I did not expect another chance to get the heck out of town again this year, but Favorite Ex surprised us with an invitation to his cabin in the mountains of Virginia. We've spent a weekend with him last year, and it was lovely, so a return sounded marvelous.

And it was... Although made slightly more complicated by the fact that I had the next ( Read more... )

The way the weather's going I doubt I'll be doing very much more dining out, but I did sneak one more in, in the form of Facci, a pleasant Italian in the vicinity of Fulton. I think I might have had lunch there once.

The goal was an outing with Ex and Wife, and they chose the location for intersection of our peculiar requirements with a solid ( Read more... )

I auditioned for a zoom "radio play". Vocal stuff is not mega my forte, but I thought I did some pretty cool things during the audition. Not cool enough - the director's rejection included a note to consider varying voices if I read multiple characters. Which I certainly thought I was doing - but I guess it didn't read. That's discouraging.

( Read more... )

There's a native fruit in my neck of the woods called the pawpaw. Looks like a little green mango thing, tastes like a creamy banana custard. It's pretty much impossible to store or ship, so one can pretty much taste it mostly if one knows people where to find them.

Anyway, a friend took me on a hiking trail where a few pawpaw plants grow in the ( Read more... )

I hosted a party!

Given my general inclination towards paranoia, I had some trepidation about inviting people. I've had as many as 2-3 people in my space on previous occasions, and hosted a handful of very exclusive firepit nights, but for the past few weeks despite the weather being perfect we've not felt up for even that much.

For past few years ( Read more... )

One of the new additions to the Merryweather district is Clove and Cardamom, which brands itself Indian/Mediterranean fusion.

The outdoor seating is a cluster of umbrellaed patio tables on a wide patch of sidewalk - I'm not sure it'd have been separation enough on a busy weekend, but an early Tuesday night worked quite well.

I am a spice wimp with ( Read more... )

I am not very observant. No pun intended, although it is also true in the Jewish sense, but I merely meant that it took me until Thursday-Friday to realize that the week during which I took off Tuesday and Wednesday for Rosh Hashanah was also the week of Labor Day Monday, so I was about to embark upon a five day weekend.

Not that I had much by ( Read more... )

Last time we've gone anywhere was a workation weekend for my birthday in January.

So, when a friend invited us to join her at a vacation rental in Ocean City it was very, very tempting. She intended a Friday through Wednesday stay. I am absolutely not good at the sorts of vacations that call for staying put and "relaxing", but my craving to skip ( Read more... )

In the continued adventures of one very domesticated Leia Feline, a friend of hers took her out kayaking.

Said friend has learned to do so this spring, and has been into it avidly enough to buy her own and to want to drag along anyone willing to be dragged - which I was, enthusiastically.

The particular marina we found in Annapolis (which was a ( Read more... )

I had misgivings about 48 Hour Film Festival this year. My usual team was pretty conscientious about wanting everyone vaccinated, and we eventually decided to skip the Friday night writing session but be there for the Saturday filming.

Then our producer and our director both had a covid scare, both being exposed to someone who was diagnosed, and, ( Read more... )