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				As many of you know, I have developed a fondness for ruins in recent years.  Ruins are everywhere!  Obviously Italy and Greece have a ton, but there is a good amount of more recent ruin-age along the drive to Rehoboth.  Many things can be classified as a ruin in my view--anything that has been neglected and left to fall apart on its own.   Although, "on its own" may not be the right way to say it, because really it's BEST when nature is helping to tear it apart.  I refer to this as "the Earth reclaiming" the structure.  I love it the most.  Because nature is like, "Yeaaah, you thought you could conquer me, but NO DICE!!"  This is why Potter immediately alerted me to the History Channel's series on "Life After People"--she knew I would absolutely eat it up.  I mention all this because there's a watchtower on the 14th Street Bridge that I've been wondering about for years.  It's always appeared totally unused, but then the windows started breaking.  Finally, about a year ago, they boarded up the windows.  I thought, how can this watchtower be a ruin, when thousands of D.C. officials and politicians drive by it everyday and see that it's becoming an eyesore?  Well, one of those officials, from the Department of Transportation to be exact, decided to do something about it, and four years later, the watchtower now houses a giant kaleidoscope!  How cool is that?!?!  The ruin is now what Guitar Boy's dad would call "art in public places."  From one favorite form to another! [10.22.09] As many of you know, I have developed a fondness for ruins in recent years.  Ruins are everywhere!  Obviously Italy and Greece have a ton, but there is a good amount of more recent ruin-age along the drive to Rehoboth.  Many things can be classified as a ruin in my view--anything that has been neglected and left to fall apart on its own.   Although, "on its own" may not be the right way to say it, because really it's BEST when nature is helping to tear it apart.  I refer to this as "the Earth reclaiming" the structure.  I love it the most.  Because nature is like, "Yeaaah, you thought you could conquer me, but NO DICE!!"  This is why Potter immediately alerted me to the History Channel's series on "Life After People"--she knew I would absolutely eat it up.  I mention all this because there's a watchtower on the 14th Street Bridge that I've been wondering about for years.  It's always appeared totally unused, but then the windows started breaking.  Finally, about a year ago, they boarded up the windows.  I thought, how can this watchtower be a ruin, when thousands of D.C. officials and politicians drive by it everyday and see that it's becoming an eyesore?  Well, one of those officials, from the Department of Transportation to be exact, decided to do something about it, and four years later, the watchtower now houses a giant kaleidoscope!  How cool is that?!?!  The ruin is now what Guitar Boy's dad would call "art in public places."  From one favorite form to another! Hello, Fall!  I don't say hello because the temperature dropped 30 degrees overnight--though it did.  I say hello because I have been to the land of emus and lemurs, popcorn and cider, where God created fall, and it was GOOD!  I speak, of course, of Pumpkinville.  For the third time in six years, we joined the Freddys in an autumnal romp through Pumpkinville, only this time we had active and engaged little kids with us to "legitimize" the trek.  Not that we wouldn't have--and have in the past--gone without them and been the only adults sans children in the place.  True to form, I wore my llama sweater (which, when it was sold at the J.Crew outlets in 2001, seemed so cool...  I mean, Rooker got two!  But now it just seems like a llama costume).  I was hoping to attract my favored camelid.  Unfortunately there were only two adult llamas and a baby.  NOT ENOUGH LLAMAS FOR ME.  And none of them were in the full contact area.  Fail.  Nonetheless, I did kiss one of them on the cheek.  It was magical.  So before the weather drops another 30 degrees, and they ship the 90-year-old tortoise to Florida for the winter (they really do!), visit Pumpkinville and get your fix.  And tell the creepy fish I said SUP! [10.15.09]   Last week I journeyed to Charlottesville to see U2 at UVA's football stadium.  I think "journey" is the right word.  I've seen U2 three times in concert and each time a journey was involved.  I attended my first show in 1998 with a tight-knit group of high school Army brat friends dubbed the "Patton Park Posse," and it was a bit of a coup.  I was a high school senior and we'd convinced my parents to drive us several hours down to San Antonio in the trusty Toyota Previa [see Fave IM].  I couldn't believe my parents said yes, and immediately agreed to their stipulation that we fit in a visit to the Alamo.  The second time I saw U2, it was senior year of college.  Frequent A&A.com contributer Sarah M. and I drove over six hours from Williamsburg to North Carolina.  On our way home we talked about how little time we had left at William & Mary, and how, even scarier, our lives were about a quarter over.  Heavy stuff.  This time, though the two hours to Charlottesville was short in comparison, the figurative journey to get to the concert felt like it was filled with a series of pitfalls ranging from inconsequential to infuriating.  But then we were there.  And it was awesome.  I note that when I attended the first and second U2 shows, I was nearing the edge of a big change.  I wonder if there's another one around the corner.  I don't know what it is, but I must be on the cusp of something. [10.08.09]
In the immortal words of Bridget Marquardt from the original version of E!'s The Girls Next Door, "As everyone knows, I love to theme."  As everyone knows, I love to repeat that phrase.  I especially ove how she uses "theme" as a verb.  It's December now, so I'm subtly theming at the workplace with a saucy red knit top.  Probably no one will notice.  And if they do, they'll think it's a top I would wear in any month.  But it's not.  It's a HOLIDAY top.  This past weekend I was theming in a not so subtle way, wearing red acid wash skinny jeans and a dark green shirt with Christmas ornaments on it.  Both of them.  Together.  All at the same time.  It was beyond questionable.  But I was decorating the tree!  And there was eggnog!  And the London Symphony Orchestra's version of the Nutcracker!  And so taste mattered not.  I hung up all my kitty-themed, Tinker Bell-themed, and Eastern European-themed (thanks, Sarah G.) ornaments without a thought to how Forever 21 and Target would feel about how I was torturing their clothing lines.  And really, I didn't leave the house, so now one else saw.  Except for Annie D.  She stopped by for dinner.  But nothing I could ever do or wear would shock her.  This is the person who dressed up as twin devils with me for Halloween 1998, and as Betty to my Wilma for Homecoming 2000.  I mean, c'mon... as everyone knows, Annie D. loves to theme. [12.01.09] We're just days away from my favorite holiday--THANKSGIVING!  It's all the good food, good wine, and--at Nanna's house--champagne without the stress of shopping for gifts or decorating the house.  At my first Thanksgiving meal of the year, provided by a workplace food venue, a friend asked us all to name our favorite thing on our plate--in other words, to complete the sentence, "It wouldn't be Thanksgiving without ____."  Obviously I said gravy, because I'm obsessed with dips, spreads, and sauces, which means cranberry sauce is a close second.  (I try to have a little of each in every Thanksgiving bite!)  But it occurred to me at lunch that I should share with you all another Thanksgiving staple in Nanna's household:  sauerkraut!  It's just as vital to our family as the mashed potatoes and stuffing!  It wasn't until some time in college that I discovered that not EVERYONE has sauerkraut on Turkey Day.  In fact, almost no one does!  This blew my mind.  Then, one day a few years ago, I found someone else who has to have sauerkraut on her plate, right there next to the turkey:  you know her as K-Dawg.  I know her as my Thanksgiving soulmate.  We think we've narrowed it down to some sort of wider-Baltimore tradition.  But I implore you, I dare you--bring a can of sauerkraut to Thanksgiving this year!  You'll thank me later! [11.19.09] I've been so pleased to see the 80's make a huge comeback in recent years, both in terms of fashion and music, mostly because I didn't dress myself (and I definitely didn't buy my own clothes) for most of the 80's.  So to be able to live out childhood fantasies involving leggings and bubble skirts is a personal thrill.  Last night, though, I felt a huge pang of nostalgia for the 90's, a decade that seemingly had fewer definable, standout characteristics than the five decades preceding it.  The trigger for this was a long overdue viewing of one of my favorite movies of all time:  Empire Records.  Um, I can pretty much recite the entire script and list every song on the soundtrack.  The coolest thing about this particular screening was that I watched the "special fan version," which included tons of deleted scenes I'd never seen before.  More to see, more to love, more to memorize.  Renee Zellweger, Liv Tyler, Robin Tunney, and Ethan Embry have never been better.  (Although Ethan Embry was pretty sweet in All I Want for Christmas -- also a 90's flick!)  So while it's pretty crazy that we're less than two months away from a brand new decade, I'm glad we have something to look forward to that inevitably comes with it:  the return of scrunchies, overalls, tight black pants, female R&B groups, wholesome alternative bands and all things 90's. [11.10.09] I've mentioned the self-proclaimed charm of this website before--that it looks like it might be older than the internet itself--but obviously there are other factors that have kept me from bringing it up-to-date.  The first is that unless I transfer it over to some sort of blog-type format--and you ALL know how unacceptable I think that would be--the task just seems too overwhelming.  The second is that I fear change.  But apparently Yahoo! doesn't!  Just try clicking on the "View My GuestBook" box above.  Oh!  Oops!  Geocities doesn't exist anymore!  Buh-bye!  So I'm going to have to figure out what to do about that so Sarah M. can keep up her spirited dialogue with A&A.com.  Apparently Yahoo! also wants me to stop using the web-based program I use to update A&A.com, called PageBuilder.  They tried to hide it on their site--and their tactic did keep me from updating for a week there in August--but I'm crafty and I finally found it!  They're going to have to try a little harder if they really want me to upgrade.  But if any of you very smart and talented A&A readers have ideas for updating A&A.com to a newer, NON-blogging platform, please contact me.  I would say leave me a note on the guestbook page, but that’s no longer an option for the time being… [10.29.09]