On This Date...

JK Rowling turns 46
Harry Potter turns 31
and Bingo the cat?
18 baby!
Now that's old!
Happy Birthday Bing!

For the Birds

The dry summer we are having has made the ripening tomatoes in the garden verrry appealing to the birds. They just peck through the wall of the not-quite-ready tomatoes and sip out the juice. Isn't that clever? How refreshing it must be for them. Last year, they didn't go near them, but now they don't even hesitate when I am standing right there.

I'd like to peacefully co-exist with the other creatures in the neighborhood, and I can share, even, but I threw out at least a dozen disintegrating tomatoes this afternoon. This is war, birds.

We Open Late

You can imagine how it is when some people, newly-met, learn that one is an English teacher-- I'll have to be careful of what I say, they might remark, although that response was much more common when I started teaching. I did have a friend once tell me that he would never write to me again if I ever corrected his grammar, and of course I agreed. (To be honest, it was worse when I was a cook and people would never invite me over for dinner.)

In fact, people who know me know that I'm not a language nit-picker. Particularly as a teacher, I err on the side of meaningful communication every time, because you can always fix your grammar mistakes. For my birthday, my mom gave me a copy of Grammar Rants by Patricia A. Dunn and Ken Lindblom, the premise of which is that by analyzing the denunciations of language critics we can educate students (and ourselves) about language and correctness and how they impact good writing.

Still, I giggled a little today when I read the marquis at a fast food restaurant. For want of a verb, the message was lost.

Apocalypse Later

This phrase can apply to so many things today, not the least of which is our movie viewing plans for Josh's last night here. We also went to the Newseum today, which was a nice companion visit to the Capitol. One of the many cool features of this museum dedicated to the press and its constitutionally guaranteed freedom is the daily display of a newspaper front page from each state. May I tell you, fellow beltway insiders, that very few of them even mentioned the debt ceiling.

The People's Office Building

We visited the US Capitol today and were fortunate to have a friend give us a "beyond the public tour" tour. She works for the Senate, so we stayed on the northside of the rotunda, and the insiders view of that place was fascinating. Starting with the fresco restoration project and carrying through to the floor tiles, picture frames, office assignments, stairways, balconies, and the actual chamber itself, "the Capitol" became a much more concrete place, even to this inside the beltway denizen. As we walked the halls and passageways, we saw Senators Boxer, Webb, Leahy, Rockefeller, Hagan, and Coburn, mere mortals, one and all.

I can't decide if the fact that our representatives are just people is heartening or not. I guess we'll all find out in the next couple of weeks.

ADD Woman

Since one of the themes of our summer so far has been characters with extraordinary capabilities, I suppose it's only reasonable to speculate about my own super power. Hmmmm. Well if forced to guess, I might say I am an effective multitasker who is yet able to hyperfocus in a split second.

Why, just today, caught a package of chicken wings midair as it plunged from its shelf in the grocery cold case. Later, at the check out, I handed a little boy a copy of the New Yorker split seconds after his grandmother asked him to fetch it for her. His amazement was palpable in the thanks he gave me, so present in fact that I felt the need to apologize and explain that I was really not eavesdropping.

Surely Nick Fury will be calling on me any day.

(Did I mention I can hold my breath a really long time, too?)

Uncle

"I don't think I'll be eating any more burgers," Josh whispered to me as the lights went down in the theater. We were seeing the latest Pirates of the Caribbean movie and had just checked Five Guys off our summer burger list. I nodded with understanding. Science can exact a hefty toll on even the most dedicated researcher.

Just so you know-- it was the bacon cheeseburger, fries, and a coke that put him over, and there will be more to come on this grand experiment when we analyze our data.