Captioning pictures takes a long time...

... when the pictures you're captioning are 126 of the best pictures ever of the best weekend ever, and those are exactly the pictures I was just captioning.

But now I'm finished. And here they are:


Mom and Dad's visit to DC.
Even more fun/wonderful/perfect than could ever have been imagined, even by people as imaginative as we are.

Enjoy. I sure did.

Ah! Kites!

Today was DC's annual Kite Festival. I went, of course. I love kites, and this has been on my calendar for a long, long time. Also of course, I took lots of pictures.

It was a perfect day for a kite festival - sunny, warm-but-not-to-warm, and very, very breezy. The Kite Festival happens during the ever-famous Cherry Blossom Festival, which began this weekend and will go for the next two weeks. The kites were at the Washington Monument, and the cherry trees were right nearby, around the tidal basin (and some other places too), so I decided to make a day of it and just go see everything. Many other people made a similar decision. The whole city, it seems, came out for these two lovely spring events, along with large parts of neighboring cities, states, and foreign countries as well.

It was a party. A really, really crowded party. With lots of kites.

So yes, I took pictures, but do let me say this, that it's hard to take pictures of a kite festival, 1) because the kites move a lot, and 2) because there's really no way to capture, in a still photo, what it's like to have hundreds of beautifully colored kites flying above your head all around you in the bright blue sky for as far as the eye can see. The eye can see much farther than the camera, even if the camera has 8 megapixels and a 4x optical, 16x digital zoom.

So when you're looking at the pictures, if you go look at the pictures, I'm hoping that instead of inspiring you to think "didn't I just see this one?" that they instead inspire you to think (something like), "WOW! Imagine how vast and overwhelmingly

fun this kite festival must have been, that even all of these pictures that look kind of pretty much alike cannot begin to capture it!"

Sound good? Yeah, ok then, it's a plan. :)

workin' out

I recently joined a gym: the Washington DC Jewish Community Center.  Yep, the Jewish Community Center - the JCC, as we like to call it, or even just "the J", if the two of you are tight - has a gym, and a very nice one, at that.  Apparently Jews are concerned with keeping their people in good health, and hey, I'm 1/8 Jewish, so what the heck!  I signed up.  The nicest part of it all is that I get a free membership because I volunteer there every Tuesday evening for a couple hours.  It's a good deal.

Here are some reasons why I love my gym: 

1. They have a rowing machine

2. They have a nice view of the Carnegie Institute just down the street

3. It's almost never really crowded

4. You have a choice between "Cold" and "Ambient" water from the little water machine (I usually do a careful mix of the two)

5. There is a sign hanging in the main exercise room that reads "Absolutely No Freelance Personal Training."  God, I hate freelance personal training.  So glad to see they're on top of it. 

6. There's always at least one TV with the Home and Garden channel on.

7. You can buy fresh challah in the lobby.

7. It's close to my house.

Here are some reasons why my gym reminds me of "The Nanny":

1. On the sign in the elevator advertising their spring and summer league sports teams for young adults, they mentioned that several people have met their future spouses on a JCC sports team.

2. That's really the only reason.

You guys, I've started reading blogs.

(aka, I Have a New Favorite Extreme Sport)

(no, I do not consider reading blogs an extreme sport)

I never really did before. I know it's a huge thing, like, lots of people spend lots of time doing it, but I never really did, until just lately...

because...

I have become completely fascinated with extreme snow mountain biking... in Alaska (obviously). Long, endurance mountain biking races on big bikes with giant fat tires...

There are people who bike the Iditarod. Did you know that??? The Iditarod! The dog sled race! The one they make dog sled racing movies about! Incredible!!! I've been following the stories/pictures of some of the people who did it this last month - yes, they do it in February/March - and I'm totally hooked.

The race starts in Anchorage, and there's a finish line in McGrath, after 350 miles, and then a brave (crazy?) few push on to the ultimate finish line in Nome, Alaska, 1,100 miles from where they started. This year saw the first woman ever finish the bike race all the way to Nome - in just over 25 days. WOW!!

Anyway, the reason I even bother bringing this up (don't worry, Mom, I'm not going to try it) is because there's one blog that I particularly love, that's written by a journalist from Juneau who did the Anchorage-McGrath stretch (350 miles), and the other day she posted a little story entitled Covering Ground that I'm copying here for you all to read:

A co-worker who doesn't know me very well stopped me today and said, "Hey, I saw you out on your bicycle by the ferry terminal the other day. Wow! You're really covering ground."

"Which day was that?" I asked, because it seemed the natural response.

"That day you were out by the ferry terminal," he answered.

"Could be a lot of days," I said.

"You mean you've been out there more than once?"

I just smiled because the ferry terminal is only 12 miles from downtown Juneau. There seems to be this perception among non-cyclists that their world is a very, very big place - too big to traverse without the aid of big machines and fossil fuels. It takes a slow-moving cyclists' perspective to realize that our world is in fact a small place, because all it takes is patience - just patience - and you can go almost anywhere.

Doesn't that just make you smile? And want to travel around the world? On a bike?

My roommies had a little talk with me the other day about how, like, biking the Iditarod would be really cold and stuff, and I'm making them nervous with all my talking about it and making them look at pictures of seas of snow and little people on little bikes riding through it all in minus 30 temperatures wit minus 80 wind chills...

They're really cool pictures though. 8-)

I have posted the link to this and other fun sites - like the one from the guy who actually did travel around the world on a bike (and a sailboat) - in the column on the right, for your reading/viewing enjoyment. :)

Little Skippy, by the way, is doing really well, and I'm completely in love with her, and for her part, she is happy that she will never see more than a dusting of snow. With her tires, I'm happy with that too.

OMG Caits

I FINALLY got pictures up from Caitie's wonderful visit now over a week ago. WHAT HAVE I BEEN DOING THAT IT TOOK ME SO LONG!?!?! Well, it's not about what I've been doing, it's about what our internet's been doing, or rather, NOT doing, and that would be working.

But now its working. So now they're up. Here. Woohoo!

As you may notice, the photo album has some big blank holes in it, like, lots of trips to Caribou that went seemingly undocumented, and lots of "just got up" pictures that should be part of any photo album but just aren't in this one... oh, and that Chinese place in... Chinatown...

That's because a lot of the pictures are on Caitie's camera. And the pictures on Caitie's camera... somehow... haven't made it to the internet yet...

However, if she puts them up, I will happily post the link on my blog. She's got all the Alexandria pictures, for example, including (my personal favorite) "Caitie passes out on a picnic table at mile 15." Yeah, you've got to see it.

But ok, we had such a great time together. I made her come do all my favorite things with me, things like "eating falafel" and "biking to Alexandria," things I usually do by myself, and it was so much fun to share them with my little sister.

And let me tell you, she totally loved biking in the crisp, early-spring-early-morning DC weather.

So that was that. And it was awesome.


FYI, the social events calendar here is getting full... I've got some extra special visitors coming next week, and then a friend from college a couple weeks after that, and then a friend from Paris about a month after that... (not from Paris, but I met her in Paris...) so if you too would like to pass out on a picnic table at mile 15 or participate in any of the other fun events you saw pictured here, act fast! ;)

The extra special guests, by the way, are my parents. My dad will be making is debut journey post-transplant, and their trip happens to fall on his birthday, his first birthday with new, functioning organs... I don't know about you, but I feel a double pie special coming on... blueberry, and chicken pot. Yum, yum.

March 19, 2008

(Franklin Delano Roosevelt)

Some pictures from my morning downtown on this very significant day, as our country enters its sixth year at this war...  

The BBC has very similar pictures of some of the same people.  We must have been standing near the same spot.  

Yes, I am that awesome, thank you.

This week I took a gig at a school that's just up the road.  I live at (around) the 13oo block of 14th street, and this school is a straight shot up, on the 5000 block of 14th street - all told, just over three miles, with a nicely marked bike lane almost the whole way.  Lovely.

A quick lesson in DC city planning: east-west streets are named, A-Z (actually, A-W, but whatev), then 2 syllable words A-Z, and the three syllable words A-Z, then plant names A-Z, and that takes care of the whole city by "Juniper" or so.  (This could be a much longer lesson, of course, but that's all we need for this particular story.)

So.  I live at (near) 14th and N.  The school is at 14th and Gallatin.  Gal-la-tin.  Just under two alphabets.

Anyway, back our show... 

One of the things I love about biking is that it's almost always faster than public transportation, especially for short distances.  Going up 14th street from P, by my house, to U, for example, I pretty much always beat.  This is because the bus has to stop every block to let people on an off, and I don't.  Also, I ride like the wind.  

This morning, as I turned right onto 14th at P, there was a bus, headed north.

  

Ready, set, go.  

It started badly for me.  Apparently no one felt like getting off from P-T, and no one really felt like getting on either, so the bus didn't have to stop at all, it just bumbled along and I pedaled away behind it, watching it get two, then three blocks ahead.  

But luck was on my side once we got to U St, where tons of people all of a sudden needed a bus.  Thanks, U St.  I not only caught up, but got a good enough lead goi

ng into the hill  starting at Belmont that by the time we got to the top, in Columbia Heights, at Harvard, the bus and I were neck and neck.  The better part of a whole alphabet and still no clear front-runner.  This was set to be quite the race. 

When the light changed at Irving, I took off, legs pedaling fast, eyes on the prize, down a little hill from Newton to Perry, then up again to Shepherd, then down another little one to Upshur, and then the final big hill, from Webster to Farragut, 5000 14th St. 

By the time I pulled into the parking lot at Gallatin, the 5000 block 14th St, I had not only left the bus that had started with me at P St in the dust, but 

I had also passed the bus in front of it as well.  

All while saving myself the $1.25 bus fare.  

God, I love my bike. 8-) 

A room of one's own...

actually, a room of my own.  For real.  I, Shana, at 24 years old, finally got a room to myself.  

The big move was last weekend.  It's hard to explain how happy I am.  David was a wonderful, wonderful, completely lovely roommate.  But wow.  I feel like a real grown up now.  

I took some pictures, obviously.  You can check them out here.  OR, alternatively, you can check out this website and come see the room for yourself.  ;) 

(I really can't even think of a title here)

Last Friday I was going to write a post all about how, as of February 17, I'd had only two dollars left for the rest of the month, and about how I was determined to make it last, and about how I was actually quite successful in this endeavor, and when around rolled February 29, the last day of the month, I, having just passed go, next month's paycheck in hand, decided I'd better go spend those two dollars.  

(Except one was sitting in my dresser... it had been in my pocket, and I took it out just before sending it to its death in the washing machine - wouldn't that have been a tragic way to spend half of the remainder of my money for the month!?  and it never made it back to my wallet.)  

So on my way home from work, I swung by Whole Foods, thinking I might take my one dollar and buy, like, a can of beans, or perhaps some bulk popcorn.  I wandered around the store for a while, clutching my dollar, wondering what on earth I was interested in eating that could be worthy of my two weeks of careful saving, when I happened upon the olive bar.  Aha, I'd thought, this is what I want, I want olives!  I took one of the little tester cups and tested one, and indeed, it was a very good olive (feta cheese stuffed!), but testing the olive helped me to realize that I didn't want olives, I wanted one olive, and there, I had just had one.  So I left Whole Foods, still clutching my dollar.  Didn't even go back for bulk popcorn.

I never did get around to writing about it - busy weekend, you know.  But today I spent that dollar, plus the one I'd left on my dresser, plus a couple more from the new paycheck, on some toothpaste. 

That's pretty much the end of this story. 

Barack Obama thought you could use some chocolate. 

and less funny, but still notable: 

Hillary ate your potato chip that looked like Jesus.

I guess he finally got up.

There's a statue in the ground in DC at Hains Point, a park on the very tip of a long long island in the Potomac (which might technically be a peninsula, but I don't feel like looking it up to check) called "the Awakening".  

Rather, 

there used to be a statue in the ground in DC at Hains point, blah blah blah, called "the Awakening".  

It's not there anymore. 

It is moving.

Today.

Wednesday, February 20.

It has been moved.

It's one of those things that I've seen in guidebooks about hiking and biking  and picture-taking in and around DC, and it's always made me think, hey, that looks pretty cool, I should take a ride out there and see it for myself. 

Well. 

Of course, I have a story. 

And this is how the story goes: 

Monday morning I woke up to amazingly beautiful weather - temps near 70 (Wisconsin, eat your heart out) and a light breeze... that turned later into a strong wind and, even later than that rain, but for the morning, at least, it seemed like a day straight out of a fairy tale, especially for February.  And I thought to myself, hey, today might be a good day to go ahead and take that ride out to that statue.  

But first, of course, pancakes and coffee.

By the way, yes, this was Monday.  In DC, when a day is a federal holiday, like, for example, President's Day, it's not just bank and postal employees who get the day off (rest of the country, eat your heart out).  

So I fixed some coffee and whipped up some "just add water" pancakes (very tasty), dumped some applesauce on top and opened up the Sunday paper, and what do I see but the following headline: 

One Last Climb Before Big Move: Sculpture Headed to PG County

It was moving.

Wednesday, February 20.

Today.

Moved. 

But this was Monday, when I read about it in the paper.  Coffee-pancakes-applesauce-paper-Monday, so I had time.  You know, like, 48 hours.   Or 36.  You know. 

And I actually didn't get out there on Monday, because that would've been too easy, and you know, I thought about the issue thoroughly and determined that since it was a holiday, the crowds would be intolerable, and, since it was a holiday, I would 

be needing an afternoon nap.  So I decided in favor of a Tuesday-after-work visit instead.  

Tuesday after work it was.  'Round about 5 o'clock yesterday I made my first-and-last-ever pilgrimage 

out to Hains point to bear witness (and lots of pictures) to the Awakening before it moved to Maryland.  

I was fortunate to arrive at the exact same time as a bus or two full of unbelievably/remarkably homogenous 14 year-olds from somewhere-that-wasn't-DC.  Once they (and their teachers... it was kind of cute) all had a shot and climbing up at sliding down the giant knee, I got my own chance, first and last:

 

definitely worth it.  Worth, even, the freezing cold ride home in 30 degree twilight weather with gusts of wind up to 30 mph.  In my face.  You only regret what you don't do, right?  Frozen misery lasts a half hour, but not sliding down the Awakening's knee, not biking to Mt. Vernon in January, not canoeing around that last corner, those things last a lifetime.  

More of my pictures from last night are here.  

I made two friends on my trip: one, a former pro basketball player for San Antonio and then for DC who these days keeps in shape by cycling laps around Hains Point after work.  He was on his way home as I was on my way home - apparently the wind sent him packing early, as he usually does significantly more laps than he did last night.  But he kept me company on the mile and a half back into the city, and thus helped keep my mind off the wind in my face.  And that was nice.  

Apparently there's quite a bike culture at Hains Point, a whole group of people who go biking laps around at various times of the day.  Interesting. 

I learned this from the second friend I met last night, one who had ridden down not to bike laps but to, like me, photograph this giant piece of aluminum one last time before it was to be carted away by cranes and trucks.  Unlike me, however, he had been there every day for a week, making sure he got that last perfect shot... 

As it turns out, this guy is an avid photo-taker, biker, and DC blogger.  And he's got some really great (read: better than mine!) Awakening shots, like this one, and this one.  Cool, hey?  I like them.  He even posted this one, which I am proud to have taken myself.  :)  Of course, he returned the favor by taking these shots of me.  Shana climbs to the top of something cool - classic:  

(He was there this morning too, and he's got some cool shots of the the Awakening being carted away to Maryland on his blog.  The Washington Post had a little video too, which was also kind of fun.  Other people have remarked, and I agree that I also would've kind of somewhere expected to find a whole body under those woodchips... )

At any rate, I'm kind of excited to be plugged in, at least somewhat, to the "DC-biker-blogger" scene.  I mean, this guy, my new friend, has a link on his blog to the folks who sell the "you'd look hotter in a helmet" bumper stickers.  That's big time! 

I've been up to a couple other things since my sister Cassie left, like this bike trip down to Alexandria, a thinly veiled attempt to keep myself from getting totally depressed that Cass wasn't here anymore.  It served its purpose for a while, but in the end I got totally depressed anyway.  No bike trip can replace a fun/adorable little sister.  

And Skippy, in case you're wondering, is still holding nice and strong.  Heck of a bike, I tell ya.  30 mph gusts of wind, here I come.  Eat your heart out. 

(I don't even know what that means.)

Best weekend ever!

Cass came to visit me in DC.  

It was so so so fun/perfect.

 

We borrowed my friend Megan's bike (Pauly - now bffs with Skippy, of course) and rode all around the city visiting museums, monuments, memorials, markets, important buildings, cheetahs, and fun people.  We saw everything, AND ate our weight in cheese fries to boot.  If that's not fun/perfect, I don't know what is! 

It was all of the things I love all at once: biking, DC, good food, 

cookie decorating, picture taking, all my friends, and of course, my lovely sister Cass. 

The pictures are here. 

When she left, I was very sad. 

BUT I think chances are good that she'll come back sometime... 

how can you say no to a second chance at such a great time!  

And now I'm getting ready for when Caitie comes to visit,

 which will be soon, right, Caits?  ;) 

and THIS is what it looks like...

... when your wonderful co-workers buy you a brand new lock, the most hard core bike lock money can buy:

and THIS is what it looks like...

when you get a new bike.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Skippy.

this is an example of what it looks like when your bike hasn't been stolen. 

(I am so jealous.)

And just to top it all off...

it's Groundhog's Day.  

:-\

What's missing from this picture?

(no, it's not "you") 

(though you actually aren't in this picture)

Hint: it should've been locked securely onto the street post, in broad daylight in downtown DC on the same street as the White House, where I'd left it not three hours earlier, where I always leave it locked securely when I ride it to work... rode it to work... 

If you guessed "Shana's bike!" then sadly, you were right. 

It's missing.

My bike.  Li'l Dais.  

She has been stolen.

I am completely depressed.  I slept for 12 hours last night and seriously considered calling in sick to work today.  I also seriously considered "not resting until I found her thieves and brought them to justice," but I was too tired from being so depressed.  And in DC, where even filing a police report for a non-registered stolen bike is pretty much impossible/pointless, at least being well-rested was probably the better option anyway. 

I could say more but I don't really feel like it. 

I'm still in mourning. 

I probably will be for a while. 

(Even my blog is wearing black.)

sigh.

she was a good little bike... 

... such a good little bike... 

Ah, success!

Here's the deal:  

I've been to France a number of times.  In fact, I used to live there, in Paris.  

My little sister Caitie had never been to France... had never been, in fact, out of the country.  So it was determined that I would take her around France for a few weeks, which I did last summer. 

We had a classic good time.  As you can see:

The goal of the whole trip, from my end, at least, was to (have a classic good time, and) make Caitie catch the travel bug.  As you probably know, I've got it.  Bad.  So I'm a good one to pass this along to her.  It can be highly contageous.  

Well.  Fast-forward seven or so months, Caitie goes to college in Milwaukee, Shana moves to DC, dad gets a transplant, la de da de da, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and now it's January, and Caitie's on her way to Orlando with the dance team from her school.  And when they arrived at the airport, she texted me and said: 

"you've created a monster.  

we flew into orlando international and i thought, 

oh, international?  where can i go from here?" 

I couldn't be more proud.  :) 

(... maybe she'll decide to quit school and come with me on the Russia-Australia-and-lots-of-stuff-in-between trip I'm planning for the fall...)

I biked to Mount Vernon.

It was fun.

But cold. Really cold.

The pictures are here. They are heavily captioned. Enjoy.

When I got home, I, naturally, baked some bread, some of the most beautiful, delicious loaves of bread I have ever baked in my life.

(and of course, I took a picture)

I also took a long, hot bath.

What an all-star day. 8-)

FDR Memorial

Is it wrong...

... for me to want to name my new bike "Daisy"?  

Daisy, as some of you may recall, is the name of my beautiful, beautiful '95 Eagle Summit wagon, who not only got me to work faithfully every day, but also kept me company on many a journey up and down Iowa's Great River Road. 

She's currently living in Wisconsin with my parents.  

I miss her every day. 

ahem.

Anyway, so I got this bike, and I've tried to name it several different things, some of which were cute and clever, etc., but nothing sticks, nothing, and I've finally realized that I have a hard time calling "that cute, dependable thing in my life on an undetermined number of wheels that gets me where I need to go and provides fun and good times along the way" anything but "Daisy."  

So what do you think? Maybe "Daisy Junior"?  

 

Anyway, the-as-yet-unnamed-new-bike and I went out for our

 first big spin together today (the Great Falls trip was on a borrowed bike, back before I acquired this beauty).  We did the "Zoo Review" trail, up Capital Crescent and then

 down through Rock Creek Park.  I discovered about halfway into the ride (though I could've found out beforehand, I just wasn't paying attention) that once you get past Bethesda, the CC trail isn't paved anymore.  And it rained last night.  Soooo we got a little muddy.  I spent the trip back down through Rock Creek trying to figure out if I looked silly or bad-ass, all covered in mud speckles.  I'm going to go with "bad-ass".  

I haven't blogged in a long time.  :-/

But you know, check all the other blogs you read (assuming you read other blogs).  I'm guessing they haven't blogged much lately either.  

That's because it's a busy time of year, and everyone is too busy to blog.  But now that present buying/wrapping/opening is all over, I have time to write.  And you have time to read!  AND and, I bet you're looking for something to do besides pay attention at work.  It's hard to go back after some lovely time off, isn't?  So this is going to go really well.  

It would be too much to try catch up on all the stuff I haven't blogged about for the past month and a half... so I'm not going to bother trying, and if you want to 

know the story about me having to drive home from DC for Christmas, you're just going to have to give me a call and ask.  

I know, right? 

There are pictures available here, along with picture of lots of other things I haven't captioned yet.  Because I've been busy.  Ok. 

I did have an absolutely wonderful Christmas... best ever, maybe, since all of us knew we'd already gotten what we'd all wanted most: a transplant.  

... and also, maybe, a snowstorm.