Neat building (now a bank) over by the white house. The White House is about 200 yards behind me where I'm standing here. 

I wasn't sure which of these two shots I liked best for putting the building in context. They seem to give the building vastly different feels. 

Closer up shot highlighting the corner turret and the patina of the copper. 

Another Shot 

I thought this church, nestled in among all of the buildings, was quite interesting. I suppose it might be more appropriate to say the buildings sprung up around the church. 

The view of the Church resolves as you approach. It's an old Episcopal church from the days of Abraham Lincoln. 

The red door of the Episcopal Church. 

Went to the Smithsonian American Art Museum in China Town and they had this really cool sculpture of a hoarse, done in some kind of drift wood. Very cool looking in person. 

Short Post 4 a Short Week

One of the best things about a week with a holiday is that because of the elongated holiday weekend, you get a shortened work week. Also, you don’t have to worry (as much) about having things pile up as most other people who would be contributing to the piling are gone as well. So that is a happy thought.

Having said that, I wish everyone an (early) Happy Thanksgiving. May your holiday be full of people to hug and good food to be thankful for.

Nothing would be more tiresome than eating and drinking if God had not made them a pleasure as well as a necessity. ~Voltaire

Shipping is a terrible thing to do to vegetables. They probably get jet-lagged, just like people. ~Elizabeth Berry

Red meat is not bad for you. Now blue-green meat, that’s bad for you! ~Tommy Smothers

Pre-season Cheer

I realize this sort of thing is supposed to wait until AFTER Thanksgiving, but what the heck…

At my Lewis small group last week Bruce brought a bunch of old movies/CDs he was wanting to give away (which I thought was pretty much a wonderful idea, I should follow suit). In his collection was an overwhelming amount of Christmas music which jumpstarted my thinking about the Christmas season. I think that one of the most…nostalgic?...aspects of Christmas (aside from food) is the music. The Vince Guiardi Trio score to Charlie Brown Christmas has a way of draining every last bit of stress out of me, no matter when I listen to it. I really don’t think it is physically possible to be stressed out when this music is on, which is a good thing since much that has to do with the rest of Christmas can get very stressful.

I didn’t watch a lot of classic Christmas movies over and over, but the few I did watch on occasion really left their mark. So this week I wanted to prompt some discussion by asking what your favorite Christmas movies are.

I really like:
Charlie Brown Christmas
White Christmas
A Christmas Story
Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (the claymation/animation one)

Sky Line Drive

Famous Drives:
Lake Shore Drive - Chicago
Mullholland Drive - LA
Fifth Avenue - NY
Pennsylvania Avenue - DC
..AND Sky Line Drive in Virginia.

Ok, so maybe skyline drive isn't as famous as the above mentioned drives, BUT it is certainly beautiful. My first time going up skyline drive was with Malcolm late last year as spring was changing to summer. This year I went with Amon as Summer was changing to Fall. Since I finally got around to downloading these off my camera, I thought I'd share a few of my favorites (decided you probably didn't want to see all 150+). Enjoy. Oh, and stay tuned for more night shots from the Dupont Area.

~MikeyC>

My favorite part about the drive was the contrast of the deep rich colors of the leaves agains the clear blue sky. So beautiful. 

While we were driving along Skyline, I saw this one tree that was completely bare already up ontop of a big rock outcropping. We stopped so I could climb up there and take some pictures. 

When I got to the top I saw this other tree. It was a really interesting horizontal shape and i just liked the look of the withered wood with the rest of the gold leaves and blue sky. 

I have no idea what this vegetation is but it looked like a very well manicured topiary that just happened to be naturally occuring. Really neat I thought. 

Up there I found a tree that had these big bunches of bright berries hanging from it. 

Some berries among the small remaining bits of green grass. Great color contrast. 

As I walked around up on this peak area I found a cool rock formation. On the rocks was a single ladybug. It was still moving, slowly, but must have been miserable. 

Inside the rock formation I found this intersting view out of the cave. The shape the rocks made was almost more intersting that the view between them. 

On the drive home I set a tripod up on the front seat and got some interesting motion blurs.