inside. I brought hummus and pita chips, but nobody ate them. (Mostly, the chicken and corn on the cob got eaten and some of the cookies.)

After that I went over to my friend Kathleen’s place in Crystal City. Her balcony overlooks the Potomac (and DCA) so is a good place for watching fireworks. Part of her building blocked the view of the fireworks on the National Mall, but we could see fireworks from 30 or so other places. Also, we played a few rounds of Blank Slate, which was fun. It was a fun evening, though the traffic coming home was terrible.

And Saturday, I went to see the touring company of the revival of 1776 at the Kennedy Center with Cindy. This production features “a company of artists who identify as female, trans, nonbinary, and gender-nonconforming.” For the most part, the script appeared unchanged, but it’s not like I have it memorized. The fundamental problem I had with this show is that 1776 is one of the rare musicals for which the book is good but the score is so-so, with amateurish lyrics. Sherman Edwards never wrote another musical and the world is better for that. There are two songs I like. They did fine with “Mama Look Sharp.” “Molasses to Rum to Slaves” will never be entirely satisfying to me without John Cullum playing Edward Rutledge. (Admittedly, I would pay good money to watch John Collum open a supermarket, so I may be biased.) Overall, I thought the show was just okay.

Afterwards, Cindy and I went to meet up with a flyertalk friend of mine at Pisco y Nazca. This is an excellent Peruvian restaurant. I drank a classico chicano, which was delicious and refreshing. As for food, I ate ceviche dos temperaturas which consisted of marinated fish with choclo (a type of corn with large kernels) and sweet potatoes in a spicy sauce. That was also quite tasty. The others also seemed to enjoy their food. We had lively conversation, mostly travel related.

Now I am in minor panic mode regarding upcoming travels. I’ll be fine, but there are always last minute things to get done.

Moving on to last week, it was still pretty busy.

Apple Technology for Jewish Genealogy: I go to a monthly meeting for Jewish genealogists using Apple tech. This month we ended up talking mostly about AI. It hadn’t really occurred to me, but there may be some real potential for using some of the AI engines out there for translating documents. My to-do list re: genealogy keeps getting longer, but my have-done list remains stagnant.

Grimm Keepers: Our story this session was “All Kinds of Fur.” It’s got some creepy elements (involving incest, for example). But it also provides a good opportunity for discussion of some folktale tropes and some mythological bases for this, going back to Sumerian legend. (Marc wrote a note in the chat that read, “Jack and Jill climbed up the ziggurat to fetch a pail of daughter.) Tim has done extensive research on this story, which definitely helped the discussion. This group remains a valuable activity for me.

Needles and Crafts: My weekly crafting get-together continues, also. Basically, we talk about crafts and books and what have you while working on our various crafting projects. In my case, I am currently working on a Tunisian crochet afghan. If it weren’t for that group, I’d never get any needlework done.

All Things Equal: Cindy and I went to see this one-woman play, subtitled “The Life & Trials of Ruth Bader Ginsburg.” The play was written by Rupert Holmes. Michelle Azar played the title role ably, with several projections and film clips. It really felt like RBG herself was actually talking to the audience. The aspect of the play that interested me the most (probably because I wasn’t as familiar with it) was her repeated mentions of Erwin Griswold as her foil. As the dean of Harvard Law School, he’d asked her how she justified taking the place of a man - and he went on to swear her in to her Supreme Court seat. There was also an excellent sequence of her dissents as the court moved to the right. I do think Ginsburg made a huge mistake in not resigning during the Obama administration, which she attributed (in the play) to her confidence that Hillary Clinton would become the next president and pick her successor. But, anyway, the play (which was only one night) was worth seeing.

Incidentally, we ate at Ben’s Next Door beforehand. This is the more upscale adjunct to Ben’s Chili Bowl (which is the logical place to eat if you are going to the Lincoln Theatre and has good vegetarian chili.) The food and drink were good, but it was earsplittingly noisy. So I won’t be back there.

The Flushies: Saturday was The Flushies, the annual party / award ceremony for the (formerly Style) Invitational. The Washington Post may have killed the Invitational but it lives on (via Gene Weingarten’s substack page) and there were probably about 70 (maybe more?) losers there. Lots of interesting conversation, seeing people I knew and meeting some I didn’t, plus the usual sing-along to parody songs, and so on. My contribution to the potluck was quesadillas, by the way, because they’re quick and easy to make. All in all, it was a nice afternoon.

PixelBloom: On Sunday morning, Cindy and I went to Artechouse for PixelBloom. This is their annual tribute to D.C.’s cherry blossoms and this year’s edition was butterfly themed. There’s a 22 minute immersive presentation and two side rooms with interactive exhibits. For example, you can color butterfly wings and move your arms to flap the wings.

Another exhibit was called Blooming Strings. In this one, there was a row of transparent panels with branches and flower buds on them. As you walked back and forth, the flowers bloomed and butterflies appeared and flew around. There was also music playing. Here’s a short video. (I think you have to click through to flickr to play the video.)

And here’s a video clip from the main presentation, which we actually watched all the way through twice because it was so relaxing.

There was other interactive exhibits, that I haven’t written about because they’re harder to explain. Anyway, the whole thing was fun and was worth an hour or so.

JGSGW: Sunday afternoon’s Jewish Genealogical Society of Greater Washington meeting had a talk on Jews of Northern Virginia. It was focused on the earliest congregations in the region, most of which were in Alexandria. It also covered Jewish-owned businesses. It’s not particularly relevant to my genealogical research, but it was still worth going to.

I’ve been in rather a blur of social activity since I got back. But let’s do first things first.

Celebrity Death Watch: Robert Clary was an actor, best known for playing Corporal LeBeau on Hogan’s Heroes, though he got his start in the musical revue “New Faces of 1952.” Carol Leigh was an activist who focused on sex workers. Fred Brooks wrote the book The Mythical Man-Month. Greg Bear and Ray Nelson were science fiction writers. June Campbell was the fashion reporter who created the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition. Jay Pasachoff was an astronomer who is believed to have seen more solar eclipses than anyone else. Jean-Marie Straub was a film director. Wilko Johnson played guitar for Dr. Feelgood. Ray Oldenburg studied urban sociology and popularized the term “third place.” Bernadette Mayer was a poet. Sheila Vogel-Coupe was the oldest sex worker in the United Kingdom and had apparently started her career as an escort at the age of 81. Louise Tobin was a jazz singer. Christine McVie was a keyboardist and singer, as well as songwriter, for Fleetwood Mac.

Gaylord Perry was a pitcher, primarily for the San Francisco Giants. Quentin Oliver Lee was an operatic baritone, best known for playing the time role in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera. Dominique Lapierre wrote Is Paris Burning? Dick Enthoven owned Nando’s. Bob McGrath played the human character Bob Johnson on Sesame Street. Jim Stewart cofounded Stax Records. Jay Goldberg was a lawyer who represented a lot of famous people, including Donald Trump, Johnny Cash, Mick Jagger, and Bono. Roddy Jackson was a rockabilly performer. Lee Lorenz was a cartoonist and editor for The New Yorker. Jean-Louis Bourgeois was an expert on mud brick architecture and worked both in the American southwest and in Djenne, Mali. Ruth Madoc played Fruma Sarah in the 1971 film version of Fiddler o the Roof. Herbert Deutsch co-invented the Moog Synthesizer. Grant Wahl was a sports journalist. Paul Silas played basketball for the Boston Celtics and the Seattle SuperSonics before going on to coach for the Charlotte Hornets. Georgia Holt was an actress and singer best known as the mother of Cher. Dame Beryl Grey was a ballerina. Abigail Kinoiki Kekaulike Kawananakoa claimed to be the last remaining Hawaiian royal princess. Frances Hesselbein was the CEO of the Girl Scouts starting in the mid-1970’s and changed their focus away from homemaker type activities, Wolf Erlbruch wrote German children’s books. Stuart Margolin was an actor, best known for playing Angel Martin in The Rockford Files. Curt Simmons was a pitcher, primarily for the Phillies. Steven “tWitch” Boss was a dancer and actor. Belinda Douglas-Scot-Montagu was commissioned to work on an embroidery for the 900th anniversary of the New Forest. Dino Danelli played drums for The Rascals.

Ned Rorem was a Pulitzer Prize winning composer. I have to admit that I knew his name mostly from crossword puzzles. But he earned me 27 ghoul pool points (15 for his position on my list, plus 12 for uniqueness).

Irene Cara was a singer and actress, best known for the song “Flashdance … What a Feeling.”

Kirstie Alley was an actress, best known for playing Rebecca Howe on Cheers.

Joseph Kromelis was a homeless man and sometime street vendor in Chicago who was known as “Walking Man.” He was the victim of an arson attack while he slept under a bridge in May 2022. People suck.

FlyerTalk Dinner: Last Friday night, I went out to dinner with a few friends from FlyerTalk at Open Road in Rosslyn. The food and beer were both very good and the service was okay. (I had the Tropic Thunder IPA and their tacos.) The prices were a bit on the high side, though we got the happy hour prices on the drinks and the entrees were big enough for two meals. Overall, I’d recommend it and I’d be happy to try their Merrifield location (which is closer to my house, though the Rosslyn one is right across the street from the metro, so is reasonably convenient). I should also note that Rosslyn looks to have been cleaned up quite a bit since the last time I was there, which was ages ago.

Chocolate Tasting: Last Saturday, Cindy and I went to a chocolate tasting at River-Sea Chocolates in Chantilly. The place was a little hard to find, since their sign is not visible from the parking lot. But we did figure it out and were in plenty of time. We watched a few videos about chocolate growing, processing, and shipping, then tasted 5 different chocolates. The first two were dark chocolates - one from Thailand, one from Brazil. While they had similar cacao percentages, they tasted very different. Then there were two milk chocolates - one plain and one one with salted caramel. Finally, there was a white chocolate with gingerbread spices. The Thailand and the salted caramel milk chocolate were my favorites. We also got a little tour of their factory, seeing all the machines.

I also liked that their products are ethically sourced. For example, they check that the beans are all grown organically and that no child labor is involved. They even ship their beans by sailboats, to prevent the environmental impact of containerized cargo ships.

I bought several chocolate bars (as did Cindy) and highly recommend this place to people who like good chocolate. I thought I knew a lot about chocolate, but I did learn more and I will definitely be shopping there again.

Voices Swap: Last Saturday night was the monthly Voices in the Glen story swap. I got there late, because I had taken a nap and forgotten to turn on my alarm clock. At least I was on time to hear Margaret tell Dylan Thomas’s “A Child’s Christmas in Wales,” which is always a delight. I told a very brief version of La Segua, a Costa Rican horror story, in honor of my recent vacation.

Loser Brunch: Sunday was a Loser brunch at Lena’s in Alexandria. We had three tables full of people, scattered throughout the venue, which was slightly awkward, but we were able to get up and mingle. I got a margarita pizza (very good) and a drink called a Venus de Milo, which had campari, white peach, proseco, and grenadine, and was very tasty. Service was slow and there were some mistakes, but it was very busy, so it was forgivable.

This is rather burying the lede, but some of you already know that the WaPo killed the Style Invitational (along with the Sunday Magazine section and some other stuff). What you may not know is that Pat (the Empress) and her predecessor (Gene Weingarten, aka the Czar) are giving it a new life (alas, without prizes) on substack. They are hoping to get people to pay $5 a month or $50 a year, but you can sign up to read for free if you just want to read. Go to The Gene Pool and join.

Cookie Exchange and Dinner: I did a holiday cookie exchange with a bunch of puzzle folks again this year. We simplified things by having centralized receiving points for each city with multiple participants. The DC folks met up on Monday night to have dinner at Rasika West End (good Indian food) and distribute cookies. There was also lively conversation involved. By the way, my contribution was maple cinnamon stars, which are basically ordinary sugar cookies with cinnamon and maple extract added, cut into star shapes and decorated with gold sprinkles. Here’s a picture:

Also, I met up briefly today (Sunday the 18th) with the guy who received our cookies from the out of towners to get the rest of the ones he had. We still have one person who hasn’t done his share yet.

Post Office: I mailed off the rest of my cookies on Tuesday morning. The Merrifield Post Office is very efficient and it didn’t take long. I didn’t think I’d need another post office trip, but I discovered that some of the holiday cards I had required extra postage, so I made another excursion on Friday morning, this time to the Oakton Post Office because I had a couple of other errands to run in that direction. Things were slower there, since it’s much smaller and has fewer people working. Still, it gave me an opportunity to do my good deed for the month, since I always have a baggie full of pens and pencils in my pocketbook and was able to lend a pen to two people who needed to fill out customs forms. Note to self: check the box next time I buy cards to make sure they just require normal postage.

MIT Club of DC Holiday Party: Wednesday night was the MIT Club of DC holiday party, which was at a law office in Georgetown. The food (heavy hors d’oeuvres) was pretty tasty, but the drink assortment was weird, with lots of wine, sodas, and a bottle of Ketel One vodka. (I stuck to ginger ale, by the way.) I had lots of interesting conversation, some with people I knew before (e.g. someone I used to work with) and some with people I hadn’t met before. The possibility of a storytelling event for the club got mentioned.

TCC Webinar: Today there was a Travelers’ Century Club virtual explorations seminar about festivals. There were three speakers, who covered Guerewol in Niger, Naadam in Mongolia, and Punakha Drubchan in Bhutan. I’ve been to Naadam in Tuva (and the so-called “little” Naadam in Mongolia, which paled in comparison), but both the other two looked interesting. There was also good conversation in the breakout room for the Gurewol Festival afterwards.

Condo Association Holiday Party: Tonight was the annual condo association holiday party. There was fairly good attendance. I sampled several of the hot hors d’oeuvres including some very nice cheese puffs. And I had a glass of wine. I talked with a few neighbors but didn’t stay for long. I went back up to my condo and lit my Chanukah candles and now I am about to play board games over zoom.

Chanukah: I lit the first candle tonight. Chappy Chanukah!

Rabbi Doctor Silver: I forgot to mention this play that I watched on-line in early May. It’s a new translation of a Yiddish play by Sholem Asch. The plot involves a well-respected rabbi, whose wife is having an affair with her music teacher. She ends up leaving her husband, but when things go wrong for her with the music teacher, the rabbi tries to take her back. This stirs up his congregation (and, especially, the board of directors). There is also tension with his mother who lives with him. I didn’t find the story particularly convincing, but the play was well acted.

The Flushies: Last weekend was The Flushies, the annual award ceremony / party for the Style Invitational Loser community. My contribution to the potluck meal was tabbouleh and, after chopping ridiculous amounts of parsley, I remembered why I don’t make that more often. At least it was successful, meaning I had only enough leftovers for one meal. I thought some of the award announcements went on a bit long, with Pat reading too many of the entries by a couple of the winners. The group singing of song parodies also seemed longer than usual. But my perception of length was probably influenced by the absurdly hot weather (90+ Fahrenheit). I, generally, handle heat well, so I imagine other people were also chomping at the bit. Still, it was good to see some people I don’t see frequently (and see some in person who I usually see over zoom). And, of course, it is always fun to meet new folks.

Transport Planning for the Exurbs: I went to an MIT-related webinar about transport planning this week. The speaker is a planner for the Fredericksburg, Virginia area. I didn’t find much of what he had to say surprising. For example, of course people are reluctant to use a bus service that runs only once an hour. I was also glad that he talked about integrating pedestrians and bicyclists into the complete picture of transit needs. But I was somewhat disheartened by the length of time to get improvements implemented.

Textile Museum: I went to the Textile Museum on Wednesday with a few people from my crafts group. They have an exhibit on Indian textiles, which included examples from the 14th century to the present time and ranging throughout the subcontinent. In general, I preferred the embroidered textiles to the block printed and dyed ones. One other interesting thing was that a lot of pieces had an unusual sort of symmetry, where, say, both sides had birds but each side had different birds.

The stitching on this piece was particularly detailed:

This piece is more modern with interesting stylized figures:

The exhibit also includes various garments.

This piece incorporates iridescent beetle wings, along with the stitching.

After looking through the exhibit (and browsing in the gift shop), we had lunch a the falafel place in Western Market. I couldn’t resist trying their vegan shawarma. It was tasty, but I think the falafel would have been a better choice. (There are a wide range of other food stalls at Western Market, by the way, ranging from arepas to lobster rolls, fried chicken to sushi. Someday I have to try the Guatemalan place.) All in all, it was a lovely excursion.

The Upstairs Department: On Thursday night, I went to see this new play at Signature Theatre. The story involves a young man who came out of a medically induced coma with the ability to hear dead people. His father died of COVID while he was in the coma - and that’s the one person he can’t hear. He and his sister go to Lily Dale (a real spiritualist community) where he hopes to learn how to control his power. His sister is a skeptic and the real gist of the play has to do with their relationship. The other character is the medium who they work with. The tone is much lighter than this description suggests and there were several moments of excellent character-driven humor.

By the way, I had dinner before the play at Tacos y Pina. The food was very good, as was the margarita I got. But I thought it was rather pricy for what it is.

Chavurah Barbecue: Yesterday afternoon, my chavurah had a cookout. The weather was beautiful - well, except for a brief rain shower. My contribution to the side dishes was a simple macaroni salad (elbow macaroni, scallions, pimentos, dill pickle relish, olives, and mayonnaise). It was good seeing folks and the conversation ranged from politics to movies to genealogy to books to baseball, etc. We will probably do another event for the Fourth of July.