Posted by barb on Jul 18, 2003 in
Around DC I found out about the Washington Dolls’ House and Toy Museum at the miniatures show I went to in April, and I thought that Maggie would be the perfect person to take. (I wasn’t so sure that Andrew would enjoy it.) Wow! The museum takes up 7 large rooms in what seems to be an old house in Chevy Chase MD (just across the border into DC). But this represents only half of the Flora Gill Jacobs’ collection.
Our plan was to grab lunch and head off to the International Spy Museum after the doll house museum. However, on our way to lunch, I pointed out to Maggie that there was a secret option #2. “What is secret option #2?” Maggie asked. “We could go home.” I replied. I could see Maggie’s face light up a bit. While I think we could have made it through the museum, I’m not so sure either of us would have gotten much out of it.
So, instead we went home after lunch at The Cheesecake Factory (we split a sandwich so we could each have a slice of cheesecake, of course). We spent the evening finishing tiling our mosaics.
Posted by barb on Jul 17, 2003 in
Books by Frederik Pohl
This is the second installment in the Gateway series. I was completely drawn in by the first book, and it’s now among my favorite books. So, I was a bit startled/jolted when I started this one and found the style and point-of-view was completely different (the first book was completely from Robinette Broadhead’s point-of-view, whereas this one had a different point-of-view for each chapter).
However, I quickly got over my surprise, and was drawn in by Beyond the Blue Event Horizon as much as I had been by Gateway. This book picks up several years after Gateway, and follows a family’s voyage to a Heechee food factory in the Oort cloud. After three years of travel (they do not take the Heechee ships because the last person who tried, did not return), they arrive, only to discover that they are not alone. They stumble upon a human boy, Wan, who has never seen another human besides his mother who died when he was very, very young). He has been living at another Heechee port, nicknamed Heechee Heaven, cared for by the “dead ones” — machines with the imperfect memories of men and women unfortunate enough to have stumbled into Heechee Heaven.
Pohl does not disappoint. The characters are well-crafted, and the story compelling. I’m looking forward to the third installment.
Posted by barb on Jul 17, 2003 in
Around DC,
Pictures Wow! We did a lot today, and I can barely move!
We started in Fells Point Baltimore , where we had lunch at a cool Egyptian restaurant.
We did not have enough time in Fells Point — I think next time we’ll dedicate at least half a day to the area.
From there, we headed a bit north to the American Dime Museum . I’d been there with Andrew earlier this year, but I thought Maggie would enjoy it. It’s a bit weird, and not everyone I know would “get it”. (In fact, a couple people, possibly a mother and son, came in after us, and had disappeared before we had even completed one room.)
Finally, we went to the National Aquarium . I’d been waffling on whether to bring Maggie there or not. It wasn’t that I thought she might not enjoy it, but I’ve already been three times in the last couple years, and it’s expensive! But then I thought that it might just be the highlight of her trip. As it turned out, it was the highlight — especially the sea horses exhibit as a whole and the sea dragons in particular.
(Mental note: Arrive at the Aquarium after 3PM. You avoid all of the school and daycare groups, and have a much more manageable child-to-adult ratio. Plus there are just fewer people there.)
Oh! And, we also saw the While You Were Out truck in Baltimore — right across from the Aquarium. Looks like someone in the Baltimore area might be in for a surprise soon! Sigh. I didn’t see Andrew Dan-Jumbo, though.
All in all, a very tiring day. But loads of fun!
Posted by barb on Jul 16, 2003 in
Biking,
Concerts,
Pictures Since Maggie and Jim have recently taken up mountain biking, I thought we could go for a bike ride while Maggie was here. We rented her a bike at Spokes, Etc. in Vienna, and went for about 4 miles up the W&OD trail (Washington and Old Dominion — an old railroad that was turned into a bike trail). Maggie quite enjoyed being able to go fast, since usually she’s going up and down so much that she can just take off. We reached 17 mph on a straight away, and on our way back down a hill, we got up to 26 mph!
This evening we had tickets for The Reduced Shakespeare Company ‘s All the Great Books at the Kennedy Center. I’d seen RSC’s Shakespeare performance on PBS last year, so I was really looking forward to tonight’s performance. I was not disappointed!
Picture of Andrew and me on the viewing deck of the Kennedy Center, with the Lincoln memorial in the background:
Posted by barb on Jul 15, 2003 in
Around DC,
Pictures Maggie needed to see water, so we went to Annapolis. While we were there, we shopped up and down Main street. I took just a couple pictures:
I think my best find of the day was a “Mad Scientist Tigger”. I didn’t even know they had made one, but apparently it was available at the Disney Store (where I rarely shop). I found it in a toy-collectable store.
Posted by barb on Jul 14, 2003 in
Around DC Since several of the other museums I wanted to take Maggie to are not open Mondays and Tuesdays, I decided that we would start with a trip to the National Air & Space Museum . This is probably Maggie’s favorite Smithsonian museum (though the Natural History Museum would be a very close second).
I really wanted to show her the Explore the Universe exhibit, which is the first I’ve ever seen that features some aspects of high energy astrophysics (like a flight spare model from the EGRET telescope on the Compton Gamma-Ray Observatory, and a piece from one of the detectors on the ROSAT X-ray telescope). These artifacts were also featured in a cool “Museum Roadshow” interactive display, where they parody “Antiques Roadshow” to tell you a bit about each artifact.
We also stopped by the Natural History Museum, so Maggie could see the dinosaurs and the big blue whale. Unfortunately, they are renovating the room where the whale used to be, so no more whale. We, of course, went through the gift shops, too, and there Maggie accidentally dropped the lid of a box between the shelves and store-front window. <Giggle> We were going to tell the clerk, but she was looking frazzled and cranky, so we just slipped out instead.
Posted by barb on Jul 13, 2003 in
Around DC Maggie flew in today from Georgia. After stopping at home for lunch and to drop off her luggage, we headed down to Alexandria. We each found a few used books, but for the most part we were all just window shopping. We had dinner at the Thai restaurant across from the Market Square — this was where Andrew and I ate the first time I was in Alexandria.
After dinner, we took the Alexandria Ghosts & Graveyard Tour. There were actually two “ghost” walks leaving form the same location — one was led by a member of the parapsychology department of the University of Virginia, and would tell about how to spot a ghost, how to photograph and record a ghost, etc. The other tour, the one we took, was a telling of the folklore that had collected between the revolution and civil wars. Our guide was in costume, and led us by lantern light (though it wasn’t actually dark enough out for us to need a lantern). She was a fairly animated story teller, though at times it grated on my nerves a bit. All in all, though, I quite enjoyed the tour we took, though I think it would be interesting some other time to take the other one, too.
Posted by barb on Jul 12, 2003 in
Crafty Me,
Pictures It took the whole 7 hours that the instructor scheduled for the class, but I was able to finish it! (Though in the last few minutes, I had a bit of extra help from the instructor.) I also bought a kit to make another, identical, basket….let’s just hope I remember how!
Posted by barb on Jul 8, 2003 in
Books,
Pictures While we were in Alexandria, I released a book “into the Wild”. (Check out Bookcrossing.com if you don’t know what that means — it’s a way cool web site! You can also check out my bookshelf .) I released it on a bench in the Market Square
It’s hard to see, but the book is on that bench — way to the left.
I was worried that it might get rained on, since the forecast called for thunderstorms.
Nothing to worry about! Someone picked it up, and registered it today!
Posted by barb on Jul 6, 2003 in
Biking,
Pictures Yay! We finally got to take our bike trip to Alexandria. It’s somewhat difficult for us to plan bike trips for now, since I’m not able to go great distances. The two books Andrew has of bike rides in the DC area start at about 7 miles, which I could do, if they weren’t all listed as “hilly”. The rides quickly get longer. But we cut one of the trips in half, by not returning to our starting point. We can do this because Metro allows bikes on the trains during off-peak hours. (That’s me on the train…trying to ignore the fact that Andrew is taking a picture.)
The path we’d chosen was a total of about 7.5 miles, but with getting to the Metro, getting from the Metro to the start of the path, etc. I put a total of 10.6 miles on my bike (plus a bit more, because the sensor for my bike’s computer jiggled out of alignment for a bit – read great post here about that). Next time I’ll try to enjoy the scenery a bit more — the path goes right along the Potomac, with a great view of the Lincoln and Washington Memorials, as well as the Kennedy Center, and I may have caught a glimpse of the capitol in there too. Unfortunately the rechargeable batteries I bought with my new camera suck, and I couldn’t take any pictures (the picture of me on the Metro drained the batteries completely…that and the pictures of Felicia, the PhD Candidate bear, were the only pictures I’d taken on this recharging.)
I’m looking forward to getting out again soon!