*****
"There's never an egg timer around when you need one." Nor a pair of scissors, nor a sock that matches the one that you want to wear.
Ovation is airing "The American President" right now. On MSNBC last night, Brian Williams kept talking about the "proportional response" scene, and maybe someone in the programming department at Ovation was watching. Or maybe it's a coincidence. "TAP" is an objectively bad movie, but I always watch it when it comes on. I don't understand why. Another thing that I don't understand is why on earth the President's credit cards would have been "in storage in Wisconsin." This has never made any sense to me.
Part of me is inclined to think that the airstrikes against Syria are right and justified, Trump notwithstanding. I don't trust his motives (on this or anything else), but even a broken clock is right twice a day.* Not that I'm comparing Trump to a broken clock. Because he's not right anywhere near as often as twice a day.
My favorite line: "I hope so. Because if that was an undecided, then we need to work on our people skills."
*****
It's Saturday now. My 12yo had baseball practice this morning, and I was actually going to sit in my car and write and read. It was still a little cold, and it's a new season and a new team, so I don't really know anyone yet. I'm not the most outgoing person in the world. I'll talk to anyone, but it wouldn't occur to me to just walk right up to a group of people whom I've never met and introduce myself and join the conversation. So if there are little clusters of women who all appear to be friends, deep in conversation, and none of them make any welcoming gestures, then I'm likely to just stand or sit by myself.
I like to sit (or stand, as the case may be) by myself, so this isn't a problem. This is not one of those tiresome rants about bitchy mean girl suburban sports mom cliques. It's not that complicated. Because I'm just as likely to be standing and chatting with people I know, and to not notice and welcome the person standing by herself. I don't do that intentionally, and so I'll assume that other women don't do it intentionally, either. But today, two very friendly women waved me into their group and introduced themselves, and I spent a pleasant hour and a half talking about the same things that I always talk to other mothers about.
*****
One day last week, I came into the kitchen to find my son scrubbing his sneakers with the brush that I use to scrub pots and pans. I threw the brush away. But then I realized that we had probably been eating out of pots washed with the dirty shoe brush for at least several weeks. Gross.
*****
On Wednesday and Thursday, I worked at HHS headquarters, the Hubert Humphrey Building. It looks East Germany circa 1971-ugly from the outside (though it does have a really nice view of the Capitol and the U.S. Botanic Garden), but it's rather impressive inside; well, at least the lobby is. You might think of a huge government ministry, housed in a huge mid-20th century building, and picture a bloated, inefficient, and agonizingly slow bureaucracy. And maybe that's a little bit true of HHS. From the video displays in the lobby, I learned, for example, that March is both National Nutrition Month and Save Your Vision Month, but March was five days gone, and I guess that no one had thought to look up the awareness months for April.
On the other hand, the place was crackling with energy. You can argue all day about whether or not government should do whatever it's doing, but it's doing stuff. I have tons of neighbors and friends who work for the Federal government, and I've worked for government contractors for most of the last 18 years or so. Government people work, and they care about what they're doing, and they believe in what they're doing. They just need to look at a calendar once in a while.
There's a Metro stop, Federal Center, right around the corner from HHS, but on a beautiful day, I'd rather walk a bit. Plus, I hate to change trains. As far as I'm concerned, if it's not on the Red Line, then it doesn't exist. Union Station is exactly a mile from HHS--not long, but long enough when you're wearing work shoes and carrying a computer and a bunch of paperwork. I walked with my colleague, who lives in DC. She is a native Washingtonian, and I've lived in the DC suburbs for 18 years, but we snapped pictures and pointed fingers like tourists. The light was perfect at 6:15 PM. We walked on the Capitol grounds, and Dana Bash of CNN rushed right past us. (She's very pretty. And very tiny.)
It's nice that even in the security state (it took me no less than fifteen minutes to get through security at HHS), you can still walk around on the Capitol grounds. Lots of people were out--tourists, runners, government employees just off work, Capitol Hill residents--and no one had to go through a metal detector, or submit to a search.
I took this picture of the Capitol on Wednesday evening. The lady on the lower right might have been a tourist, but not necessarily. With her anorak and her canvas tote and her hair up, she reminded me of someone. OK, it was me. She reminded me of me. I don't normally use filters, but I tried one and liked the color effect; the creamy soft shine of the dome against the pale turquoise hazy sky is very 1959 postcard, which is a good thing.
 |
| Kodachrome. |
*****
Later today:
3YO: AUNT CLAIRE! YOU CAN'T CATCH ME!
Aunt Claire: You're probably right. (Sits down.)
(Scene.)
So that's all for now. Once again, I was trying to use a movie line as a funny title; and once again, I ran out of post before I could make the metaphoric connection. I have things to do, and I need to bring this train into the station. Until next week, avoid Dupont Circle--it's a mess.
*****
* The one I'm wearing on my wrist, for example. Daylight Savings Time commenced about a month ago, and I just haven't gotten around to setting my watch to the correct time. Five more months and I'll have the correct time again.
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