OK, well, maybe not great success, but I will give myself a small Borat-style high-five. We're finally starting to see some veggies in the Special Olympics Victory Garden! Niiiiice, I liiiiike!

The herbs -- basil, parsley, dill, cilantro, sage, chives, thyme, oregano -- have been doing well, and I've been harvesting the thinned seedlings for salads and other recipes. However, I was skeptical that we had enough hours of sun in the backyard to produce any actual veggies. The tomato, cucumber, and pepper plants have been growing like mad. But I was beginning to think we'd have a bunch of gargantuan plants with no edibles.

Joy! This week, I noticed our first red tomato. This tiny cluster is from the Juliet plant we bought at the Falls Church Farmers Market. Woot! You can see from the picture that the birds have been trying to get at it. (Despite the menacing inflatable snake that ain't foolin' NOBODY.) It's not going to win a blue ribbon at the State Fair. No matter! After carefully photographing it, which I made Mark do because my hands were all muddy, we carefully harvested it, and it's now in the kitchen awaiting a place of honor in a salad of some sort. Hopefully there will be more where it came from. I may live to regret those words... in which case you will ALL be receiving cases of salsa for Christmas this year!

I also noticed that the cukes are starting to proliferate. These are also farmers market plants, which are clearly at home in their back corner of the garden and are threatening to overtake the beans and squash.

I continue to struggle with the southeast corner, which doesn't seem to get enough sun to support anything. Plus it's the lowest, wettest point of the entire yard. I've tried lettuce from seed packets, several times, to no avail. I got a few seedling freebies at a gardening workshop last weekend -- yes, I attend gardening workshops on weekends for fun, are you the least bit surprised at my geekitude? -- so I might put in some cilantro and dill back there to see how it does.

My other struggle is with the compost pile. We've held off buying an expensive rotating composter, and instead used an old plastic trash can. I tried to keep everything manually rotated and aerated, but I let it go for a week or so because of all the rain. And when I opened it up this week it was chock-full o' maggots. Barf! So much for that experiment. I dumped it out in a secluded spot in the backyard and let the birds have a nice lil' picnic. We'll cover it with grass clippings and still have a workable compost pile. Another lesson learned for the Victory Garden files!

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Related links:
* Our Special Olympics Victory Garden (May update)
* Celebrating Joan with the first seedlings of the season (March update)

Here are a few snaps from Mark's latest gig... The band, American Giant, has only recently formed and this was their first outing. They played at a walkathon/fundraiser event for the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of America, which was a little bizarre and very different from the standard smoky-drunken-divebar gig. I have to admit, though, watching them play onstage at the foot of the Washington Monument was pretty kickass. The National Sylvan Theater is little more than a rickety old bandshell, but the location makes it almost majestic. Having Jerome from Jimmy's Chicken Shack there to run sound on equipment from Rams Head didn't hurt either.

Hopefully there will be more American Giant gigs (and, ahem, a web site) soon, and y'all can come out and join us next time! Bring your earplugs. :)

I've been on Twitter for several months now. While the basic mechanics are pretty straightforward, it took me a while to get the hang of it and feel like I had a useful tool on my hands. There are approximately three gazillion "Twitter How-To" articles out there, but none of them really got to the heart of it. And it finally occurred to me that everything I needed to know about Twitter, I learned in kindergarden:

The Golden Rule
Follow everyone who follows you (unless they are an obvious spambot). You can always un-follow them later if their tweets get annoying, but at least give them the benefit of the doubt up front.

Share everything
Re-tweet helpful stuff. This has the double-benefit of sharing interesting tidbits as well as promoting someone else's tweet. If you do this on a regular basis, folks will start re-tweeting your stuff too.

Nobody likes a copycat
Don't just "RT" everyone else's material. And for god's sake don't spit out an endless stream of quotations. Add your own original thoughts from time to time!

It's polite to use someone's name in conversation
Use @ handles as often as possible. This directs a question or comment to a specific person, and you're more likely to receive a response that way. Unless you have a large pool of loyal followers, posing a generic question to the masses is not going to generate many responses.

Nobody likes a braggart
Constantly promoting only your own stuff (products, website, events, etc) starts to occur as spam after a while.

Just because someone's popular doesn't mean you need to be their friend
People with tens of thousands of followers aren't always the most interesting tweeple. More often than not, they're obsessed with rote numbers of followers. Yawn. (However, I do always give 'em a chance to really wow me, per the Golden Rule above.)

Know your friends
Use a tool like TweetDeck to group the people you're following into categories. This way you can easily skim a topic and see what folks are tweeting about. I follow a pretty diverse set of people -- travelers, gardeners, techies, foodies, winos, CSRfolk -- and TweetDeck helps me keep their conversations organized.

So what have I actually gotten out of Twitter? Here's a quick list of tangible benefits:

* I got someone a job
* I got some free plants (from several different people)
* I won a free bottle of wine in a contest
* I got a timely news snippet that proved helpful in a conversation with a vendor
* I've learned about lots of great local events
* I was able to give a particularly smarty response about hashtags in a work meeting
* I connected with a CSR industry expert who gave me some great jobsearching advice

...and, most exciting of all: I got an AMAZING fare to Italy by being in the right place at the right time and following the real-time advice of a travel guru.

Might I have gotten those things even if I weren't on Twitter? It's possible. But unlikely. There's something about the immediacy of tweets that is vastly different from an email you can stash away and maybe read later. And there's something intoxicating about gaining access to people who you might otherwise only read about or see on TV. Following a person and reading their random tweets gives you more insight into their humanity. And I happen to think that's pretty frickin' cool.

Do you have any great Twitter pearls of wisdom? Please share!

"Live a balanced life; learn some and think some
and draw and paint and sing and dance
and play and work every day some."
-Robert Fulghum "All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarden"

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It's official. We're going to Italy in the fall. On Tuesday night, with the help of the good folks at FareCompare I found a redonkulously low fare from DC to Rome and just couldn't resist. (As a side note, it turned out to be a mistake on the part of the airline. They left out the fuel surcharge. Oops! Hee hee.) So, we're booked: September 16 to October 16. Italy, here we come!

And now comes the fun part! I love researching for upcoming trips. And while I have been collecting information, articles, blogs, tips, and contacts for a few months now, it's time for the real work to begin. Since we've never been to Italy before -- I know! unbelievable! -- we'll probably spend a few days each in "the big three" cities of Rome, Venice, and Florence. There's a wealth of information about what to do and see and eat and drink in these places. I may try to find us some couchsurfing hosts, and I hope to hook up with a few of the amazing Italy/travel/wine folks I've been chatting with on Twitter.

That'll be fun, but this trip is really all about slow travel. A corollary of the slow food movement that began in Italy as a reaction to fast food, slow travel is a philosophy that embraces a decelerated pace, cultural immersion, and deeper exposure to the richness of "going local." Slow travel typically involves a stay of at least a week in one place, with day trips fanning out in concentric circles from your home base. After our frenetically-paced SE Asian junket last November, where we arrived home feeling exhausted and in need of a vacation from our vacation, I decided our next trip would be as slowed-down as possible. I've been drooling at pictures of small towns in Italy -- OMG, they're all GORGEOUS! I've been researching agriturismo venues where you can pick veggies from the garden and learn to cook fresh local dishes from scratch. Heaven! I've been collecting charming Italian wineries like baseball cards. After all, we will be there for the harvest season. Cin cin!

But I feel like I've hit a wall.

How do you *plan* a trip whose very essence is about not planning at all?

Is this information filed right next to the sound of one hand clapping? I haven't figured that one out either. Anyway, I'd love to hear from the slow travel mavens out there. How does one find the elusive balance that covers just enough of the basics so you don't miss out on all the good stuff, but allows the trip to unfold organically?

We also haven't decided which region to use as our home base. Any and all suggestions are being evaluated! Send your recs my way, please and thanks!

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It's simply not summer in the US until Memorial Weekend, the official inauguration of the season of grillin, chillin, and overconsumption of the vice of your choosing. This year we decided to start our summer off right with a trip to Osyrusfest 2009 in Coatesville, PA.

We'd attended this event two years ago, and it was great to see how it's grown. Started a few years back by the illustrious Preston and Paul Hoffman as a way to celebrate jam bands (and an excuse to drag millions of dollars of lighting equipment to the quarry outside their old family homestead), Osyrusfest has evolved into one of the premiere small music festivals in North America. The schedule was jam-packed full of excellent bands from all over the country. Even for someone who gets easily bored with the never-ending wiffly-wafty nature of jam music -- ehm, that would be me -- the jaw-dropping lights and striking Ofest setting kicks the whole thing up a notch or ten.

Learning from past mistakes with leaky tents, this year we decided to rent a big honkin' RV and drive up from DC. Several participants flaked out at the last minute, which just left more room in the RV of Love & Justice for me, Mark, and our friend Josh (better known in some circles as The Minister of Intoxication). We got the exact same model we'd rented last year for Burning Man, and the minute I stepped inside to load up our gear I had a huge flashback to our dusty, surreal adventures on The Playa. And, sniff, I missed Crystal and Foreward and the rest of the GBOF crew! Nevermind, we were about to create a whole set of new memories with a new cast of characters.

We finally hit the road around 8:30pm on Friday, which meant missing most of the hideous weekend traffic, but it also meant arriving just before midnight. After taking a wrong turn at Gum Tree and almost taking out their neighbor's mailbox, we rolled into the Hoffman Estates just as the Mobias Project set was ending. I wiggled the Mothership into position, and we cracked open a frosty beverage to celebrate our successful arrival. The party raged deep into the night, complete with a DJ set and a neverending supply of Fisherman's Brew beer. (Sponsorship is goooooood!)

The rest of the weekend was somewhat of a blur, albeit a totally mellow and relaxing one. Daytime consisted of parking ourselves in the shade outside the RV and interacting with our neighbors, sharing beverages and tasty treats. If we were so inclined, there were several sporting options to partake in... everything from whiffle ball to bocce. Mostly we just sat around chatting and enjoying the continuous current of music from the DJ tent, live guitar and drum circles, or our own RV sound system. It was chillaxed to the max!

The highlight of the weekend was indisputably the stellar set by Eclipse, a Pink Floyd tribute band from Nashville. They totally stole the show. Mere words can't quite convey the exhilaration of standing on the overgrown quarry floor, surrounded by lights and fog, listening to this band belt out Pink Floyd favorites like "Comfortably Numb" and "Wish You Were Here." If I closed my eyes, I coulda sworn I was actually seeing the Floyd live and in the flesh. It was truly breathtaking. The band has seven members, including one vocalist who sounds more like Roger Waters and one with more of a David Gilmour sound, plus a hot female saxophonist/keyboardist, and another hot female vocalist who can belt out "Great Gig in the Sky" like nothing I've ever heard. So they can really cover the full gamut. If you are the least bit fan of the Floyd, make it your business to see these guys in concert. They blew us all away.

And then, the icing on the cake: we got to hang out with most of Eclipse after the show. Such is the benefit of having a ginormous mothership of a vehicle... you get to host the best parties at the festival! We never quite matched the 20-person pileup of BM 2008, but we certainly did circulate a lot of folks through the RV of Love & Justice on Saturday night. And I have to say, in addition to being a phenomenally talented bunch, Eclipse are also outstanding peeps to hang out with. It was a pleasure getting to know them. The absinthe was flowing, the hookah was fired up, and the steady stream of innnnnnnnnteresting people kept the conversation lively, to say the least. Good times.

By the time Monday rolled around and it was time to roll on home, everyone was a bit rough around the edges, as you can imagine. Preston was overhead to say something to the effect of "I can *feel* how much fun I had this weekend. Even my teeth hurt!" Amen, brother. We were all using our inside voices the following week at work. No matter, it was completely worth it! Kudos to Preston and Paul for a tremendously successful Osyrusfest 2009. Oh, and on top of all the fun, we raised a bunch of money to help provide clean drinking water to Varkhadiya Village in Gujarat, India, via the fabulous folks at 1Well. Gotta love fun that benefits a great cause. Summer 2009, here we come!

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PS. All Ofest pics can be found here. Anybody who wants originals, please visit the Flickr set and help yerself! (There are a few additional photos posted there.) I didn't get everyone's email addies, so kindly help me spread the word to the rest of the 'Fest folks.

PPS. Hippie-ravers HEART oktapodi, big time! Here's a small sampling of the new friends our groovy cephalopod made at Ofest:

In celebration of Mother's Day, this seemed like a good time to check in with an update on our gardening adventures. As I've said before, my mom was the one who instilled in me a love of veggies and diggin' in the dirt. So while I'm more than a bit sad she's not around to witness my latest attempts at green-thumbery, what better way to celebrate this day?

This year we (and by "we" I mean "I") decided it was time to graduate from container plantings to a full-blown garden in the backyard. I was inspired, in part, by First Lady Michelle Obama's awesome efforts to raise the profile of organic gardening by planting a vegetable garden on the grounds of the White House. Hurray! The likes of Alice Waters and Michael Pollan have been advocating this for years, and it's just another sign of positive regime change to see the First Family involved in gardening efforts. (To his credit, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack is doing some kickass things to embrace sustainable agriculture, and has planted his own garden right on Ag grounds.) There's been much talk of "Victory Gardens" this year, given the troubled state of the economy and America's higher awareness of the importance of locally-sourced food. And how much more local can you get than your own backyard? The time was right to fully embrace the gardening ethos, and take our efforts to the next level.

Just one problem: our backyard is pretty shady. We love our "secret garden" backyard for the privacy it affords. While the front yard is super-sunny and enjoys afternoon southern exposure, the back is full of tall trees and doesn't get as much sun. Hrm. While there is an interesting movement (see below) that recommends doing away with that All-American pasttime of keeping a high-maintenance, resource-draining green carpet of turf, we weren't quite ready to take the plunge and dig up our front lawn to make way for veggies. So we tried to find a suitable spot in the backyard that would get enough sun to sustain a small patch of salad fixins.

We found a spot, and opted to go with a raised bed. Supposedly raised beds are a more efficient use of space and water, and are the way to go when planting vegetables. So we plotted the dimensions of a possible raised bed, taking into account the odd shape of the yard, several drainage spouts we didn't want to disturb, and the extant foliage. We settled on a very odd shape, and set off to obtain the necessary lumber to make the frame.

The result was affectionately referred to as either the "Trapezoid Garden" (Mark) or "Special Olympics Garden" (me). Yes, the shape is weird. Yes, it's a bit larger than recommended for a raised bed garden. But ya gotta work with what ya got.

In preparation for planting all manner of herbs and vegetables, I decided to try to start a few things from seed. After purchasing a boatload of seeds (rookie gardener syndrome), as well as a few peat starter trays, I planted some tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, rosemary, and a handful of flowers for the front yard. Lacking a proper greenhouse setup, I had to be satisfied with a few sunny windows and plenty of water.

By late March, we'd mulched over the scant remaining grass using newspaper and a combination of grass clippings and compost. Having lugged five big bags of designer dirt home from the garden store, it became obvious we'd need a *lot* more soil for this puppy. Hoo boy.

Meanwhile, the cukes and tomatoes had all succumbed to mysterious malady I eventually identifed as "damping-off disease." This fungus rots the stems at the soil surface, causing them to topple over, shrivel up, and die. Boo-hoo! It's caused by overwatering and poor circulation. I've decided that the peat trays are partially to blame, as it's hard to tell if the plant is sufficiently moist or oversaturated. It was discouraging to lose a whole tray of seedlings, but fortunately the peppers were still in good shape.

At least, until the mercurial DC spring weather got the better of me. I accidentally left the seedlings outside overnight once in April. The daytime temps had been in the mid-70s, so I'd put the plants outside to "harden" a bit in preparation for eventual planting. That worked out great, but that night it plunged to the 40s. Eeeek! The abundant tray of seedlings dwindled down to a few extra-hardy specimens. I was crushed. One glimmer of hope: an errant tomato seedling from last year's crop managed to survive the winter and poke its little head up. I've since been warned that hybrid seedings are not to be trusted, but I'm still proud of this one tough little soldier that made it through the ice and snow. I eagerly await whatever fruit it decides to bear this season.

Gradually, throughout late April and early May, we transformed the bed into something that might actually support vegetative life. This involved many trips to the garden center for bag after bag of dirt, plus some attempts to turn over the existing soil and combine it with the purchased stuff. I transplanted several lettuce varietals that I'd started from seed, as well as scattering some new lettuce seeds directly into the garden. I researched "companion plants" and which veggies played nice with each other, and attempted to plot out the garden schematic. I also attended a workshop co-hosted by The DC Historical Society and Washington Gardener magazine, and geeked out to an afternoon of Q&A by Cindy Brown of Green Spring Gardens. My true geekburger nature shone through as I reveled in the research, the planning, the anecdotal stories from other local gardeners. But at the same time, I was realizing that gardening is really all about trial and error. As with most great hobbies, in gardening one must not be afraid to fail once or twice or three times, in pursuit of that one combination that really works. I don't like to fail (who does?) but when you're talking about a 99-cent pack of seeds or even a $2 plant, happily, the stakes are low. When the cucumbers I started from seeds all croaked from the damping-off fungus, I bought a bunch of seedlings from the garden store and planted those in the garden. When cutworms (or perhaps the insane amounts of rain we've been having lately) got the better of those seedlings, and all but one flopped over, I bought heartier plants at the local farmers market. Hopefully the third time's the charm. Likewise, though I can't seem to keep a tomato seedling alive no matter what I try, a friend has come through with some awesome heirloom plants. Live and learn, and take good notes to prevent the same debacle next time.

Which brings us to the present. As of this weekend, I've planted nearly everything, except the peppers, which require really warm weather to flourish. The multiple varieties of lettuce, which love the cool damp weather, are starting to mature and I've already started incorporate some into our daily salads. A sage plant from the garden center seems to be doing well, alongside a stevia plant that I just couldn't resist. (I have no idea how you make the transformation from green leafy plant to organic sugar substitute, but that's an experiment for another day.) The new cukes are in, fingers crossed. I planted a bunch of herbs from seed, including basil, cilantro, and chives. Several types of heirloom tomatoes (Cherokee Purple, Cherokee Chocolate, and Black from Tula) from our friend's garden are planted alongside some other funky-sounding tomatoes (Nebraska Wedding, Juliet, Pink Beauty, and Green Zebras) sourced from the Falls Church farmers market. The Juliets were purchased from a farmergrrl with a Jack Skellington tattoo. Now *that* is the American dream, friends and neighbors. I also planted a few different types of carrots, beets, and beans, as those were always my favorites to garden with my mom. I think she'd be proud of my efforts. Now, if I can just keep the birds and squirrels from eating everything...

PS. I have discovered that gardeners, in addition to happily sharing their knowledge, are generous with extra plants and clippings. Along with the heirloom tomatoes, in recent weeks I have been the benefactor of rosemary clippings, hostas, and day lillies. I could also have my share of free mulch if only I had a way to transport it from a friend's yard in DC. Much love to my garden peeps, you are a wise and bounteous group of folks!

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Related Links:
* Michelle Obama: How Does Your Garden Grow?
* Obamas to Plant Vegetable Garden at White House
* Michelle Obama's Garden
* For Vilsack, the Proof Is in the Planting
* Lawn Reduction and Lawn Substitutes
* Why Mow? The Case Against Lawns

I arrived at the Ambassador's residence around 9am for orientation. Stepping inside this oasis of lush style, you'd never know you're just a few steps from the Dupont Circle Metro Station. From the stunning entryway leading to a jaw-dropping wooden staircase, to the dining room with Elizabethan wainscoting, to the skylight in the Edwardian ballroom, the Thomas Gaff house is a true DC landmark. It's a few blocks from the actual Embassy of Colombia. But it was no surprise that this was the chosen site to host the Embassy's open house. The place is sa-weeeeeet!

This was Cultural Tourism DC's second year organizing Passport DC, a series of 30+ embassy open houses all occurring on the same Saturday in May. The event provided a unique opportunity to visit some of the most gorgeous properties DC has to offer. Embassies from Australia to Zambia opened their doors to the public, offering cultural programs, food tasting, and a rare glimpse inside buildings that are not often open for walk-ins by the Average Joe. I'd heard about the event from the volunteer coordinators at the Cherry Blossom Festival, and it sounded like a great opportunity to give back. I received two assignments: morning shift at the Embassy of Colombia, and afternoon shift outside the Embassy of Ukraine.

Last year's event drew over 50,000 people, and this year they expected even greater numbers. In preparation for a day of directing the masses, Denisse Yanovich, Cultural Attaché at the embassy, gathered up a group of Passport volunteers and embassy staff to dole out assignments. As any good volunteer knows, there's nothing better than knowing exactly what you're supposed to be doing, so it was a great relief to see the shifts planned out in precise detail. Denisse explained that some of us would be tasked with crowd control, making sure that nobody brushed up against the priceless Botero painting in the foyer or wandered upstairs to Ambassador Carolina Barco Isakson's private residence, and some of us would be serving treats or handing out literature in the main ballrom. I ended up at the passport stamp station. The event program guide featured a "passport" section in the middle, where visitors could collect a stamp for each embassy visited. My very important job was to offer an official stamp to those who wanted to commemorate their visit to Colombian soil. Most embassies used standard ink stamps, or stickers, but at the Embassy of Colombia we didn't mess around. I got to use an ancient metal seal to emboss page after page. After a few hours the muscles on my right side started to feel like jelly, but it was worth it for the excited reactions. "Oooooo! It's so *official*!" and "Coooooooool!" and "Wow, that's awesome!" were just a few of the standard responses. People really dug it. And as any good volunteer knows, there's nothing better than recognition of a job well done.

Last year, the Embassy saw about 2,000 visitors. I don't know what the final count was for this year, but I'm guessing we surpassed last year's benchmark by about midday. The line stretched out the door and around the block. People were almost as excited to see the exquisite artwork as they were to enter the raffle to win a free tshirt emblazoned with the "Colombia es pasión!" tagline. Visitors were also treated to videos extolling Colombia's tourist attractions, free Juan Valdez coffee, and bocadillos with guava and queso. I didn't see the Couchsurfing group who met up for the day, but did run into a random friend who was surprised to see me wielding an official Colombian seal. It was a great morning.

My shift was over around 1pm, when I was relieved by the afternoon volunteer. Denisse directed me to the kitchen in the bowels of the residence for a spot of lunch. (As any good volunteer knows, there's nothing better than a free lunch! Especially one awarded in recognition of a job well done.) I was a bit sad to leave, but my next shift awaited. I ate as quickly as I could, and caught the Route 3 shuttle bus to my next destination in Georgetown.

On the shuttle, I sat next to a woman who had just come from the Embassy of Uzbekistan, and was en route to Saudi Arabia. She and I marveled at the fact that when you've lived somewhere for a while, you tend to take for granted the goodies that are available in your backyard. When else do you get a chance to see what the Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia has to offer? Legally, Embassy grounds *are* officially the soil of that particular country, so it's probably the only chance someone like me might get to "visit" Saudi Arabia. Alas, today it wasn't meant to be, as I needed to continue on to my next shift at the Embassy of Ukraine.

Long story short, I got redirected to help out at the main information booth back at Dupont Circle. I spent the rest of the afternoon directing folks to the appropriate shuttle lines, explaining that although the Embassy of Australia closed at 3pm there were still plenty of embassies open until 4, and handing out program guides until they ran out. While not nearly as organized as my time in Colombia that morning, it was nonetheless energizing. By the time my afternoon shift ended around 4:30, I was exhausted and more than ready to head for home.

It's too bad Passport DC is only once a year... so many fabulous embassies, so little time! But for those who are looking for a second chance, the European Union countries are doing their own open house events next weekend:

Shortcut to Europe
Saturday, May 9
1-4pm

Related links:
* more photos from the day's events
* video/pics from all embassies

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I'm working on some new blog posts, I swear I am. But in the meantime, I wanted to share this award-winning short by Kirsten Lepore, which came my way via nerdseyeview. I completely agree with Pam, it's a "nearly perfect travel story." Enjoy, and Happy Earth Day!

Wowie-zowie. I'd known about the evils of styrofoam -- especially after so much time spent picking it off our lawn -- but I didn't quite comprehend the magnitude of its nefariousness until this weekend.

I signed up to do a Potomac shoreline cleanup, one of Marriott's many "Spirit to Serve" activities that happen throughout the year. Saturday was a fabulous day to be outside: bright early spring sunshine, and a strong breeze to keep things cool. About two dozen folks from Marriott HQ and various local properties spent several hours on Saturday morning cleaning up Roosevelt Island. Situated in the Potomac River between DC and Virginia, the island is a 90-acre preserve with paved and wooded trails, a memorial to Teddy Roosevelt, and the remains of George Mason's house. It's a cool little spot and a nice respite from the rat race. Unfortunately, due to its location, Roosevelt Island also catches a lot of trash that gets dumped into the Potomac.

Blue trash bags and hazmat gloves in hand, we split up into smaller groups and each got assigned a specific section of the island. Our group wound up on the south tip under the Rt 50 bridge. I had visions of discovering all sorts of bizarre stuff -- discarded clothing, medical waste, maybe even a dead body! -- but it mostly came down to two things.

Styrofoam and cigarette butts. Ew.

At the start of the day, the organizers asked us to keep track of how many butts we picked up. I stopped after 50, but estimate my grand total to be somewhere around 100. They also asked us to count the number of plastic bags, and I was pleased to report that I'd only found two or three. That's a sign of something good. However, the quantity and frequency of styrofoam bits was most disheartening. Cups. Chunks of packaging. Those frickin' peanuts. Small bits. Reeeeeeally small bits. The stuff was absolutely everywhere. Yes, I know the new and improved styrofoam is CFC-free, so I guess it could be worse. But the stuff never breaks down. NEVER.

What ran through my mind, over and over again, as I stooped to pick up yet another white bit of the vile stuff, was that someday far in the future, aliens will come investigate our planet and find nothing but little pieces of styrofoam everywhere. And they'll wonder WTF we were thinking. I wonder that too.

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Yayyyyyy, little green theengs! The first seeds we started in indoor kits have sprouted. I think these might be the cukes.

What a fitting way to celebrate my mom's birthday, which, when she was around, was practically a national holiday. She was an avid gardener, and I credit both my love of veggies and my love of diggin' in the dirt to her fabulous guidance. Happy Birthday, Mom!

I've been resisting it for a long time. Twitter, the latest killer app... you've probably heard all the arguments pro and con, I'm not going to rehash them here. Personally, it boiled down to the almighty question of What's In It For Me? And I hadn't come up with a compelling enough answer to propel me into signing up for a Twitter account.

Until...

::: cue dramatic music :::

This week I went to a DC Web Women event. In addition to the usual top-notch presentation and Q&A from the group, afterwards a group of DCWWers sat around discussing the merits of Twitter for professional purposes. Somewhere amidst all that debate, I decided it was time to plug into the Twitterverse and finally see it for myself.

What do I think is In It For Me? Well, for starters, I'm looking forward to connecting with folks I might not otherwise have access to. This will be particularly useful as I continue to ramp up my job search, and try to expand my network into the new field of Corporate Social Responsibility. Also, I love the idea of getting local recommendations on the fly while we're out traveling. I doubt I'll be nearly as ambitious as the Twitchhiker, but travel and Twitter are an intoxicating match. And finally, I'm curious about using Twitter to microblog while on the road. Not that I'm giving up crafting more in-depth blog entries. But the ability to send a quick Tweet or post a single photo does open up some new possibilities. And brevity, after all, is the soul of wit. ;)

So, here I go! If you're on Twitter, feel free to follow me at http://twitter.com/pulpologist.

BTW, for anyone out there who's been living under a rock and doesn't know what Twitter's all about, here's a great video from Common Craft called "Twitter in Plain English."

You can't always get what you want
You can't always get what you want
You can't always get what you want
But if you try sometimes...
Well you might find...

You get a penmanship award!

Today is the celebration of the birthdays of three great and influential men. I'm sure most of you have heard that it's the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth. This year the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin's birth has also been getting a lot of press. But there's one slightly lesser-known birthday to celebrate today as well, as it's the [cough-mumblety-mumbleth] anniversary of the birth of our own Mark Schramm. I don't have the time or the budget to do one of those soaring video retrospectives showing highlights from his life, but I can offer you a handful of recent travel pics:

Hey wait, actually I do have a video! Here's a short clip from last fall, of Mark and our nephew James getting down with their bad selves. Clearly music appreciation runs in the family!

Happy Birthday, Abe, Chuck, and Mark!

Whew, January 2009 has definitely been a month of "best of times, worst of times." I have to admit, I'm pretty glad it's about over.

We joined the rest of the world in celebrating the Coronation of Barack Obama on January 20. (Yay, stem cell research! Yay, an intelligent person in the Oval Office! Yay, attention to climate change! Yay, End of an Error!) We hosted a couchsurfer from Indianapolis. He'd helped with the Obama campaign in his home state, and was excited about waking up at 4am, waiting in the dark for a few hours, and then standing in the freezing cold for a few more hours with the huddled masses to observe this historical moment in person. We watched it on TV from the comfort of our warm, cozy house. Still, it was a wonderful event to witness, and it'll be nice to be able to travel without having to automatically apologize for being an Amerkan. And how cool to have a Chief Executive who understands the power of Web 2.0, for a change.

The celebration was marred by the passing of Mark's dad, who had a stroke in early January and never fully regained consciousness. We spent some time in Connecticut for the funeral and helping Mark's mom get things in order. Not a fun time, needless to say, and it brought back a lot of sad memories for me. However, it was nice to see friends and family and get a chance to celebrate John Schramm's life. He had just taken a business trip to China and seemed energized by that endeavor, so I'm glad he was able to go out on a high note.

In the "not-so-monumental but still reaaaaaally fun" category, and because I can't leave you on such a morose note, we got a chance to see one of our favorite bands last night at one of our favorite DC venues. Thievery Corporation rarely plays gigs in DC anymore, but they played the first of FIVE back-to-back sold-out shows at the 9:30 Club last night. As always, the show was spectacular. If you ever get a chance to see these guys live, go for it! Their latest album, Radio Retaliation, contains the usual eclectic mix of Jamaican, Indian, African, Latin, and Middle Eastern beats and melodies. It's goooood stuff.