Moon

Today was a major showing of parental tag-teaming, and as such, I don't have much to report on other fronts. The kids were busy and happy and have been fast asleep for a couple hours now. I'm not long for this world but while on the couch with T watching 60 Minutes and then Real Time from Friday, I became increasingly distracted by the incredible moon-and-cloud show rolling by just outside my window. I made T pause the show and grab our tripod while I took the camera out the front door and started metering. The moon is so intensely bright, the sky behind the clouds (before they, disappointingly, blew away) so inky black, that capturing both in a way that did them justice was beyond the scope of our abilities. Nonetheless, I'm struck by this image of la luna. You can just see a bit of the top rounding backwards towards that which is hidden from view, and the craters give us a sense of their various depths in the degrees of shadow caught on film. (How quaint, the word film. Alas that is not accurate but it sounds more romantically lovely than memory chip or the like).

Off to bed but what do you think of Jon Tester? I like him. And I still groove on Howard Dean's complete willingness to just say what he's thinking and what he feels. Amen brother!

Really, really alarming

I'm a few days late, but did y'all see this? This guy, Alex Jones, might truly be the craziest human I've seen rant in recent times. He is terrifying, ignorant, and beyond paranoid. He is exactly the sort who should NOT have a gun though I'd bet my hands he's got an arsenal...for the day "1776 commences and the Republic rises again." Oh.My.God.

Stout Waffles, Recycling Center field trip (again)

We are having such a nice time with Mom and Dad. Oliver started back to school today, and afterwards, all of us went to the Montgomery County Recycling Center, a really cool visit/field trip for pretty much anyone in the DC-area. Both my boys love it (today was J's 3rd visit, Ol's 2nd), and Mom and Dad found it fascinating. I am always entertained and impressed by the Rube Goldbergian system of conveyor belts and shaking contraptions which funnel and sort huge amounts of recyclables past the hands of workers who must ache by days' end, having hunched over to sort for so long. It's a really neat place and the sheer amount of everything is overwhelming. This is one center in one county in a state that is actually committed to recycling, and you just know all that's piling up is a fraction of what could be recycled. I always just sit there staring both gratefully and mournfully: the former because at least someone is doing something but mournfully because much of the world isn't and the Earth and its creatures are being asked to absorb all our waste. It's just impossible that we can sustain this degree of output.

After we got home, we popped popcorn and settled into a family viewing of Harry Potter #3. During the film, I remembered that I needed to test Spiced Stout Waffles for the Your Best Beer contest on Food52 so scurried to get them made and tasted before the deadline. They are quite good and I will definitely make these again. Gorgeous, eh?