Tag Archives: DC

Artomatic: A Photo Essay

24 Jun

One of my favorite DC events is something called Artomatic. It’s a month-long art festival held every 1-3 years (depending on their ability to get organized and secure space) – usually in a building that’s under construction or slated for demolition. This year’s festival occupied ten floors of an old office building in Arlington and featured more than 1,000 artists.

Pretty awesome, right?

The event is not juried, so it’s a mishmash of stuff – some is Art with a capital-A, while other stuff looks like a classroom of kindergarteners could produce it.

Since the building is otherwise vacant, it’s easy to get lost. Fortunately they have bars on almost every floor, so you’re usually well fortified for your wandering. And there’s a stage area for entertainment on each floor – everything from poetry readings, to garage bands to fashion shows.

Last night was this year’s closing night, so my friend Betsy and I went over to check it out. Here are some of the more bizarre highlights:

There almost an entire floor dedicated to dioramas made from Peeps. This was my favorite because it was a fairly accurate portrayal of the Occupy movement in DC:

Peep Show

This was an entire room decorated bizarrely. Kind of what I assume a crack den looks like:

The End Is Near?

Not exactly sure what’s happening here, but it’s the only clown exhibit that didn’t completely terrify me:

Maybe because the hands are more creepy?

I took this mainly to taunt my sister, who offers to knit me things. If you REALLY loved me, you would make me a body-sized glove. Or a mitten. I’m not that picky…

Ain’t no needles large enough…

I’m pretty sure this is some kind of Cat’s Cradle reference, but I named him MC Knittin’ Kitten.

Let’s raise the roof.

I’m not sure what makes this art. Did the guy make Godzilla’s body from scratch? If so, I’ll put a tick in the “art” column. If he simply chopped holes and stuck frightening baby arms out of a dinosaur? Not so much.

How evolution really started…

Um… anyone want to attempt to interpret this one?

At least give her more nipples.

Forget about the goose who lays the golden egg. I want to birth a solid gold baby.

When gold-diggers get pregnant.

I didn’t take this photo for the message, though I do like the “Buy car, kick tires” idea. No. I liked this because the little drip of paint running down from his crown reminded me of the stick that holds up opera glasses. Very delicate for an Abe Lincoln skull.

Kick those tires!

Back on the Peep floor – someone had constructed a Peepmobile for kids to play with. What you may not be able to see – in this photo, it is a large fifty year old man in there driving.

When you can’t afford a corvette for your midlife crisis…

So Artomatic. Aren’t you sad you missed it? I swear – there is also REAL art there. It just didn’t photograph well.

Also? There was a fashion show with legitimate models walking a catwalk in ridiculous shoes. Knowing my obsession with models falling, any guesses what I spent my time doing? Standing with my iPhone filming, hoping I’d get footage for my own YouTube wipeout. Maybe next year.

A girl can hope.

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Thank you for over-sharing.

12 May

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My yoga instructor this morning was a guy who takes it all a bit too seriously. In addition to wearing nut-huggers, sporting a thick ’70s porno ‘stache and playing a flute during class, he walks around projecting “deep thoughts” in a stage voice during the class.

(If this is ringing a bell: yes, I’ve written about him before.)

Today’s theme was “asking for help.” It was a great message: part of living in – or belonging to – a community is allowing people to help you. It’s good for you, and people enjoy being allowed to help. Nice lesson and I should probably try to follow it more often.

But where it went a bit sideways was in the examples he chose to share with us. During our 90 minute class, I learned:

  • He has a voice coach for opera
  • He has a language coach for foreign languages
  • He has a life/career coach
  • He once had $52,000 in credit card debt
  • He was able to pay it off using a debt relief service

Each revelation made me lose focus on my yoga pose and instead head down a mental HabiTrail of marginally related thoughts.

Of COURSE he has a voice coach! No wonder he always projects his voice like Tobias Funkë. I wonder if he’s capable of a regular conversation without a stage voice? 

I wonder what foreign languages he studies? Italian seems like a no-brainer because of the opera, but I’m also going to vote for Spanish. Because he looks like someone who would like to use authentic pronunciation when ordering at Taco Bell.

A career/life coach? Whoa – that one had her work cut out for her, because I’m not actually seeing opera singer + yoga instructor + floutist as an obvious career path. Also: I didn’t realize one could AFFORD a life coach in pursuing that career path.

Ah ha! Let me guess how you racked up $52k in credit card debt. I’m going out on a limb here, but – was it all the coaches? 

Or maybe it was the flute.

Or the shorts. 

Actually – there’s really just no telling.

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The End of an Era

18 Apr

An official photo from NASA HQ.

Yesterday at 10am, this city stood still. People in suits poured from buildings, mingling with tourists who flock to the Capital year-round in patriotic attire. Photographers had impressive equipment perched on tripods pointed at the White House, framing what they hoped would be the perfect shot. Everyone looked to the heavens in anticipation.

And then she appeared – the Space Shuttle Discovery strapped to the top of a modified 747, cruising over the National Mall in what is normally restricted airspace. The crowd erupted in cheers.

As I stood watched Discovery take her final victory lap, I had goosebumps. I turned to the White House cop standing next to me and said, “It looks like they’re having a blast,” referring to the pilot who I assume had a shit-eating grin on his face as he did THREE fly-bys that required sign-off from the FAA, Homeland Security and the Secret Service. “Hell,” he responded, “I’m having a blast!”

Just taking the sight at face value – a friggin’ Space Shuttle strapped to an airplane – is jaw-dropping in a physics-defying kind of way. But it was more than that. It was one of those moments when you realize you’re witnessing history, that – just as I remember where I was when I learned the Challenger blew up (Mrs. Lockery’s sixth grade writing class); I will now never forget the day the Shuttle program ended. Because I saw it with my own two eyes.

In middle school, I was a member of the Young Astronauts Club. It used the sex appeal of space to interest kids in math and science, with the unstated promise that if you excelled in both, you just might get to ride in a Space Shuttle some day. With the retirement of the Shuttle, I wonder: what will fuel this generation’s curiosity?

As I walked back to my office, I couldn’t help but smile. And I noticed that everyone else I passed was also smiling. I suppose you can’t help but share a feeling of awe and pride and hope when you’ve just seen something that left our atmosphere 39 times receive a well-deserved salute.

Last night over dinner, Alan and I discussed it. I told him I overheard an intelligent-looking guy on his phone right after the fly-by, saying, “I need you to explain the physics to me. How can an airplane take off with a Space Shuttle on top of it? How does it not flip over when it is in the air?”

We laughed, then Alan said, “Just think. I don’t care how scary a flight is now… you can always reassure yourself by saying, ‘At least we don’t have a Space Shuttle strapped to the roof.'”

I pictured the first pilot who was told he’d be flying a 747 with, oh, um, a SHUTTLE attached to the top. “You want me to do WHAT?” I can imagine him asking, incredulously.

“Don’t worry,” the engineers would’ve said. “Just think of it as having an extra set of wings.”

Then, once he floored it down the runway, they would’ve looked nervously at each other and said, “I can’t believe we talked him into that. Here’s hoping it actually works!”

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Armed & Dangerous.

10 Apr

Star Wars Safeway?

The primary grocery chain in the DC area is Safeway, and most of the stores in the city have widely accepted nicknames. (Don’t ask me why the same can’t be said for their chief competitor, Giant.)

For example, the Safeway by me is known as the Soviet Safeway, because inventory often gets picked over, leaving bare shelves and long lines. (Admittedly, it has gotten better in the past 10 years, since Whole Foods opened five blocks away, but the nickname remains.)

The most popular Safeway is probably the Social Safeway, over on Wisconsin Avenue in Georgetown. Perhaps because it draws younger customers from nearby Georgetown University, it has an openly flirtatious vibe. If you ask someone to help you retrieve a box from a high shelf, there’s a fair chance you’ll wind up on a date.

Meanwhile, in Adams Morgan, with its high Latino population, sits the Spanish Safeway. The Senior Safeway is located in the basement of the Watergate complex, and we all know that Monica Lewinsky was the only non-retiree to live there since the 1960s.

The Safeway where I shopped when I first moved to DC and lived on the Hill is known as the Un-Safeway, because it is located in the Southeast quadrant of town, where the majority of our city’s crime statistics come from.

There are others – the Sexy Safeway, the Secret Safeway, the Suburban Safeway – but I won’t bore you. That’s not actually the point of this.

The point is: there is a dude who works at the Soviet Safeway who fancies himself something of an on-air personality. I know when he’s working because he seeks out and seizes the microphone, making constant announcements while I shop.

Somehow, in three years together, Alan had never been treated to his schtick. So when we walked into Safeway last week, he heard someone chattering on the PA and said something like, “Oh Lord. Can we shut him up?”

But with my decade of acquired wisdom, I said, “Just listen,” as I pointed to the ceiling.

What started as a thank you for someone who made a check-out donation to Safeway’s cause of the month (testicular cancer?) quickly morphed into a rave about the Virginia Deli Ham that was on special in the back of the store. And then he kept talking. And talking.

Kind of like this. But smoother.

We largely tuned him out, but as we neared the checkout lane it proved more difficult. It also got more interesting.

“Leon,” he said. “Leon, just because you got to work 15 minutes late doesn’t mean the rest of us should have to wait 15 minutes for our break.”

Then, “Leon, the rest of us got here on time and deserve our break. Now come to the front of the store.”

Pause.

“Leon, man. We have customers here forming long lines who would like to pay so they can leave our store. Get. Up. Front. NOW.”

And finally…

“Leon. Maybe you don’t need this job. But some of us need breaks. This is not cute.”

We had to walk past him as we collected our groceries from the self-checkout area, and in doing so, we accidentally made eye contact. He shook his head with disgust. He looked at us as he spoke into the mike, “Some people!”

And we weren’t sure. Was he talking to us, or Leon?

I do know this: next time, I’m going to wear a smock and be prepared to work the register so someone can get a 15 minute break. If the universe values irony, that someone will be Leon.

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But I just wanted to borrow a book…

23 Mar

Yesterday I walked to the library to pick up my book club’s next selection (In the Lake of the Woods by Tim O’Brien). When I got there, the sole librarian behind the counter was the woman I mentally refer to as Rita the Regulator.

Rita is not the librarian of your childhood who warmly comments on your selections or makes customized recommendations. She has no social skills and her job seems to bring her nothing but annoyance. If she had a visible thought bubble over her head, I’m pretty sure it would say, “Everyone is an idiot.”

Yesterday I had a chance to study her because she was on the phone with her back to me as I approached the desk. It sounded like she was having an argument with a patron. “I told you,” she said. “I looked. There’s not a book back there for you… No… I checked… spell your name again for me… yes… that’s the name I looked for, and I can tell you – there is NOT a book with that name on it… you will need to call back in a few hours… a few hours… because maybe then there will be a book back there with your name on it!”

Rita: Hates people, Loves Buffet?

I observed that she was wearing a brightly colored short sleeve button-up shirt featuring large parrots, and it made me imagine her at the store, picking it out. Had she liked the colors? The birds? Or was it a pragmatic decision made simply because of the shirt’s fit and weight, with no thought of the parrots on it? In any case, she looked like a Hawaiian tourist, which was an interesting look for the DC library in March.

The thing that makes Rita interesting (aside from everything else that fascinates me about her) is the fact that she can only perform one task at a time. Whatever she is doing has her full attention, and if you try to interrupt her you will receive a very terse reprimand. Knowing this, I patiently waited for her to complete the phone call while a line of slightly more restless patrons formed behind me.

When she hung up the phone, she turned and assessed the line, and her face seemed to read, “Great. Even MORE idiots to deal with.” In any case, she completed my transaction (which included updating my phone number in the system because there was a message on the computer prompting her to do so, which she was unwilling to override even with a line of people bearing down on her).

Book in hand, I exited. Or rather – I tried to exit. The library has two sets of automatic glass doors you pass through. I made it out the first set without issue, but then found the next set locked. I should’ve been clued in by the fact that a woman with a stroller was standing there, just hanging out between the doors, when I entered.

“It’s locked,” she said. I tried to muscle my way out, but it wasn’t happening. I turned around to re-enter the library, but the doors wouldn’t open because they’re triggered only by the pad inside the library. I was able to wrestle one open just enough to squeeze through so I could tap the pad and let the woman out.

I approached the desk to tell Rita that something was wrong with the doors, but she wouldn’t interrupt her transaction to look at me. “There’s a line,” she informed me without making eye contact.

I leaned toward the next person in the line, “You might want to let her know that the doors are locked and people can’t get out.”

Duty done, I returned to the entrance and reversed my way out, prying the doors open with some effort as I realized that the library was something of a fire trap. I held the door open for the baby stroller lady as I went, and we both laughed with relief when we finally made it to the sidewalk.

Like this, but not Spiderman, and not in a glass. So actually, not really like this.

The way the library is laid out, the entrance and exit face each other because it’s a bit like a horseshoe. While we were rejoicing in our newly found freedom, I looked up to see a guy – the guy who Rita had been helping when I tried to inform her about the doors – stuck in the exit foyer, grabbing the door handles and shaking them with a slight look of panic in his eye.

He was so absorbed in his task, he didn’t even notice me, sitting there staring at him, and it made me wonder if someone had watched me do the exact thing. It was not unlike watching an orangutan behind glass at the zoo.

And suddenly I understood why Rita shook her head and thought we were idiots.

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