myxer

Over the last two years I have learned, or rediscovered a few things. Let me share: There are things to do and places to see in our own backyard, that it is easy to overlook in the hustle to travel and see the world.  Being near home I have discovered and rediscovered the wonders near me.  To really see a place, you need to spend time seeing it.  I made a point of walking the same walk, five or more times a week, for a year.  I got to know it rather well, and was still surprised after months of walking the same steps, that there were things I had not seen, some had been there, some were changes.  When we travel and spend a few days in a place, more often just a day or two, all we really see is a very limited glimpse of the place.  This renews my desire to go stay in one place for a month or two.  Rent an apartment, live among the locals, walk the same sidewalks for a month or more.  22 more moths and I can start doing that.   I have enjo...

What could be sweeter than three bears? This video has been in my draft folder for months, maybe longer.  Come cook with me someday? 

An old friend got me started on blogging by asking me to fill in for him for a couple of weeks one summer while he went on holiday (he is English.) Through blogging I have met some wonderful friends.  Some only virtual, others in Person.  I have mourned a few losses.  Celebrated a few accomplishments. Hence this weeks Sunday Five: 1: Have you met any bloggers in person?  2: Do you almost always leave a comment?  3: Are there blogs you read that you would never leave a comment on?  4: Has anyone ever tracked you down from your blog?  5: What blogger do you hope to meet in person someday? My Answers! 1: Have you met any bloggers in person? About 10 of them. 2: Do you almost always leave a comment? There is a core group that I try to leave a comment, even if it just a couple of words to let you know I was there, and a few I rarely comment on.  3: Are there blogs you read that you would never leave a comment on? A few.  There are a couple I stopp...

I have a couple of cameras (well more than a couple.) I have a great bag full of lenses, this was taken with a 10.5mm Nikkor fisheye lens. An amazing wide view of the world.  Life is not always easy, or fun. I am fortunate to be able to choose how I respond to the trials of daily life.  Usually with getting stressed, then realizing that it is all a part of the journey.  It may not be the party I hoped for, but while we are here I might as well dance.   I grump about the weather, and the traffic, and the cost, but I am very fortunate to live in a wonderful area.  As a major world capital, there is money, power, influence, and with that comes shopping, food and drink, museums, and arts.  It isn't perfect, it can be cold in the winter, and steamy in the summer, there are times when you simply have to give up on traffic and go home.  From the first time I visited here, I dreamed of living here.  This is really the first place in my life that...

I am enjoying my second set of Prada eyeglass frames, I keep getting compliments on how good they look.  How much Prada actually worked on the design, I don't know.  I do know they didn't cost much more to make, than the no-brand one's from my favorite discounter. But they have that brand.  Now I am stingy.  I seldom pay full price, and true to form the Prada's were half off on the purchase of a second pair of glasses.  Making them not much more than the no-brand frames from the discounter.   When I lived in Orlando, there was a Calvin Klein factory outlet store just off International Drive, back in the days when factory outlets were actually owned and operated by the manufacturer.  It allowed me to indulge in some good stuff, without suffering anxiety over spending that much to look fabulous.   I have no idea how much the Dior sunglasses are, if you want to try them on, you have to give them your ID and credit card to hol...

  I have mentioned before that one of the early blogs I contributed to was the "Mirror Project" that posted photos from contributors showing reflections of the world that in someway reflected the photographer.  It was a fun project, it kept me looking for shiny objects.  It ended when literally someone dropped it, dropped the server all of the postings were saved on.  The last time I checked parts of it had been restored from bits and pieces, but the down time kind of ended that one for me.  Still I find myself stopping to take a photo of a reflection.  I saw the good doctor recently, I was pleasantly surprised that I had only gained 3 pounds in the past year, I was sure I was up 10 or 20 pounds.  We talked, she is nice and fun and understanding of what I want, of what I feel is important.  I commented that I have largely my dream job, she said her nephew asked her recently about becoming a doctor, she said "I had to think about that, but yes, I a...

  It has been about 23 months since we returned from Ireland, to a vastly changed world, with no idea how long the changes would last.  My most traveled year, I boarded a little over 30 airline flights, 4 last year.  A couple of times I have gone to Europe twice in a 12 month period, it has been a couple of years since the last trip, and I am longing for the good old days.   I am maxed out on accrued vacation and paid personal days at the office, and struggling to find reasons to take a day here and there to minimize the loss of paid time off that I will never get.  In the past this was never a real issue, only when I was distracted or careless did I run afoul of the rules.  But without travel, both business and personal, I find it hard to take the time I have earned.  I often add a few days to work travel, staying over at my own expense to see people or places. I have had one work trip in 28 months.  And nothing seems to be coming up. ...

I had something else written and then realized this is 2/22/22, or across the pond, 22/2/22.  A date sequence like that will not happen again in my lifetime.  We should do something special.  People talk about once in a lifetime trips, well this is truly a once in a lifetime date. I think the only once in a lifetime trips I have had, are to places I don't care to ever go back to.  And there are a few, I won't name names to protect those stranded in those places, and unable to escape.  There are far more I would go back to, than I hope to avoid.   Speaking of going back, I want to go back to the transit center at the World Trade Center site in NYC.  We were there briefly last summer, what a great space, it deserves more time on the next trip.    We booked lunch reservations last August at the restaurant on the observation level of the new tower at the World Trade Center.  A spectacular view, and a nice lunch, I am very glad we d...

A few weeks ago, someone accidentally put my office Zoom account on a list to be shut off, and it WAS, in the middle of a regularly scheduled call, on a consulting contract,  that pays us rather well, when it went off. My interaction with the powers to be, was polite but frustrating, I looped my boss's boss into the conversation, and finally someone went oops, my fault! The really nice thing is the person who made the mistake, took responsibility and apologized. I had driven to the office that day, when it was resolved, I closed up shop, put the top down on the car and drove home a little early.  Sometimes the most productive thing is to leave work a little early.  I can look back and laugh at it today, but in the moment, I needed a little change of pace. Kind if like Gordon.

If you laughed at the title, you are an experienced adult, or you are simply old.  I recently replaced my cell/mobile phone.  I don't recall if I bought in 2015 or 2016, I think 2015, so it was likely 7 years old.  It still worked, but the memory was full. The resident memory that holds the operating system and all apps, was full to the point I couldn't update or add anything, without taking something off.  And I am not a big app user.  So after putting it off for months, I decided it was time, and off the phone store.  Probably the easiest sale they had all day.  I told the guy what I wanted and needed, he said this one is best, he had it in stock, done deal.  It works, does a few things the old one didn't, does more than I want or need.   Last summer my office changed the security protocol for remote email access.  I followed the directions, first step was delete my office email from my phone, that was easy. Second step was f...

When I first moved in Washington DC, my office was so close to the White House, that I signed a release for my information to be shared with White House security.  We were inside the exclusion zone for inaugurations, as in the Secret Service locked our building and told us when we could return after the inauguration. The office moved a few blocks away a few years ago.    12 years ago there was a construction fence very much like this, in front of the west wing, the area of the executive offices. The official answer was it was underground utilities work, that took about three years and several hundred thousands of cubic yards of concrete.  When the new bunker was finished, there was a discrete announcement that the second half would be started in a couple of years.   I was in the office recently and took a nice lunch time walk.  I hadn't spent much time around the White House over the past five years, for four of those the sight of t...

I have been thrown out of a few retail stores over the years for taking photos.  And I am shy about asking permission.  It is usually obvious that I am taking photos, I generally use a relatively large serious looking camera and lens.  I am sometimes a little nervous about it.   I ran across this shoe store filled with fabulous displays. There were no customers in the store, one person behind the register.  I took a couple of photos, said thank you and turned to leave.  The clerk said, before you leave - my heart sank - she continued "You have to take a photo of this shelf, they are my favorites and I want the world to see them!"  So here they are, being shown to my little corner of the world.  Aren't they fabulous! And how nice to be encouraged instead of thrown out of the store.  Share your fabulousness with the world.  

  I often like weird art, modern art, representational art, color studies and color blocks, found object sculpture. I like most art, the unusual modern stuff leaves a lot of people asking is it art, or saying what a pile of trash, but I often like it.   Here in Washington DC, the Hirschhorn Museum has interesting shows of modern and non-traditional art.  The Museum was built in the 1970's, it is round, as in a circle, with only a small glass entry box on the ground level, most of the galleries' are on the floors above (and another space below ground level.) The building is really mid-century brutalist, with a stone panel exterior.  And as many of the buildings of that era and style have, the exterior was starting to flake and fall off. The building is undergoing a major exterior renovation.  The interior is open.  The outside is wrapped in scaffolding.  The effect on the ground level is striking.   One of the current displays, is a ...

I  had a flashback moment recently.  The CBS Sunday Morning Show did a feature on th e  South End Rowing Club   i n San Francisco .  I have seen the club, watched people swimming in the bay. They do open water swimming in San Francisco Bay.  So part of the flashback was I have seen Aquatic Park, and that club, but deeper, the real flash back for me was 32 years ago, at the peak of my fitness, I did open water swimming in the Atlantic Ocean, along the coast of Florida.   I would go out probably 100 yards from shore, and swim parallel to the shore.  I was swimming a lot, 2-3 hours a week of laps in a pool. I learned to stay afloat as a child, I seriously learned to swim so I could compete in two seasons of Sprint Series TriAthlons, with swims up to half a mile.  I recall swimming as much as half a mile, parallel to the coast in open water. It is peaceful, powerful, relaxing.  It is surprisingly fast. Wonderful memories. 

Train travel in the USA can be a challenge, the trains tend to be slow, the equipment is often old. There are limited routes; away from the upper east coast and California, service is very limited.   BUT!  The people are nice and the price can be very attractive.   I recently booked tickets to go to New York later this spring, made hotel reservations, went to email someone special that we had made plans and realized I had train tickets to go up on a Monday, and hotel reservations starting on Tuesday.  I didn't want to add a hotel night, so I endeavoured to change the train tickets.  I should be able to do it online, but the reservations computer was running so slow that I kept getting kicked out.  I called, argued with the automated system that couldn't understand the difference between my saying "D" and "E", finally I was sent onto a human being.   And She was SO NICE and HELPFUL.  She encountered the same slow reser...

Happy Valentines Day One of the keys to others loving you for who you are is to like yourself. There have been times in my life when I was hard to love, because I didn't like myself.  I know all of my flaws, they are all a part of what makes me, me.  My flaws are a part of what makes be beautiful, just the way I am. A part of what makes me loveable.  When I am feeling down, or I meet someone who is dealing with self acceptance, I think of this song.   You are so beautiful!     Like yourself today Love 

I recently needed to meet with a colleague, it could have been a simple hand off, I could have left a package with the front desk at the building she lives in, instead we met across the street for coffee, and cake. It was good to have face time - and not that app on some device, seeing someone face to face.  1: Coffee - hot or cold? 2: Carrot cake or chocolate cake? 3: In person or virtual?  4: New and local coffee shop, or big chain? 5: When was the last time you met someone face-to-face?  My answers: 1: Coffee - hot or cold? Cold 2: Carrot cake or chocolate? Carrot  3: In person or virtual? either, but in person was nice 4: New and local coffee shop, or big chain? New local  5: When was the last time you met someone face-to-face? Last Tuesday  Please share your answers in the comments.

  Five or so decades ago, when I was a child, I heard (I read only duress as a child) that the future promised flying cars and personal jet packs.  Hmm, we are still working on those. If you have ever been in a major traffic jam, can you imagine all of those cars replaced by flying cars?  Sky jams.  Jetpacks still prove hard to control, though computer controlled vectored aircraft have become a reality. Think of the $100 rechargeable drone (I had an early one that ate a tree) there has been amazing progress in just the past five years.) Above is a Bell (yes Bell Aircraft a real manufacturer of helicopters) vectored thrust vertical take off and landing aircraft. The next generation of helicopter? And this is not a mock up, it is the real thing, that has flown. It is more stable and more controllable than the helicopters of the past 70 years.   A personal drone is being tested, it would fit into the light sport aircraft category.   Le...

Okay, I have a thing for shoes.  I have owned and worn some spectacular shoes over the years.  In my midlife crisis, I spent a year working in a large department store, selling shoes in the ladies shoe department.  The experience left its mark on me, the second thing I notice about a person after their eyes, is the shoes they are wearing or not wearing.  I have never worn womens shoes, they would look silly on my large feet and I have no idea how anyone walks on those heels, pressing your toes into that pointed end will do cripling damage. (My mother had a couple of toes amputated from damage from shoes she had worn for years.)  Anymore I wear shoes for comfort, but that does not mean the shoes can't have style.  I like strong colors, bright colors, unique designs.  If I see a nice stable running shoe in a sparkly finish like the one above, I would probably buy it.      

  I have maxed out on the number of vacation and sick leave I can have with my employer, meaning I don't accrue any until I use some.  So I took last Friday off, except that I well I didn't.  My time sheet says I was out sick.  But I woke up very early, like 5 AM, and couldn't get back to sleep, so I spent an hour in bed checking blogs, then got up, turned on the coffee and sat at my desk.  One of the reasons I couldn't get back to sleep was my brain was focused on a writing project.  Eight years ago I had written a chapter for a book.  The editor emailed recently and asked me if I would be willing to update the chapter for a second edition.  It is a short chapter, about 2,000 words, it was out of date, but within my scope to update without too much research.  I agreed.  My brain was engaged thinking about that commitment (that is not due for 12 weeks.)  I logged onto my office computer and send the first email at 6:29 AM, then dove...

I have been taking photos since I was a child, I started to get serious about it in high school.  This was my first commissioned cover shoot, as I recall I was paid a whopping $15 for this.  I really needed a wide angle lens, something I didn't buy until the fall of 1976, after this had gone to print.   Suncrest was a local skilled nursing home.  My grandmother was on the auxiliary, the volunteer group. She asked me to do this, she probably paid for it.  The cookbook was a fundraiser.  It was printed by a friend of - the village undertaker who ran a print shop as a sideline.   My grandfather died in this nursing home late in the fall of 1976.  He had dementia, my grandmother and I cared for him at home until late summer of that year.  He had a health crisis, was in the hospital, then home for a day or two, then a couple of different nursing homes.  He died quietly of a heart attack while having lunch one day.  The nur...

I am not paranoid, I am being tracked and here is the evidence.  This starts in about 2013 or 2014, and is shockingly accurate.  If I zoom into the details, it sometimes knows what room I am in, in some buildings.   I might be tracked by some nameless, government entity, but probably not.  But if I can find this, so can they. I am tracked by my phone.  I get this report from Google, updated monthly, with an annual report that includes everything they know about where I have been. At some point in setting up something I apparently clicked the magic button to get a copy of the report.  I can't remember the last time I went someplace that I didn't want anyone to know I was going, maybe back in the days of adult bookstores.  But if I want to not be followed, I could just turn off my phone, or leave it at home (I don't always turn it on, often leave home without it.)  I am not worried about others knowing.  I assume that customs and immigrati...

If Yogi Bear and the Road Runner had a love child, it would be Grizzly and the Lemmings.  And you don't have to wait until Saturday morning to watch. This is a repost on YT, the series is also on Netflix.  It is good slapstick funny.  

  What did you do this week that -______?  1: Made you happy?  2: You were surprised you could do?  3: That pleased someone else?  4: Made you realize you are lucky?  5: That was fun?  My Answers:  1: Made you happy? Had coffee and carrot cake with a colleague at a new bakery / coffee shop.  2: You were surprised you could do? Finished reading a couple of books.  3: That pleased someone else? Reached out to an old friend I hadn't heard from for a while.  4: Made you realize you are lucky? Slept really well.  5: That was fun? Cooked, I do enjoy it.   Please share your answers in the comments, feel free to be silly, or frivolous. 

A couple of Sundays ago, the CBS Sunday Morning Show (one of the most intelligent programs on American network television) did a feature on the Futures exhibit in the Arts and Industries building of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC. It was a cold Sunday, and I needed to get out for a walk, so I drove into the city and spent some time walking a couple of the Smithsonian museums.  For those not familiar, the Smithsonian is not one museum, it is a bunch of them.  Arts in Industries is one of the oldest buildings, and it had been closed for 19 years for structural repairs.   One of the items on display was a hyperloop car/capsule.  The concept of a hyperloop is basically an enclosed tube, kind of like a pneumatic tube, transport pods would move inside of the tube at very high speeds, just under the speed of sound.  The working model, uses linear induction electric motors, that have no moving parts, and magnetic levitation t...

  Starting this made me think back to when shoes became a thing for me, I was a teenager (really I was, I know it was decades go, but I can still remember when) and there were two things I saw that made me go weak at the knees, a pair of dress boots - not work boot - not cowboy boots - but spectacular dressy - I had to have them.  And Adidas tennis shoes, in light blue swede with three white stripes down the side - they were sexy!   Over the years the obsession has taken various forms.  Cole Hahn  driving mocs, I had almost every variety of those they made at one point, exotic leathers, I had a wonderful pair of crocodile shoes - that were terribly uncomfortable but looked amazing.   Anymore it is comfort or not at all, and I have a huge pile of athletic shoes in my closet.  Different colors, different styles, different manufactures.  The one thing they have in common is comfort.  But color and style will motivate me to buy.  T...

  I had a couple of encounters recently with uglies, not just the jug above, but the human incarnation.   One person forwarded a link to an article describing terribly unsafe living conditions for renters.  The article concluded with a couple of paragraphs of racist commentary on the people who owned  and managed the buildings.  The post drew some very appropriate criticism.  I reached out to the person who posted it saying that there were serious issues.  That the expressed racism was offensive and undermined the credibility of everything in the article.  The person who posted it, strongly disagreed and made excuses for why the reader should overlook the racist comments and just pay attention to the terrible living condition. I can't help but think maybe the entire article was tainted by the authors racism.  I am in a position to cut the poster off from the formun, something I rarely do, but I did.   T...

  We became a couple in the fall of 1992.  J was teaching at Rollins College in Florida, on a year to year contract, and looking for a permanent job.  This would have been in January of 1994, our first airline trip together, from Orlando to Washington DC, for a conference where he had a laundry list of unproductive interviews.  The flight was suppose to pause in Cleveland and go onto DC, someplace between Orlando and Cleveland, Continental decided the flight was not going from Cleveland to DC, and we had an unexpected layover and a late flight onto DC.  My one and only trip on Continental.  In Cleveland we stepped outside for a minute, this was long before TSA, and the security was easy.  I hadn't seen snow in about 14 years.  I remember grabbing a handful and being surprised at how cold it was. I think I still have that Calvin Klein turtleneck.  The leather jacket I outgrew.