Culture No. 40: The Touristy Photo Dump

While I usually have my camera on me, it's taken me less than three months to fall into the 'I live here so I'll do it some other time' mindset of never taking any photos while we're out and about. So when Drew's Mom and Stepdad came to visit this past weekend, I tried to break the habit by breaking out the ol' point and shoot every now and then. Despite the rainy weekend, we managed to hit up parts of Old Town Alexandria, Capital Hill, the Smithsonian, and Georgetown - a good crash course, I'd say. :)

Lunch at The Chesapeake Room in Barracks Row - Yum!

The Capital from the Old Town Waterfront

Old and New in Alexandria. My Inner Architect rears its nerdy head.

Old Town

Air & Space

The Castle Gardens

Old Town

Cupcakes No. 6: CakeLove

The cupcake gods hate me.

I had ridiculously high hopes for CakeLove, most of them stemming from the fact that it is within walking distance of our neighborhood and I enjoyed the thought of gourmet cupcakes whenever the craving struck, but alas, it is not to be. Why? Because they’re terrible, that’s why.

Okay, terrible is way too harsh. It is really hard to make a terrible cupcake, especially when it’s someone’s successful livelihood. (They’ve been around for 10 years, so who am I to judge?) I’ve finished every CakeLove cupcake I’ve ever started, but at $3.35 a pop – unless you get the weekly special, which are usually priced at $2.75 – the grocery store bakery next door starts to look reeeally appetizing.

The chain has six locations in the DC Metro, but I’ve only been to the one near our condo. The employees are always very cheerful – noticeably and wonderfully so – and the interior is clean and bright and modern looking. But outside of the baker’s racks and a plain, ol’ foodservice display case, there is really nothing in the décor to differentiate it from a deli or a coffee shop other than a slew of construction-esque signs that warn you to eat your cake at room temperature. The signs themselves are entertaining, but they seem a little random without a larger scheme to tie in to.

They’re also a bit ironic because CakeLove serves their cupcakes straight out of the refrigerated case. And while I understand the concern for food safety and the trumping power of health inspectors, anyone who thinks I am going to wait 15 minutes for my cupcake to come to ‘room temperature’ has obviously never seen me eat cupcakes before. (Or anything, for that matter. ;) Many of the cupcakeries I’ve visited don’t refrigerate their cupcakes, so I wonder if that is something left up to the reigning health department. Sour Buttercream – what a way to go!

However, in the interest of a fair review, I gave them the benefit of the doubt and tried them both ways, room temp and cold. On my first trip about a month ago, I bought a Raspberry Vanilla cupcake for me and a 44 (As in, the president. I do love the DC humor. ;) for my friend Hannah. The cupcakes sat in the warm car for several hours before we ate them and, while you’d think they’d be all soft and melty, mine tasted like a dry muffin buried in a blob of strangely unmeltable buttercream. Strike one.

Tiramisu (left) and Coffee (right). Afterwards, we went home and drank coffee. Cause that's how we roll...!

Trip number two occurred a few nights ago, when I lured the huz away from his homework with promises of a sugar fix. (Secretly, I’d walked past CakeLove earlier in the day and saw them advertising a Tiramisu cupcake, which I knew I had to try.) Drew ordered a coffee cupcake and we set upon them immediately, fresh and cold from the case, but unfortunately, with the same results as before: a heavy, dry cake with dense, toupee-like frosting. The center of the Tiramisu cupcake had the benefit of being injected with espresso, which softened it up a bit and gave it a lot more flavor, but not enough to save the day. Strike two.

Do I dare give them a third try? Probably. Someday. Perhaps then the Lords of the Cupcakes won’t be quite so cruel. :(

Cupcakery Design - Two out of Five Cupcakes

The Cake - One out of Five Cupcakes

The Frosting - Two out of Five Cupcakes

Tuesday Thrifting No. 4

Yesterday was a banner thrifting day! Not only did I set a four year-old peeping tom along the straight and narrow (by shooing him away from my dressing room and hopefully in the general direction of his MIA mother), but I also found my second piece ever of in-the-wild (as in, not ridiculously overpriced on Etsy) Catherine Holm enamelware: a 2 quart stock pot in better-than-I-could-hope-for condition. Unfortunately, it wasn't in my colors - red, navy, or turquoise - so what did I do with it? Put it in my Etsy store, of course! (It's a dog eat dog world out there, kiddos. I'm saving up for a living room rug, so at least you know it's for a good cause. ;) But for now, it does look nice in my dining room next to my other pieces of avocado green C.H. - a lidless coffee pot, two cereal bowls, and two mini-bowls. Makes me feel all hip inside. :)

A few weeks ago, I also found this NYC Subway map mug, which I had to buy - despite my moratorium on mug purchases - because Drew and I both have a thing for subway maps and it made our Underground mug look not quite so lonely in the cupboard. It has quickly become my second favorite mug, falling short only to my vintage Tayler and Ng "Le Chat" mug - looks like this one, except brown - that my old roommate picked up for free at her church's rummage sale. That one may be impossible to beat. :)

Then there was this Campbell's Soup recipe card box, which came (unopened) with enough Campbell's Soup recipes to keep me cookin' up new stuff long into the fall. (Not that my recipe folder isn't already bursting with recipes to try!) My old recipe box was just a cheap plastic thing from Wal-mart, so this is definitely a fun improvement!

And yes, did you spot that too? My new-to-me sugar canister? After finding the first three canisters all those weeks ago, I Etsy-stalked the missing one - even emailing sellers to see if they'd break up their already incomplete sets - until someone listed it all by its lonesome. And then I splurged. :) I still need to buy a new canning ring for it - anyone know where I can find those? - but seeing the four of them reunited makes me happy. :)

What about you? Any good finds this week? :)

Top 100 Ways You Know You Live In NOVA: No. 99

99. After months of trial and error, you finally figure out how to operate the Metro's farecard machines and manage to pass your knowledge on to at least one desperate tourist every trip.

I am quite proud of this accomplishment. Do you see that machine?! It is just as confusing as it looks, especially if you're just buying a farecard and not a pass. (Oh yes, there is a difference!) Drew did a project in school where they redesigned the machine's interface to make it more user friendly, but I guess no one got the memo. Too busy workin' on the escalators, I suppose!

NTOTD No. 18: Kindle Books

Am I the last person on the boat again? Probably. Nora might be one step behind me, but she lacks the opposable thumbs necessary to operate a touch screen with any sort of grace, so that's probably not a fair expectation. She's not much of a reader anyways.

I don't have a Kindle, but I do have the Kindle app for my iPod. I downloaded it ages ago, intending to read all the free classics available online, but that idea went the way of all my college English books I've yet to Goodwill because I "might want to read them again someday." (Because everyone reads Aristotle on the beach. Duh.) So, like my copies of To the Lighthouse and Crime and Punishment, my sad, empty Kindle app sat on its digital shelf and collected dust.

Until I got a free download of Extremely Load and Incredibly Close and suddenly rediscovered how much I enjoy reading. (Ironically, this joy was stolen from me in college, where quantity is substituted for quality and architecture majors are discouraged from reading any book that isn't 98% black and white photos or written in Italian/French/any other language you cannot read. Am I bitter? Yes.) The floodgates opened and I was young again, the elementary school Book It! Champion, pouring through books faster than I could download them. I actually had to make myself stop downloading one day, otherwise I knew I would never go to sleep! (And yes, I was the Book It! Champion. Just ask Sister V., who had to bear the shame of her precocious sister's name called out on school P.A. system every week. :P)

But outside of making books cheaply accessible (The waiting lists for books at our public library are ridiculously long. Like, if I didn't download The Hunger Games, I'd be waiting till 2020 to read it long.), I really like how the Kindle store completely skips the publishing process and allows authors to get their stories out there without going through the middleman. Granted, this allows a lot of crappy writing into the mainstream, but it also allows some really awesome stuff. My favorite this week? The Wool series by Hugh Howey. I downloaded the first of its five parts on the strength of its reviews - 99 cents isn't going to break anyone's bank, least of all mine - and was instantly hooked. (You can download them all at once and save a couple bucks. If you're into dystopian sci-fi's, I strongly suggest taking that route, unless you want to help the author out a little bit, which is cool too. It's worth it either way.)

I quickly downloaded the next four parts and I read them everywhere - the bathroom, the kitchen, the bus, in bed - all thanks to my Kindle app. I even started reading it to Mr. C last night before we went to bed, which was a mistake. Bedtime stories are supposed to put you to sleep. We ended up reading all of part one and staying up till midnight. And when I looked at the author's website, I found out he's actually releasing Part 6 in a week or so. Egads. Looks like we have lots of late nights reading under the covers in our future!

What about you? Do you have a Kindle or the Kindle app? What's your feeling on the 'real book' vs. 'ebook' debate?

And yes, I am shamelessly breaking my rule about no Apple products in the bedroom. But I'm reading, not Facebook surfing or playing Draw Something. I think that makes it okay.

Happy Easter!

I have very little musical talent outside of the bathroom or the car, but (/confession time) I've always wanted to teach a children's Sunday School class with music drawn solely from R.E.M., Cake, and Guster albums. This is probably precisely why no one's ever let me teach a class of young impressionables, but still - don't tell me R.E.M.'s "Stand" would not make a fantastic, get-up-and-do-the-motions singalong. (Watch the video. I wouldn't even have to choreograph a dance!) And Guster's "Two at a Time" would be the perfect accompaniment to a lesson on Noah, especially since the album version even has a children's choir in the background. (The live Youtube version is a little rough, but Mr. Gardner finds the right note eventually. Promise.) Cake's "Sheep Go To Heaven" might be better for slightly older children, but after watching the music video, I think I might skip that lesson entirely. (Youtube it if you're curious. You'll see what I mean.) Or better yet, just stick with Sunday School Curriculum 101. Obviously, there is a reason I've never made it past herding the 'Waddlers.' Oh well. ;)

But along those lines, Pandora played R.E.M.'s "Talk About the Passion" this morning, a song I'd never heard before but instantly liked. Apparently, it was the band's (unsuccessful) attempt at a "hunger song," but it also seemed appropriate for this Easter weekend. I just watched the movie The Passion for the first time ever Thursday night - I know. I'm way behind the bandwagon. Won't be the first or the last time either, I can assure you. - so the complete agony that accompanied the first Easter is fresh on my mind. (I've seen the Jesus film once or twice and attended a handful of Easter plays, but Mr. Gibson takes the reality of crucifixion to a whole new level.) It's unbelievable, really, what humans are capable of and how there is still a God good enough to even want to save us. Good Friday indeed - talk about the understatement of the millennia.

Happy Easter, all! I hope you have a wonderful weekend full of family, friends, and 'talks about the Passion,' however they may come about. :-*

Top 100 Signs I Married the Right Man No. 79

79. He has cowlicks. Multiple ones. In multiple directions. <3

Priorities

I once overheard a little boy sagely tell a friend "Chewing gum is more important than a shower." A seemingly incongruous statement, but not at a campground where the showers run on coins and are (in)conveniently placed right next to the snack shack. Obviously, Junior had much grander plans for his parent's money.

That said, I think I enjoy eating way too much to ever be a professional writer. (In SAT terms, eating > writing. See? Even the greater than symbol is getting its eats on!) Every now and then, I have a really great blogging run where I post almost every day and I'm like, "Yeah! I could totally do this for a living!" And then life happens and I don't post for weeks and suddenly I'm like, "No! I need my three square a day! I could never do this for a living!"

That said, the past two weeks have been really busy.

First up was my bestie's bridal shower, which was lovely and hitchless, but nerve-wracking in the sense that I've never thrown one before. Thankfully, I had lots of help from the other bridesmaids, E.'s friends, and the most obliging husband ever. (Aka mine. ;) It was a "Display Shower," where everyone brings their gift unwrapped and you skip the whole hours-of-present-unwrapping in lieu of...well, "more time to enjoy each other's company," if I can be so bold as to quote the invitation I wrote. ;) Have you ever been to one before? I know some people were a little wary, but I think it worked out really well! We made a scrapbook of encouragements, wedding advice, and fun memories of E. ahead of time and read it to her and her fiance at the shower. It was a lovely substitute and I don't think anyone missed feigning excitement over cookie sheets or spatulas. :) (My advice? No Apple products in the bedroom!!!)

Post-wedding, that ponytail is getting the chop! Any suggestions?

The day after the shower was my birthday! Drew and I went into D.C. to check out the cherry blossoms, which were supposed to peak that weekend. Unfortunately, the rain got to them before we did - I think the peak was probably more like the Wednesday or Thursday before - and while they were still pretty, the weather was gloomy and cast a bit of a pall over the whole day. (Not being able to find any decent food on the Mall also cast a pall. A big, pouty, "I get cranky when I'm hungry" pall. I told you food was important to me. ;) Eventually, after a sub par and overpriced lunch at the Natural History Museum, we gave up and went home, but not before stopping at Alexandria Cupcake for a birthday treat. That lifted my spirits a bit. :) And as soon as we got home, the sun came out, so the day only improved from then on out.

Hungry, tired, and cold. But mostly hungry. (See all the petals in the water? So sad!)

The day after that, I hopped on the train and went up to Connecticut for a few days - a birthday present courtesy of Mama and Papa V. While Mama and Sister V. have both taken the train to visit us, this was my first time making the trip. And can I just say: It's so much easier than flying! Bathrooms that are larger than my own, wi-fi that works most of the time, enough legroom for a small giraffe - once Amtrak joins the 21st Century and lets me print my tickets online, I will have absolutely no complaints!

Jolly Old New England was wonderful, as always. I got to meet up with a few close friends, hit up all the old hangouts, and didn't cook for four whole days! (Not that I mind cooking, but you know... It's nice to have a break every now and then. ;) There is something very intangible about the Northeast that will always make it home, but it was good to come back to VA and the huz. (And Nibbles, of course, who was sick for a week, but has since recovered from both her illness and the belief that she will get canned cat food anytime she wants. Was it all just an elaborate hunger strike? Perhaps...)

This week has been quiet in that I'm catching up on last week and preparing for next. After this Easter Sunday, we have E.'s wedding, followed by three consecutive weekends of visitors. Oh, and maybe a couple of job interviews, just thrown in for fun. But a real job means real money, so until I've convinced myself writing is more important than my next sandwich (or Nora's next can of Salmon Pate), the craziness shall continue. C'est la vie!