I've been working on legitimate writing the whole time I've been away from home. If anything good has come from all of this, I actually have managed to get a decent bit of work done on my book - there were fundamental problems with the setup, and I think I might have hammered them into something usable.
I can't even begin to explain how tired I am, mentally.
I'm ready to come home, patch things up where it matters most, sit down on my couch, dogpile with Ivan and Turtle, and watch movies.
I'm ready to have my car back, to get in and pump some music, and take everyone up to the beach.
(I don't even like beaches. I just know that that is where we need to end up.)
I'm ready to sleep with my own pillow, in my own bed.
I have some more pictures of the Casa to share with you tomorrow, as well as the rest of DC - I have been down here for a third (and, for this trip, final) weekend.
There's going to be a third music post up. (And, likely, a fourth and a fifth.)
I started this as a way to distract myself in Delaware. It'll likely continue once I'm home...
Likely.
I'm enjoying it too much to see it die.
On that note?
Showing posts with label dc. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dc. Show all posts
Sunday, May 15, 2011
Monday, May 9, 2011
The Reason I Call It 'Casa del Pollo'
You may have read me ramble on about Tió Aparato quite a bit on here. (I've also been told that Tió Artilugio would be a better translation of what I was getting at with his fake name, but... well, he's already Uncle Apparatus, so that's what he's staying.)
My uncle has always been a bit of a character, but in the last decade and a half or so, he's been slowly amassing a collection of.... chickens.
This past month is the first time I've actually visited his home in about five years. He had... a few odd chickeny knick-knacks at the time, but nothing... overly noticeable.
The ensuing five years have, indeed, brought the deluge.
Thus, ladies and gentlemen, I bring you - the proof, presented behind a cut because it really is a ton of pictures.
My uncle has always been a bit of a character, but in the last decade and a half or so, he's been slowly amassing a collection of.... chickens.
This past month is the first time I've actually visited his home in about five years. He had... a few odd chickeny knick-knacks at the time, but nothing... overly noticeable.
The ensuing five years have, indeed, brought the deluge.
Thus, ladies and gentlemen, I bring you - the proof, presented behind a cut because it really is a ton of pictures.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
The party is not over, but sometimes, you just need to step out for air on the porch.
So to speak. But life goes on.
I spent the weekend in DC - a much more action-packed weekend than last weekend was. Aparato came down with a headcold during the week, so he was a little bit laid up, but it was still a good time.
When Mačka got home Friday night, he was... far more chatty and animated than I'm used to from him. He was trying to talk to the cat (they have two), and he was quite giggly about everything. We got a pizza, and he insisted that we watch Mega Shark Versus Crocosaurus - an inspired choice, if I may say so myself.
(The pizza choice was, if I may say so myself, was INSPIRED - I'd been praying for a hangover-curing quesadilla, but a pizza with chicken on it was JUST AS AMAZING.)
Saturday, Aparato and I went museum-hopping finally, Saturday afternoon. The National Gallery (West Building) smells... disturbingly like sunblock. The building itself reeks of sunblock. It was making me laugh uncontrollably for some reason.
The museum actually closed soon after we got there, so we went across the street to their outdoor sculpture garden - which also promptly closed. (I didn't manage to get any pictures there, though - I finally had a goddamned camera with me in DC for once in my life, and I forgot it on the god-damned coffee table. Unbe-freaking-lievable. I should have good pictures of the sculpture garden next weekend, though.)
We then ended up, successively, at the Museum of Natural History and then the National Museum of American History, which were... well, okay, those two were kind of boring. I don't know. I like museum-hopping, but there's something about overloading on them. I prefer art museums to history museums, for some damn reason.
We then ended up at Legal Seafood for dinner, and as we're standing there on the sidewalk, I look up at the advertisement board for the Regal across the street. I mention offhandedly, calmly, as we wait for Mačka to show up, "...You know, I heard Thor was supposed to be decent."
But I didn't push the matter. I knew he had a head cold, so I wasn't gonna ask him to sit through some loud-ass movie for two hours or so.
Mačka shows up, and the only words Aparato can get out is, "What would you think of going to see Thor aft-"
"There's a 9:10 and a 9:50 show."
(MAČKA, WHY ARE YOU AMAZING AND PSYCHIC, I LOVE YOU.)
So we went in for a wonderful dinner at Legal. Can I just say that if you ever have the chance, go to Legal Seafood in DC if only to have the opportunity to experience the bathrooms there.
Pictures would not do it justice.
The hallway that the bathrooms are in is partitioned by a mirrored wall down the middle - the ladies' bathrooms are on the left, the mens' on the right. Each "stall" is actually an individual bathroom, walled off with a full door, and each has its own toilet, sink, and hand-dryer.
AMAZING.
Having said that, their food also amazing beyond belief. If nothing else, the crab cakes. Good lord.
Thor was also pretty fucking good.
I will admit that the story got a little muddy and over-jumbled because there was too much attempt to give equal screen time to Earth and Asgard.
I like Chris Hemsworth - he has some pretty good comic timing. He kind of looks like he got hit in the face with a cement block, though.
The guy who played Loki looks like a young Data (don't be a plebe and act like you don't know who Data is), but I enjoyed his acting for the most part. (I'm still not entirely sure what they were doing with fucking around with Loki's backstory. I'm not going to spoil it if you haven't seen the movie yet, but suffice it to say that if you're familiar with the traditional comic canon, you're gonna be a little thrown off.)
To quote the good Turtle, "Anthony Fucking Hopkins was Odin Fucking Allfather", and... well, I mean, what more can I really add to that?
Aparato and I geeked out like nerdy, nerdy children during Hawkeye's twelve seconds in the movie. I can't speak for him, but on my end, it was not only for the character, but it also means that I get to have a good ogle of Jeremy Friggin' Renner once The Avengers finally gets made.
(Contrary to my thoughts on Data, I won't consider you a plebe if you don't know who Hawkeye is.)
(They really need to stop cockteasing us with these setup films and just MAKE THE FUCKING AVENGERS ALREADY, OH MY GOD.)
(I also like how I'm judging Chris Hemsworth for looking like all smashed-faced, but I'm a Jeremy Renner fan. I don't even know.)
After the movie, though... oh, I don't know. Being away from home for so long is just... stressful, no matter how good it is to be able to be in DC every weekend for almost a month.
Make of that what you will.
Today was pretty uneventful. I had to buy a new backpack before I left DC - one of the straps was fraying pretty seriously on the one I had.
We had dinner before I left - chicken and rice and corn), and dinner was just so... hilarious.
We were sitting at the (what I assume to be IKEA) table, listening to a Cure station on Pandora, eating a good home-cooked meal, and they would not stop arguing about the best way to cook rice. They're such bickery bitches, I love it.
(I've got certain proclivities of my own, I'm not judging harshly. Their bickering is just fucking hilarious, I can't even handle it.)
I'm sitting here watching Netflix, and all I want to do is drop out of training, quit this job, go home, and fix my life.
I don't want these past few weeks to have been wasted, though, so... looks like I'll be in class bright and early tomorrow morning.
I'm just so done here, you guys. I miss all of you.
(Even though I prefer the old music video for this song, have the song anyway.)
I spent the weekend in DC - a much more action-packed weekend than last weekend was. Aparato came down with a headcold during the week, so he was a little bit laid up, but it was still a good time.
When Mačka got home Friday night, he was... far more chatty and animated than I'm used to from him. He was trying to talk to the cat (they have two), and he was quite giggly about everything. We got a pizza, and he insisted that we watch Mega Shark Versus Crocosaurus - an inspired choice, if I may say so myself.
(The pizza choice was, if I may say so myself, was INSPIRED - I'd been praying for a hangover-curing quesadilla, but a pizza with chicken on it was JUST AS AMAZING.)
Saturday, Aparato and I went museum-hopping finally, Saturday afternoon. The National Gallery (West Building) smells... disturbingly like sunblock. The building itself reeks of sunblock. It was making me laugh uncontrollably for some reason.
The museum actually closed soon after we got there, so we went across the street to their outdoor sculpture garden - which also promptly closed. (I didn't manage to get any pictures there, though - I finally had a goddamned camera with me in DC for once in my life, and I forgot it on the god-damned coffee table. Unbe-freaking-lievable. I should have good pictures of the sculpture garden next weekend, though.)
We then ended up, successively, at the Museum of Natural History and then the National Museum of American History, which were... well, okay, those two were kind of boring. I don't know. I like museum-hopping, but there's something about overloading on them. I prefer art museums to history museums, for some damn reason.
We then ended up at Legal Seafood for dinner, and as we're standing there on the sidewalk, I look up at the advertisement board for the Regal across the street. I mention offhandedly, calmly, as we wait for Mačka to show up, "...You know, I heard Thor was supposed to be decent."
But I didn't push the matter. I knew he had a head cold, so I wasn't gonna ask him to sit through some loud-ass movie for two hours or so.
Mačka shows up, and the only words Aparato can get out is, "What would you think of going to see Thor aft-"
"There's a 9:10 and a 9:50 show."
(MAČKA, WHY ARE YOU AMAZING AND PSYCHIC, I LOVE YOU.)
So we went in for a wonderful dinner at Legal. Can I just say that if you ever have the chance, go to Legal Seafood in DC if only to have the opportunity to experience the bathrooms there.
Pictures would not do it justice.
The hallway that the bathrooms are in is partitioned by a mirrored wall down the middle - the ladies' bathrooms are on the left, the mens' on the right. Each "stall" is actually an individual bathroom, walled off with a full door, and each has its own toilet, sink, and hand-dryer.
AMAZING.
Having said that, their food also amazing beyond belief. If nothing else, the crab cakes. Good lord.
Thor was also pretty fucking good.
I will admit that the story got a little muddy and over-jumbled because there was too much attempt to give equal screen time to Earth and Asgard.
I like Chris Hemsworth - he has some pretty good comic timing. He kind of looks like he got hit in the face with a cement block, though.
The guy who played Loki looks like a young Data (don't be a plebe and act like you don't know who Data is), but I enjoyed his acting for the most part. (I'm still not entirely sure what they were doing with fucking around with Loki's backstory. I'm not going to spoil it if you haven't seen the movie yet, but suffice it to say that if you're familiar with the traditional comic canon, you're gonna be a little thrown off.)
To quote the good Turtle, "Anthony Fucking Hopkins was Odin Fucking Allfather", and... well, I mean, what more can I really add to that?
Aparato and I geeked out like nerdy, nerdy children during Hawkeye's twelve seconds in the movie. I can't speak for him, but on my end, it was not only for the character, but it also means that I get to have a good ogle of Jeremy Friggin' Renner once The Avengers finally gets made.
(Contrary to my thoughts on Data, I won't consider you a plebe if you don't know who Hawkeye is.)
(They really need to stop cockteasing us with these setup films and just MAKE THE FUCKING AVENGERS ALREADY, OH MY GOD.)
(I also like how I'm judging Chris Hemsworth for looking like all smashed-faced, but I'm a Jeremy Renner fan. I don't even know.)
After the movie, though... oh, I don't know. Being away from home for so long is just... stressful, no matter how good it is to be able to be in DC every weekend for almost a month.
Make of that what you will.
Today was pretty uneventful. I had to buy a new backpack before I left DC - one of the straps was fraying pretty seriously on the one I had.
We had dinner before I left - chicken and rice and corn), and dinner was just so... hilarious.
We were sitting at the (what I assume to be IKEA) table, listening to a Cure station on Pandora, eating a good home-cooked meal, and they would not stop arguing about the best way to cook rice. They're such bickery bitches, I love it.
(I've got certain proclivities of my own, I'm not judging harshly. Their bickering is just fucking hilarious, I can't even handle it.)
I'm sitting here watching Netflix, and all I want to do is drop out of training, quit this job, go home, and fix my life.
I don't want these past few weeks to have been wasted, though, so... looks like I'll be in class bright and early tomorrow morning.
I'm just so done here, you guys. I miss all of you.
(Even though I prefer the old music video for this song, have the song anyway.)
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Our Nation's Capitol, Week 1
I think that I'll skip describing the actual first week of my training class here, because here is all you need to know: I was bored out of my mind. The instructor was teaching people how to use the 'Alt' key to get to the menu options in the program we're being trained in. There was nothing for me to take from this.
Last Wednesday afternoon, however, I took a brief afternoon trip to Washington, just to see how the trip would go. Once in Union Station, I took a walk up the the Capitol building, and then came back to the station, bought a sandwich, bought an umbrella, and came back to Wilmington. I'll be honest, all of my previous trips to DC have been in the summer - the foliage in the parks there in the spring is absolutely amazing.
Friday afternoon, it was time for me to go down properly for the weekend to visit my Uncle (Tío Aparato) and his gentleman (Mačka), two of my favorite people in the whole world.
I was originally supposed to go arrive at 6:30, and they would have picked me up... but I left for DC as soon as I was out of class, thus instead arriving at 3. I took the subway over to their house.
I have to admit, I've always loved the subway system in DC. The ceilings of the stop platforms are quite vaulted, and I've always thought that they're incredibly pretty, even though they're just cement blocks. In my agnostic mind, I consider the DC Metro stops to be cathedrals, of sorts... but I digress.
The Dynamic Duo moved since the last time I was there four years ago, but are still situated near the same Metro stop, so I knew the way... but nothing really looked familiar once I was street level. It took three blocks before I found the neighborhood Starbucks, and I instantly had my bearings back.
I headed South off of U street for a few blocks, and soon.... I had arrived.
Aparato was the only one at home, but that was alright - this was my first trip to the 'new' house, and he and I don't talk overly often anymore.
I must say one thing, first - their new house is amazing and perfect. It's four stories if you count the basement, and it's perfectly decorated, aside from the carpeting on the staircases. (In that case, the house is admittedly still a work in progress.)
But... it is a beautiful house. Tío Aparato and I sat out on the deck and talked for about two hours before Mačka got home, and then we decided to go out for food.
We ended up somewhere called St. Ex, and I had my first-ever Prix Fixe meal. The appetizer course was something akin to beef stroganoff minus the beef, the second course was roasted chicken with a some sort of large fritter (made of 'ramp', which the internet tells me is some sort of wild leek), and dessert was Earl Grey cheesecake. It was all, if I may say so myself, friggin' delicious.
When we got back to the house, we sat down to watch some television. We ended up watching Doctor Who, which I haven't done since David Tennant left... there was always just something a little bit too weird-looking about Matt Smith to me, I guess.
I was, however, pleasantly surprised - both by the fact that Matt Smith is actually sort of okay, and also by the fact that OMG, WAITER, THERE SEEMS TO BE SOME BADGER IN MY DOCTOR WHO, please give my compliments to the chef on this amazing and delightful notion!
(Things that make any show automatically better: Badger. Do I realize that he has a real name? Yes, but that point is immaterial.)
We watched some other stuff, too, but I'd been up since 7 AM, and it was nearing.... 11 PM? We watched an episode of Chopped, and we started watching Good Eats, but I was pretty much about passing out on the couch, so... it was bedtime for Ms. Millay.
I woke up around noon on Saturday, in the understanding that my cousin would be coming by and that we'd go museum-hopping... but that was, it seems, not to be. Ma Cousine was, this year, a freshman at AU, and she was caught up with helping some friends move out that afternoon.
Once she did finally show up, the four of us went out for Thai. On the way (I have no idea where were were - things not in walking distance of the house or certain Metro stops are kind of one big blur of city to me.) we had some sort of techno station blaring on the radio. I'm not overly fond of Rhianna, but the particular remix of 'S&M' we were listening to was actually pretty good.
But, as I was saying - Thai, pretty good place. We then went to see Source Code which was.... Hrm. Well. Look, I like looking at Jake Gyllenhaal as much as the next person, but... it was not a particularly amazing film.
In the same breath, I'm excited for On Stranger Tides and Thor. (I'm not usually such an unwashed plebe when it comes to movies. I don't even know.)
We got back from that and Ma Cousine went to go meet some friends, and then Aparato, Mačka, and I watched the second episode of the Doctor Who thing - MORE BADGER, with an added side-dish of awesome.
And then it was, once again, bedtime.
Woke up at around 1 on Sunday, and Mačka, Ma Cousine and I went to do some minor shopping. Not fancy shopping, shopping-at-Target shopping. We got home, and I went to evening church service with Aparato and Cousine.
Now, I was raised Catholic for a few years, but... I'm not. I don't consider myself Catholic, I don't identify as Catholic... but I never see these people. I figured I could do the decent thing and spend an hour with them.
It's also been a very, very long time since I was in a church for anything that wasn't a wedding or a funeral. Being in churches makes me nervous. I've never had that great of an attention span, and there's something about that Catholic Mass Incense that just makes me lose any chance I have at concentration. Then I get nervous that one of the really ardent older people will see me blatantly zoning out and think that I'm a heretic and try to have me burnt alive for heresy, and... well, I get nervous.
I might also add here that the church we went to was very elaborate inside, and I was very spaced out, and... all I could see around me were potential handholds.
The following text conversation took place directly after church with Ivan the Boyfriend:
We went to dinner at kramerbooks (having stopped to collect Mačka along the way), which took FOREVER even though it was delicious... and then we had to hustle back to the house so I could get my suitcase and get back to the train station. Père Du Ma Cousine had arrived just as we got there, though (he had come to collect Ma Cousine to take her back home for the summer). I literally had about 90 seconds to talk to him as I was running upstairs, and then back downstairs to the car.
We made it to Union Station with not a moment to spare - I ran back to the gate, out onto the platform, and onto the train. It left 45 seconds later.
I then came back to the hotel room once the train got in to Wilmington, and found that my cable was out.
Which isn't a big deal... I will watch TV when I have absolutely nothing else to do, but I do not watch it habitually by any stretch of the imagination. (I have recently begun watching television shows on Netflix, but that's not really the same thing as sitting down at a certain time every day or week to watch a certain show. If that makes sense.)
I decided to take a walk down to the river.
Along the way, I texted Ma Cousine to let her know that I'd gotten back safe. She texts back, "That's good. Also, apparently Osama bin Laden is dead."
I... didn't even know how to respond to that.
I sat down on a bench on the boardwalk to try to collect my thoughts, but... nothing was coming.
I walked back to the hotel room - of course my cable was out on that night of all nights.
So I fired up my netbook, found CNN, and waited for the live stream of Obama's statement to begin.
9/11 was the day before my thirteenth birthday. (Yeah, you know my birthday now.) Talk about a kick into your teenage years, right? Now, I'm not frothingly political, I'll admit, but there was really only one thing at the forefront of my mind:
Not that bin LAden wasn't a horrifically awful human being, but... at this point, was he really anything more than a symbolic figurehead? Please, someone feel free to prove me wrong on that point - and I don't want that to seem like I'm picking a fight with The Internet on that. If I'm legitimately incorrect in my assumption there, please correct me.
I've never felt so unaffected my the death of a human being, though. Like... I just cannot even care, for some reason. I remember airports before 9/11, and bin Laden's death isn't going to make the full-body scanners or the invasive searches go away. Nothing has changed.
I mean, call me cynical, but... will airport security decrease? Are any of the wars in the Middle East suddenly over?
No.
On that note, I think it's dinner-time, and I leave you with a song that always reminds me of the D.C. Metro lines.
Last Wednesday afternoon, however, I took a brief afternoon trip to Washington, just to see how the trip would go. Once in Union Station, I took a walk up the the Capitol building, and then came back to the station, bought a sandwich, bought an umbrella, and came back to Wilmington. I'll be honest, all of my previous trips to DC have been in the summer - the foliage in the parks there in the spring is absolutely amazing.
Friday afternoon, it was time for me to go down properly for the weekend to visit my Uncle (Tío Aparato) and his gentleman (Mačka), two of my favorite people in the whole world.
I was originally supposed to go arrive at 6:30, and they would have picked me up... but I left for DC as soon as I was out of class, thus instead arriving at 3. I took the subway over to their house.
I have to admit, I've always loved the subway system in DC. The ceilings of the stop platforms are quite vaulted, and I've always thought that they're incredibly pretty, even though they're just cement blocks. In my agnostic mind, I consider the DC Metro stops to be cathedrals, of sorts... but I digress.
The Dynamic Duo moved since the last time I was there four years ago, but are still situated near the same Metro stop, so I knew the way... but nothing really looked familiar once I was street level. It took three blocks before I found the neighborhood Starbucks, and I instantly had my bearings back.
I headed South off of U street for a few blocks, and soon.... I had arrived.
Aparato was the only one at home, but that was alright - this was my first trip to the 'new' house, and he and I don't talk overly often anymore.
I must say one thing, first - their new house is amazing and perfect. It's four stories if you count the basement, and it's perfectly decorated, aside from the carpeting on the staircases. (In that case, the house is admittedly still a work in progress.)
But... it is a beautiful house. Tío Aparato and I sat out on the deck and talked for about two hours before Mačka got home, and then we decided to go out for food.
We ended up somewhere called St. Ex, and I had my first-ever Prix Fixe meal. The appetizer course was something akin to beef stroganoff minus the beef, the second course was roasted chicken with a some sort of large fritter (made of 'ramp', which the internet tells me is some sort of wild leek), and dessert was Earl Grey cheesecake. It was all, if I may say so myself, friggin' delicious.
When we got back to the house, we sat down to watch some television. We ended up watching Doctor Who, which I haven't done since David Tennant left... there was always just something a little bit too weird-looking about Matt Smith to me, I guess.
I was, however, pleasantly surprised - both by the fact that Matt Smith is actually sort of okay, and also by the fact that OMG, WAITER, THERE SEEMS TO BE SOME BADGER IN MY DOCTOR WHO, please give my compliments to the chef on this amazing and delightful notion!
(Things that make any show automatically better: Badger. Do I realize that he has a real name? Yes, but that point is immaterial.)
We watched some other stuff, too, but I'd been up since 7 AM, and it was nearing.... 11 PM? We watched an episode of Chopped, and we started watching Good Eats, but I was pretty much about passing out on the couch, so... it was bedtime for Ms. Millay.
I woke up around noon on Saturday, in the understanding that my cousin would be coming by and that we'd go museum-hopping... but that was, it seems, not to be. Ma Cousine was, this year, a freshman at AU, and she was caught up with helping some friends move out that afternoon.
Once she did finally show up, the four of us went out for Thai. On the way (I have no idea where were were - things not in walking distance of the house or certain Metro stops are kind of one big blur of city to me.) we had some sort of techno station blaring on the radio. I'm not overly fond of Rhianna, but the particular remix of 'S&M' we were listening to was actually pretty good.
But, as I was saying - Thai, pretty good place. We then went to see Source Code which was.... Hrm. Well. Look, I like looking at Jake Gyllenhaal as much as the next person, but... it was not a particularly amazing film.
In the same breath, I'm excited for On Stranger Tides and Thor. (I'm not usually such an unwashed plebe when it comes to movies. I don't even know.)
We got back from that and Ma Cousine went to go meet some friends, and then Aparato, Mačka, and I watched the second episode of the Doctor Who thing - MORE BADGER, with an added side-dish of awesome.
And then it was, once again, bedtime.
Woke up at around 1 on Sunday, and Mačka, Ma Cousine and I went to do some minor shopping. Not fancy shopping, shopping-at-Target shopping. We got home, and I went to evening church service with Aparato and Cousine.
Now, I was raised Catholic for a few years, but... I'm not. I don't consider myself Catholic, I don't identify as Catholic... but I never see these people. I figured I could do the decent thing and spend an hour with them.
It's also been a very, very long time since I was in a church for anything that wasn't a wedding or a funeral. Being in churches makes me nervous. I've never had that great of an attention span, and there's something about that Catholic Mass Incense that just makes me lose any chance I have at concentration. Then I get nervous that one of the really ardent older people will see me blatantly zoning out and think that I'm a heretic and try to have me burnt alive for heresy, and... well, I get nervous.
I might also add here that the church we went to was very elaborate inside, and I was very spaced out, and... all I could see around me were potential handholds.
The following text conversation took place directly after church with Ivan the Boyfriend:
(P) Well, I figure hell really is a forgone conclusion in my case, but… Still. I was in a church during mass going ‘it would be simple as fuck to get to that dome.’ lol.It should be noted that I managed to not randomly free-run in the middle of Mass. I also didn't go to Communion... I don't care about ~desecrating the Sacrament~ or anything, it just would have felt... disingenuous, I guess.
(I) At least you didn’t start climbing? lol
(P) Basically.
(I) “LIZ! What are you doing?” “I swear to god there’s a feather up there.”
We went to dinner at kramerbooks (having stopped to collect Mačka along the way), which took FOREVER even though it was delicious... and then we had to hustle back to the house so I could get my suitcase and get back to the train station. Père Du Ma Cousine had arrived just as we got there, though (he had come to collect Ma Cousine to take her back home for the summer). I literally had about 90 seconds to talk to him as I was running upstairs, and then back downstairs to the car.
We made it to Union Station with not a moment to spare - I ran back to the gate, out onto the platform, and onto the train. It left 45 seconds later.
I then came back to the hotel room once the train got in to Wilmington, and found that my cable was out.
Which isn't a big deal... I will watch TV when I have absolutely nothing else to do, but I do not watch it habitually by any stretch of the imagination. (I have recently begun watching television shows on Netflix, but that's not really the same thing as sitting down at a certain time every day or week to watch a certain show. If that makes sense.)
I decided to take a walk down to the river.
Along the way, I texted Ma Cousine to let her know that I'd gotten back safe. She texts back, "That's good. Also, apparently Osama bin Laden is dead."
I... didn't even know how to respond to that.
I sat down on a bench on the boardwalk to try to collect my thoughts, but... nothing was coming.
I walked back to the hotel room - of course my cable was out on that night of all nights.
So I fired up my netbook, found CNN, and waited for the live stream of Obama's statement to begin.
9/11 was the day before my thirteenth birthday. (Yeah, you know my birthday now.) Talk about a kick into your teenage years, right? Now, I'm not frothingly political, I'll admit, but there was really only one thing at the forefront of my mind:
Not that bin LAden wasn't a horrifically awful human being, but... at this point, was he really anything more than a symbolic figurehead? Please, someone feel free to prove me wrong on that point - and I don't want that to seem like I'm picking a fight with The Internet on that. If I'm legitimately incorrect in my assumption there, please correct me.
I've never felt so unaffected my the death of a human being, though. Like... I just cannot even care, for some reason. I remember airports before 9/11, and bin Laden's death isn't going to make the full-body scanners or the invasive searches go away. Nothing has changed.
I mean, call me cynical, but... will airport security decrease? Are any of the wars in the Middle East suddenly over?
No.
On that note, I think it's dinner-time, and I leave you with a song that always reminds me of the D.C. Metro lines.
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
How I Spent Easter
Not that I'm Christian by any long mental stretch, mind you, but I did almost twelve hours travelling last Sunday, and it had nothing to do with visiting family members.
On the leg of the trip between Rochester and New York City, I was stuck in a four-seater on a train with a snotty teenager, a rank-smelling old lady, and some film school douche who insisted on practically draping his arm over my chest to record footage of the Hudson River out the window. (Despite numerous attempts to at least switch seats with him, he refused - I just don't like strangers' arms being all over my rack, I don't know. Maybe I'm the weird one out on this.)
I will say that the trip along the Hudson was actually very nice to look at. You can see all of these trees growing straight up the sheer rock face on the other side of the river, and... if I were the sort of person who were inclined to enjoy boat rides, it would probably a lovely place to take a boat trip on in the summer.
Actually being on boats tends to send me into a panic more often than not, though, so I don't think that anyone has to worry about me trying to foist that sort of vacation on them.
Penn Station is a hole in the ground. A hot, cramped hole in the ground. My Easter dinner was a falafel-hummus pita from Chickpea.
There was a pigeon trapped in the waiting area while I was eating, too. That threw me off a little bit.
I can't remember precisely what time I got in to Wilmington, but I was immediately struck by two things - one, I was hungry. Two, the apartment/long-term hotel room I had been set up in was a cavernous, barren box. (Much like your mom.)
The people in my class are alright, and the instructor is an okay guy, I just feel like three and a half weeks is a little bit excessive for this job. Now, I'll admit, some people really do need to learn basic computer functions, and I respect that they need all of this training. I learned how to do my job in two days in real time, though, so... why isn't there some sort of aptitude screening test for people who take this course? Maybe some of us could have just shown up for the last week or so of training and gotten caught up on more advanced skills that would be useful.
On the other hand, though, I decided midway through last week that I would use this paid, unneeded training to get some writing done, so I bought a cheap notebook, and ended up writing... and honestly, I've been bored enough that a lot of it has digressed into hilariously bad pornography. I can't help but wonder what repercussions, if any, would come of me noting on the final course evaluation that they paid me to sit around writing about cocks for a month.
In the mean time, though, I took the train down to D.C. this past weekend, and will be doing so again this weekend, and likely the next.
I'll detail those shenanigans in a later post - for right now, though, I think it's high time I had a nap.
Oh! - a quick thought while I'm at it, though. The landlord's sole response to my renewed request that the bathroom mold be taken care of - 'Not a problem I wil[sic] send him back over'.
Thank you for that eloquent and detailed response, Sir Landlord. That was, however, a shockingly immediate response given your prior track record in that department.
In the next edition(s): Things that I've discovered in Wilmington, last weekend's trip to D.C., and the art of maintaining communications with Ivan and Turtle while I'm away.
For now, though, I leave you with Serge Gainsbourg, who was completely awesome before he got really kind of creepy a number of decades later.
On the leg of the trip between Rochester and New York City, I was stuck in a four-seater on a train with a snotty teenager, a rank-smelling old lady, and some film school douche who insisted on practically draping his arm over my chest to record footage of the Hudson River out the window. (Despite numerous attempts to at least switch seats with him, he refused - I just don't like strangers' arms being all over my rack, I don't know. Maybe I'm the weird one out on this.)
I will say that the trip along the Hudson was actually very nice to look at. You can see all of these trees growing straight up the sheer rock face on the other side of the river, and... if I were the sort of person who were inclined to enjoy boat rides, it would probably a lovely place to take a boat trip on in the summer.
Actually being on boats tends to send me into a panic more often than not, though, so I don't think that anyone has to worry about me trying to foist that sort of vacation on them.
Penn Station is a hole in the ground. A hot, cramped hole in the ground. My Easter dinner was a falafel-hummus pita from Chickpea.
There was a pigeon trapped in the waiting area while I was eating, too. That threw me off a little bit.
I can't remember precisely what time I got in to Wilmington, but I was immediately struck by two things - one, I was hungry. Two, the apartment/long-term hotel room I had been set up in was a cavernous, barren box. (Much like your mom.)
The people in my class are alright, and the instructor is an okay guy, I just feel like three and a half weeks is a little bit excessive for this job. Now, I'll admit, some people really do need to learn basic computer functions, and I respect that they need all of this training. I learned how to do my job in two days in real time, though, so... why isn't there some sort of aptitude screening test for people who take this course? Maybe some of us could have just shown up for the last week or so of training and gotten caught up on more advanced skills that would be useful.
On the other hand, though, I decided midway through last week that I would use this paid, unneeded training to get some writing done, so I bought a cheap notebook, and ended up writing... and honestly, I've been bored enough that a lot of it has digressed into hilariously bad pornography. I can't help but wonder what repercussions, if any, would come of me noting on the final course evaluation that they paid me to sit around writing about cocks for a month.
In the mean time, though, I took the train down to D.C. this past weekend, and will be doing so again this weekend, and likely the next.
I'll detail those shenanigans in a later post - for right now, though, I think it's high time I had a nap.
Oh! - a quick thought while I'm at it, though. The landlord's sole response to my renewed request that the bathroom mold be taken care of - 'Not a problem I wil[sic] send him back over'.
Thank you for that eloquent and detailed response, Sir Landlord. That was, however, a shockingly immediate response given your prior track record in that department.
In the next edition(s): Things that I've discovered in Wilmington, last weekend's trip to D.C., and the art of maintaining communications with Ivan and Turtle while I'm away.
For now, though, I leave you with Serge Gainsbourg, who was completely awesome before he got really kind of creepy a number of decades later.
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