Miss Adventures

LA LA LA!

I’ve been trying to figure out how to get online wirelessly for MONTHS now, and no one has been able to help. But today I gave it another shot. Not sure what I did. Well, for one thing, I removed my wireless connection from the “bridge” that it was on. Otherwise…I’m not quite sure.

So, after doing a quick writing assignment, I’ve been zooming around on the net for a couple of hours now. I am starting to feel like Chandler and Joey on Friends when they suddenly get porn for free and are afraid they’ll lose it if they turn the channel or turn off the t.v.

I don’t know what’s more embarrassing - admitting that I (once a certified Webmaster) have not been able to figure out WiFi or referencing a Friends episode.

Well, I can’t stay at Starschmucks forever. Time to take my bounty home from this morning’s Farmer’s Market. I’ll tell you later about the delilcious zucchini fritters I made this morning.

Oh, Saint Isadore of Seville, please bless me with WiFi access tomorrow and the rest of my days. Amen.

I have been absolutely riveted by Richard Bangs story on his Tour of Libya for Slate.com.

As much as I may like to fancy myself a travel writer, I’ve certainly got a lot to learn from Bangs and others who occasionally write engaging pieces.

Last year, I tried querying Tom Swick of the South Florida Sun Sentinel with several article ideas. All were rejected, sadly, but he did direct me to read his article that details what makes a good travel story. Hopefully he won’t mind if I post it here - maybe he’ll get better queries from us so-called travel writers.
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No matter what you think of “Reagan: The Man,” “Reagan: The Funeral” should be a fascinating nugget of history in the making. Major traffic arteries in Washington will be closed beginning at about 3pm today to make way for a funeral procession steeped in tradition.

Yes, Washingtonians will complain over the next few days because they won’t be able to go anywhere without encountering security checkpoints and road blocks. Then again, many federal and city workers within the vicinity of downtown have been granted “liberal leave” this afternoon, meaning that they can use the Reagan funeral as an excuse to ditch out of work early without using their vacation time. On Friday, government workers, financial workers, and companies that follow the government schedule (most all in Washington) will have the day off.

We’ve really got it good in this city of ceremony.
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The saturation Reagan coverage is cathartic to some, annoying to others. All I know is that we’re about to get bombarded with Reaganites over the next few days.

My day job has followed the Federal Government and declared offices closed on Friday (thanks, Ronnie!). Starting tomorrow, traffic around here is going to be hellish. Barriers and fencing are already up near the National Cathedral. I haven’t had a chance to look downtown yet, but I’m sure it’s a mess, too.

I have mixed feelings about Reagan, mostly because I was too young during his presidency to really get angry about his policies. A little older, a little wiser, I’m a bit disappointed that some of the negatives of the Reagan years are not being mentioned in the media. CNN’s site has some good ones, though. I’m touched by some of the people from the former Soviet Bloc (just wrote Soviet Blog - that’d be a cool one!) who feel that they owe RR for their freedom. Then again, this is the man who ordered an invasion on tiny Grenada and refused to speak out about the AIDS crisis. This guy says it pretty well:
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Back when the whole hullabaloo over gay marriage was in effect, I wrote this lil service article on spec, just for the hell of it. I shopped it out a few places, but I think that the mainstream papers are a little apprehensive about gay-oriented travel.

I’m not gay but I occasionally work in a gay-friendly restaurant (oh, I’ve got some fun stories!), and I can’t imagine why catering to the gay market or occasionally running a gay travel feature could hurt any kind of publication. Advertisers and editors have no idea what kind of disposable income they’re sniffing at.

Anyhow, with Capital Pride upon us, I thought I’d share this piece with y’all. It’s too late to sell it now and the info will be stale next time around.

Oh yeah…and this is also a bit in response to the people on the Boots forum who listed DC as their least favorite city of all time. There’s so much more beyond the monuments…you have no idea…
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It was a great weekend for sports and a great weekend for the underdog. I’m happy to see the Detroit Pistons proved me wrong last night with their defeat over the Lakers in Game 1 of the NBA Finals. Let’s hope their streak continues.

Now I was a bit disappointed to see Smarty Jones lose his bid for the Triple Crown. Although I watched the Belmont on tv, I could hear the anguished yelps from the crowd as they lost hundreds - maybe thousands - of dollars on a “sure thing.” I wanted to see history in the making, but it was not to be.

When it was all over, I found myself rooting in retrospect for the underdog - Birdstone - who came up from behind at the last moment. In fact, I think it was a bit of schadenfreude because I’d bet on “Read the Footnotes” at the NY OTB for the Kentucky Derby and he’d let me down.

Anyhow, what irked me at the end of the race was that no one really talked about how Birdstone gave a tremendous effort. When it came time for interviews, the cameras turned from the winning trainer Nick Zito to a “smarting” John Servis. That showed an utter lack of class.
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It is now safe to say that the 17-year Brood X cicadas are long gone. They emerged from their nests, copulated, buzzed about, and died. I’m sad to see them go. Rather, I’m sad to hear them disappear. At the height of their existence in the trees around DC, the cicadas sounded like one of those rain sticks that you buy on a trip to Central America. It really was a lovely hum.

Now what do we have to look forward to this summer? Pandamania.
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Knowing that I was going to one of the nation’s oyster capitals, I also knew that I would eat well. But when I got to Apalach, I was surprised to learn just how small the area was. It was all made clear when we had to go to the Piggly Wiggly.
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This Sunday, when the NBA Finals kick off in L.A., the Detroit Pistons will be overwhelmingly the underdogs. Forget that the team is young and that most of its players have never been this far in the playoffs. Forget that the Lakers have home court advantage. Forget, too, that Pistons Coach Larry Brown has an incredible track record of winning conference finals but losing when it counts.

The real reason why the Pistons will lose ultimately comes down to this fact: four of the team’s starters once played for the Washington Wizards.
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The word “Apalachicola” ranks up there with Okeechobee and Massapequa as one of the more amusing Native American place names. It has a foreign air, but just enough grit that you instantly know that the town can be found somewhere on a map of America.

In fact, you can find Apalachicola on a map of Florida, in the central-western crook of the Panhandle about two hours south of Tallahassee. Some people call this area of the country L.A. - or, Lower Alabama - and, coming originally from Alabama, I know this to be true. This is the land of NASCAR, country music, and yellow flies. Nine out of ten times, this is the kind of place I avoid. But I was in for a surprise.
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