Words for Rice

What's another word for bagatelle? What does 'atavistic' mean? Want to figure out how to use 'demimonde' in your next conversation? Go to this fun, well-designed website and find out. While you're testing your vocabulary, you'll be donating rice to people who need it. Click on image or go to www.freerice.com.

Dona Nobis Pacem

Finally joined a protest against the war. On Sunday night, Anne gathered with a small group from an interfaith peace coalition affiliated with Christian Peace Witness for Iraq. We sang, prayed, then placed stones along the fence around the White House. The idea is that "even the stones will cry out for justice."

I Love a Parade!

Well, Anne loves a parade. Ack marched in too many in high school, playing the French horn with its way-too-small mouth piece. But he went anyway to Baltimore to see the Thanksgiving parade. Lots of high school marching bands with lots of high energy dancing (lucky them, no French horns). And who could not like Fifi, the giant Pink Poodle put together by the Visionary Art Museum. Afterwards we had a warming cup of spicy crab soup in Big Kahuna Cantina, a restaurant overlooking the harbor.

A Weather Guy

Even when he's in DC, Ack makes headlines in Wisconsin. See this cover story on him and fellow Weather Guy Jon Martin in the Nov 14 issue of Wisconsin Week. (Photo by Jeff Miller - used without permission. Sorry, UW.)

Memorial to those lost at sea...

On a walk along the Potomic River on Nov 10, we came across this memorial - a memorial to all those who had died at sea. Seemed appropriate as Nov 10 is the day the Edmund Fitzgerald sank on Lake Superior.

Best Of

Three recent highlights that deserve a "Best" ranking...

Best Coffee - Minh's in Arlington
This inexpensive (for DC) and good Vietnamese restaurant has great coffee. It's served with the hot water still dripping through the compressed grinds in a small aluminum container that's sitting on top of your coffee cup. Hidden at the bottom of the cup is a thick serving of sweetened condensed milk. Our helpful waiter instructed us to use the lid of the coffee maker as a base when it was time to take the contraption off the cup and set it on the table (protect the tablecloth). Stir it all up to create a smooth sweet flavorful blend, pour it over ice, and have a terrific glass of iced coffee.

Best Political Writing -- Dana Milbank in The Washington Post
I was among the millions of Americans disgusted with President Bush's veto of reauthorizing SCHIP, the program that provides health care for low-income children, and the House's failure to overturn that veto. Dana Milbank, a celebrated columnist for the Washington Post, offered a window into related deliberations In an October 24 column, "Children's Health Yields to the Senators From Pork," It opens this way:

The United States Senate yesterday was confronted with a stark choice: health care for children, or pet projects for lawmakers' home states.

The final tally?

Pet Projects 68. Kids 26.

Milbank's writing is snarky and smart. Proof? In this piece he labels senators not with their state, but with their pet project. Egs, "I assume this comes as no surprise that I oppose the amendment," declared Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Figge Art Museum)," or "A spokesman for Sen. George Voinovich (R-First Ladies Library)..."

Read it and enjoy some great wry writing.

Best Hike & Fall Colors - Sugarloaf Mountain
Much later than what we're used to in Wisconsin, the height of the fall color change is now in DC. Thanks to a tip from DC folklorist Leslie Prosterman, Ack and I went hiking at Sugarloaf Mountain near Comus, Maryland. This is a beautiful set of trails in a privately owned park that is open to, and enjoyed by, a teeming public. Crowded, yes, but that just means more people are out with their families, friends and church groups on a gorgeous Sunday to challenge themselves with a strenuous hike to the 1,282' peak with the reward of beautiful vistas of the surrounding farms and woods. Sugarloaf is a monadnock (a mountain that remains after the erosion of the surrounding land) so it offers great views from all sides. We took the very vertical green trail up to the summit, and the long and more leisurely 5 mile blue trail back. The trails wind through continuously varied landscapes, with their beauty enhanced from the brilliant fall colors. It was a lovely afternoon.

Ack here, we had read complaints of the trails not being well marked, but I did not find that to be the case. With the map and 'tree markings' it was easy to stay on the trail.

We're Back!

When I told friend Sue E. that Ack and I had started a blog, she wondered how long we would keep it up. It wasn't very long, obviously--only six weeks. In our own defense, the stumbling block was an inability to find an English version of the pane I'm writing in now. We were in Amsterdam and I couldn't maneuver through the Dutch version of blogspot in order to post. But of course, that was about a month ago.

Try, try again.

Ack also attended a meeting in Lille, France at the end of October. The picture is of one of the train station entrances in Lille. The mural filled the area with a surrealistic urban landscape and walkways went in and out of the painting doorways. The floor was black and had a small amount of water to make it look infinite.