Salon post: February 22

[jenett]

Good morning!

Topic of the week
Things you look forward to in the coming next season where you are (we are in what may be the tail end of the last significant storm here in New England.)

What I've been up to
I am running around getting ready for a quick and weirdly timed work trip (flying very early Saturday morning, getting back very late Monday night, the actual work stuff is Saturday evening through noonish Monday).

So I'm posting this and then going to the laundromat, as one does.


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Comments

[redbird]

I went for a nice walk along the Charles yesterday with fresh snow on the ground; we walked down from Harvard Square, then on the side of Memorial Drive closest to the river for a bit under a mile, until we got to Microcenter. There were witch hazels in bloom, and mergansers [ducks] on the river. I hadn't taken that specific route before, so it was a bit of exploring as well as a nice day to be outside.

[julian]

Oh, god, choice paralysis.

I went to the Soviet Union & some neighboring countries, when I was 16, with a peacenik singing group. Visited to Estonia (just after it declared independence), Ukraine (2-3 months before it declared independence), and parts of the actual Soviet Union. Took a ferry from Finland. Sang at a 50,000 person choral fest.

Had some Estonian songs in our repertoire that they literally had been forbidden from singing by the Soviets, so (when other people sang them), they stood up silently, instead. At this point, they kept standing, but also sang. (With tears.)

About half of us took a tour of a decommissioned Orthodox church, later in the trip. Powerful place. We knew a piece of sacred choral music, and we had the director with us, so we somehow spontaneously started singing it. Chills.

Recently/locally, there's the Wheaton Farm conservation area, about a mile from my house. I moved to Easton in August, and I'm enjoying getting to know the area. This is a nice walk; there's a pond that's part of the Easton water supply (so it's protected, obviously), and a bunch of birds hang out there. Good sunsets.

[jazzyjj]

I am currently packing up for spending the night at my parents' place. I just found out on Wednesday--while I was at a meeting--that the lady who put in the order thingy last weekend for my bloodwork left out something. So tomorrow morning I've got to go back for repeat bloodwork. It's all routine though for kidney stuff, so nothing's happened to me and I'm feeling great.





I can't currently go into too much detail about this, but the meeting I mentioned was with 3 university students who are helping to totally revamp a goal-tracking portal that is used by an organization in which I've been involved for several years. One of their focuses is section 508, and they wanted to meet with me to get some feedback from a screen reader user. They actually had VoiceOver, Apple's on-board screen reader, up and running on one of their computers. They had me navigate a little bit through their prototype site, and then asked me some questions about how I use the Internet. They also had me go to a site with good accessibility, so that they could see first-hand how these things work on the front end. They're doing a great job, and it was good to meet with them.

[alexwlchan]

Near where you live: Hatfield Forest is an old royal hunting forest near where I live. On sunny days, I like to go and wander among the trees. I don’t have a particular route or destination – and indeed, it’s mostly just forest, with not a lot to distinguish it – but it’s a nice place to walk and sit with my thoughts. It’s a good place to unplug.

Longer travel: Lake Bled, on a trip to Slovenia last year. Bled was the reason I picked Slovenia, after reading somebody’s blog post about it. On the day I went out, I was worried I wouldn’t see much – it was snowing heavily as I left Ljubljana, but the result was a picturesque, snow-dusted alpine lake without many people. I walked around the whole thing, photographed it from every angle, and it’s one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. (I want to post pictures somewhere eventually, but haven’t got round to it.)

Everything in between: North Queensferry. I was visiting Edinburgh a few years back, and got a tip off to go look at the Forth Bridge. The station immediately north of the bridge is North Queensferry, where you get wonderful views of the underside of the bridge, and also a tiny lighthouse. Plus a delicious cheese scone and soup in a cafe. I made the day trip on a whim, but it was a lovely day.

[theora]

This year as been hard, but I still hope to fit in a visit the Orangerie and Limonaia at Tower Hill Botanical Garden. It's such a ridiculous hopeful thing in a New England winter to be in a glasshouse full of blooming tropical plants and citrus trees laden with fruit.

[julian]

...wow, didn't know *that* existed. (The Garden in general, not just the Orangerie & Limonaia.) Have to go this spring, clearly.

[bethctg]

I lived in the Washington DC area for 10 months in 1997. I was in my late 20s, and I'd never felt so grown up! *g* It was so surreal taking the metro into work and seeing the Capital come into view; walking over to the White House on my lunch breaks; going over to Georgetown to see art films. I saw "Paris Was a Woman" one Saturday afternoon, and it's been one of my favorite movies (sentimentally) ever since.

(Bill Clinton was president then, but I like looking at my Obama icon. *g*)

[solitarywalker]

i think i'm going to say NYC, which is a weird choice because i like forests and dislike buildup and noise. But it's probably the place i miss the most, find myself thinking about most often. Not even any particular place in New York, more like the tremendous variety of places, how it changes as i walk from one end of Manhattan to another, across a bridge to Brooklyn, etc. Huge, cheap slices of pizza. Strand. Waking up and stepping outside and being in New York, it's this amazing feeling, like i'm already there rather than having someplace to go.