A Futile Attempt

This week’s weekly photo challenge is “hellofrom…”. For me, that would mean something from DC since we lived there for thirteen years. After spending a morning by the Lincoln memorial and Capitol, we went back the next day to see if I could get a better option at the reflecting pool. The prior day was quite sunny with good reflections in the pool. Yesterday was cloudy and grey. Rather than park in a timed parking space my husband sat in the car next to the US Botanic garden and reflecting pool while I tried to find a decent shot. I went back to where I was the day before but there were no seagulls or pigeons nearby for a close shot. So I kept taking what I thought were “ok” images of the Capitol somewhat reflecting in the pond. Every time I started to give up a bunch of birds would fly in. One of the seagulls appeared to be posing. All I all I wasted about thirty minutes. My husband is very patient! When I got home I was very disappointed in the effort. Not one of the photos were worth the trouble. I think I can safely delete them all. There was no amount of editing that could make any of them worth looking at. At least we got a ride in to town. That’s something we haven’t been able to do since the last snow storm and another one on the way. So I’ll have to use an image from the first day instead. That’s how it works out sometimes. 

Capitol Lying in State

When we moved to DC fifteen years ago, one of the first lyings in state we visited at the Capitol building was Gerald Ford. We also visited George HW Bush shortly before we moved to northern Virginia. We stood in line several hours to see Supreme Court Justice Scalia at the Supreme Court building. We even saw ourselves on C Span for two of them. All of these occurred in the dead of winter. There were a few others that we witnessed as we walked by on a morning walk - like Ted Kennedy and John McCain. Yesterday was another one. We were in town getting photos for my weekly photo challenge when we came across Harry Reid’s celebration. The honor guard was bringing the casket up the steps right after we arrived at the east front of the Capitol building. It was a sparse crowd and press along with many Capitol police on foot, motorcycle and bikes. Unlike most of the others, we could at least stand half way up the drive. It was a solemn and  orchestrated occasion. There seems to be too many of them going on these days. All of us need to see a light at the end of this long tunnel. 

Anker Power Pack

With the snow storm last week we lost power not only once, but twice. Our building has a generator, but only for the building - like hallways, elevators and parking garage. The units are left high and dry. It was one of the first questions I asked before we considered moving here. Well, it didn’t work out like we thought. It seems with every rainstorm last summer we lost power too. My little pen sized power pack barely gets us through one phone charge. So I decided it was time to get a larger power pack so we could feel comfortable the next time we lose power. So I got an Anker Power Pack and charged it up to the full amount. It’s supposed to be able to charge a phone at least five times. I’m hoping I never have to try it out. But watching a movie on the phone can be a good diversion when Wi-Fi and everything else is lost. I know we could always get in the car and charge up the phone, but that is rather inconvenient. We are expecting another storm this weekend. People in Virginia love their trees, but I draw a line when it comes to power lines and trees having experienced that disaster first hand in the Midwest. The first power outage was related to a circuit but the second one was because a frozen and snowy tree broke the line. The one nice thing about living on Capitol Hill was that our electrical was underground. It’s hard to believe they actually did something right. 

Waiting for Pick Up

With another surge in Covid cases people are less inclined to spend a lot of time indoors. When you live in a condo building you need to depend on your neighbors to do the right thing. It feels like it did two years ago when everything was shut down. Even with vaccinations and boosters it’s still difficult to walk about without hesitation. So the communication was to limit the amount of time milling about in the foyer - particularly by the front desk where you pick up and sign for packages. We have an app that releases packages rather than signing on the electronic signature device at the front desk. Last week we had several small items being delivered and we waited until late Saturday afternoon to pick them up. I called down to the front desk first so she could gather them up and place them on the desk. So all we needed to do was come down and scoop them up along with the mail that we hadn’t checked for a while. In the end there were several small items that contained some medicine, K95 masks, kitchen garbage bags, a refrigerator filter, and an Anker power pack. Luckily none of it was terribly important, but with the power outages lately I am glad we have a back up power pack to keep our phones charged and allow a few charge ups. Our ice maker quit working so the filter isn’t needed at this time. I’m just getting tired of things breaking and not being able to do even the simplest of things - which wasn’t very much to begin with. 

52Frames Self Portrait

I’ve been participating in the 52Frames weekly photo challenge for over a year. Each week there is a different subject matter or photo technique that is highlighted. I’ve learned a lot about taking photos. My camera is my iPhone 8 Plus, so my capabilities are quite limited. At the beginning of the year the subject is always self portrait - and not a subject that I particularly care for. I thought I would try a sort of double exposure technique I unexpectedly came across the other day. I tried a few times, but nothing really stood out. When we we lost power last week I had a lot more time to play around with it, but still didn’t like the outcome. Then I just got tired and flopped on to the bed. The lighting in the room was rather nice. So rather than use my iPhone, I picked up my iPad Pro - which arguably has a better camera - and tried a few shots over my head using portrait mode. I didn’t particularly like the color combination but the results were adequate. I showed the photos to my husband and asked him to pick out the image he liked best since none of them looked very good to me. I am looking forward to this week’s subject a lot more - but we need to be able to get out of the house to make it worth while. In the end 52Frames is a great diversion and one of the few things we can still participate in given the limited options we have to do anything these days. 

Kale and Spinach

We both like spinach. If you asked me when I was younger if I would ever eat spinach now I would have laughed. We use it a lot to mix in with scrambled eggs, or to make an omelette, and also for a great shrimp casserole recipe. When we were in the grocery store the other day we needed to restore our spinach supply. But the shelves were looking pretty empty and there were no spinach only packages left. We did find a combination kale and spinach mixture and thought we would give it a try. I really didn’t care for the taste of the kale - especially cooked. Maybe it could have passed in a regular salad. So we ended up picking through the batch and separating the rough edged kale from the smooth edges spinach. I never knew you could cook lettuce either. Hopefully the food supply chain will smooth out since the dreadful weather and pandemic have really created so many problems. One can’t be too picky these days. 

Snow in DC

After a very frigid morning walk in the neighborhood today, we decided a drive in to town was in order. We usually take a ride after we walk just to get out of the house. Since we had a huge storm on Monday and another snow event later in the week, we wanted to see how the city looked. It was a bright day so a lot of the snow had already melted. We took our usual route down the GW Parkway and exited at the Arlington memorial bridge. Then we drove over to the Lincoln memorial and down independence avenue.  Not much was really happening. We then passed by the Capitol, Supreme Court and into our old Capitol Hill neighborhood. All I can say is that I am glad that we now have a garage for the car. Parking on the street was a real pain. Then we made our way back to the mall past the national portrait gallery and the blue chicken. The natural history museum was by far and away the busiest place. There was a long line waiting to get in. I have to say it was one of the most mundane trips we took in to town. Maybe it’s because we didn’t get out of the car. This has been a very long and tedious week. Even the grocery stores are empty. Let’s hope it gets better soon.