Areas of Unrest

12 September 2004 - Cabbages and Kings

I have a lot of little things to say about oddly assorted subjects this week. Where to start, where to start? Let us follow the walrus.

Of Shoes. I did a Volksmarch in Arlington yesterday, which was designated as a 9/11 Memorial Walk. The walk did go past the Pentagon and the instructions pointed out the part of the western wall that the plane struck. But the heart of the walk was some of the surrounding neighborhoods. I've been through Pentagon City and Crystal City several times, but I'd never been to Fort Scott Park or Aurora Hills, which are surprisingly nice areas, with large, well-kept houses. The weather was ideal for walking and I was glad I had dragged myself out for the event. I did do a bit of shopping (well, mostly browsing) afterwards and, by the time I got home, my feet definitely felt the walk back from the metro.

And Ships. I'll count spaceships and just say that our insanely busy week at work culminated in a reasonably successful review on Thursday. I'm a bit disappointed that it looks like everything will be more or less business as usual, instead of adopting some more radical approaches to procuring our future satellites. But at least we all still have jobs.

And Sealing Wax. I read Alexander McCall Smith's The Full Cupboard of Life yesterday afternoon. If you're not reading the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series, you are missing a thoroughly delightful experience. These aren't big mysteries, full of murder and mayhem. Instead, the problems that Mma Ramotswe solves from her office in Gaborone, Botswana are ones of human nature.

Of Cabbages. Technology Review had a short blurb about functional foods this month. I hate the whole concept of turning foods into medicines. It's bad enough dealing with the latest diet fads, but ideas like cookies made with Omega-3 fish oils are too awful to contemplate.

And Kings. The Source of All Evil in the Universe has reached new depths of moral degradation by requesting that Tampa Bay, held up in transit by a hurricane, be made to forfeit the first game of a doubleheader. This request was denied, but it points out why, if baseball really needs to downsize, the team that should go is the Yankees.

And then there are a couple of odds and ends that Lewis Carroll never anticipated. I was talking with a friend at work and said something about trying to go out one night during the week. (I can exhaust myself all I want on weekends, of course.) She replied, "oh, yes, I need to force myself to get out more" and was rather disconcerted when I explained that I was trying to go out less.

The thing I went out to do this week was play board games at a coffeehouse in Clarendon on Tuesday. I found the group via meetup, but they've been meeting regularly there. Only two other people from meetup showed up - and they were the group's organizer and his girlfriend. I had a good time and I plan to go as regularly as my schedule permits.

Finally, after watching The Amazing Race this week, I want to try out a zorb. Those crazy kiwis! What I don't want to try out is a flight in a lawn chair, but I enjoyed the movie Danny Deckchair. It's an Australian version of the lawn chair man, but the gimmick is how his landing in a small town turns around both Danny's life and that of the town. It's very sweet and, while perhaps not as laugh out loud funny as the trailer suggests, well worth seeing.