Williamsport Transportation

Since transportation is one of his favorite things, Francisco and I explored Williamsport for a day through the lens of transportation. We started at the Peter Herdic Transportation Museum. Despite having spent my entire childhood in Williamsport, I had never so much as heard of the Transportation Museum. The museum is small and quiet (the woman at the desk had to turn the lights on for us). There are a lot of interesting pictures, but too few exhibits at the museum; the highlight is one of two remaining 1949 Pennsylvania Pullman Parlor cars, which you can walk through. Talk about traveling in style!

The museum is named for Peter Herdic, who invented and patented a horse-drawn cab, which was a mix between a carriage and a streetcar. There were maps of the many methods of transportation used in Pennsylvania's history, from Indian paths to canals to railroads to highways. There were also pictures of significant moments in Pennsylvania transportation, including the Liberty Bell's stop in Williamsport on a railroad tour, and the stop of President McKinley's body on its way back to DC after his assassination.

After the Transportation Museum we headed to the Hiawatha, Williamsport's paddleboat, for a little cruise down the Susquehanna. Sadly, I realized that the paddles don't actually drive the boat--they're just there for show. Per usual, Francisco's and my entertainment choices put us amidst people who aren't in an age bracket anywhere near ours: the Hiawatha was full of grandparents with their grandchildren.

We finished the day with something else unique (as far as I can tell) to Williamsport, something always worth coming home for (although not especially transportation-related): peanut donuts and peanut butter cup donuts at Dunkin Donuts. According to Diana's husband (I guess we should call him Fred), Dunkin Donuts doesn't typically sell peanut donuts so that it can serve people with peanut allergies. However, in Williamsport it does. And they're the best. Sequins, you probably need to come visit and try them!

A Random Assortment

~ Jeremy Waldron, in his inaugural lecture as Chichele Professor of Social & Political Theory at Oxford, refers to The Wire, in order to explain John Stuart Mill:

"Those of you who know the HBO TV series The Wire, may remember the
episode at the beginning of Series 3, where the drug lord Stringer Bell introduces
parliamentary procedure, Robert’s Rules of Order, to try to make meetings of his
lieutenants and his drug dealers more orderly and more productive—yielding a
wonderful array of quotes like “Motherfucka’s got the floor” and “Chair ain’t
recognize yo’ ass.” It’s not exactly John Stuart Mill; it is exactly what I’m talking
about."

~ I'm dying to hear Elliot Carter's Three Explorations, which sets lines from TSE's Four Quartets to music (it premiered the day after Carter's 103rd birthday!). Speaking of setting TSE to music, Hopkins sent me this piece on T.S. Eliot and pop music.

~ Hopkins also turned me on to Moby's Los Angeles architecture blog. I don't really know who Moby is, aside from famous, but his blog is great! At first I was really turned off by his writing, since he doesn't capitalize and is very informal. But this is such a gem that I think I'm sold on his writing:

"‘fire escape’ is such a literal term.
what if spoons were called ‘food diggers’.
and windows were ‘house holes’.
‘fire escape’ was probably named by the person who named the orange and the fly."

~ PAL on political theorist Roger Boesche, who taught Obama.

Memorial Day: Cousins

Boy, people on facebook are very particular about precisely what can and cannot be celebrated on Memorial Day--I guess Memorial Day is for soldiers who have died or been taken prisoner in a war, while Veteran's Day is for soldiers who have fought in a war.

Anyway, I hope it's also acceptable to celebrate family on Memorial Day weekend, because that's what I usually end up doing. And fortunately family includes lots of babies. Honestly, that's what's stuck out to me most so far about being home: During the rest of my life I'm mostly thinking about myself and my work and my school, but when I'm in Williamsport, the focus is on little kids and older relatives--being born and growing old. Well, and everything in between.

Speaking of the important stuff in between: Congrats to Frankincense and Mr. Frankincense on their wedding yesterday! And Mr. Frankincense is an officer in the military, so what an appropriate weekend to get married!

Omaha

During a recent quick trip to Nebraska, I got to spend a bit of time in Omaha's Old Market neighborhood, which is a charming conglomeration of restaurants and shops in old warehouses, joined by cobblestone streets.

I ran into sort of a lot of very weird stuff in Omaha: 1) Ted and Wally's orange coffee spice ice cream. Which was incredibly delicious, although counter-intuitive.
 

2) A real-live Cinderella carriage--I mean wrought iron and round and transparent, lined with lights. You need a ball gown to ride in that thing! (Or to be a bunch of teenage girls.)

3) An old man on a harmonica and a young man on a guitar. I'm not sure if they just picked up playing together impromptu-ly, but it was an odd pairing.

4) This one was not weird at all, actually: There was a man in a cowboy hat and boots sitting on a bench, strumming his guitar, looking like he was the most natural thing in the world. I mean, he just looked like everywhere he went he must take his guitar with him and play beautifully.

5. This statue of liberty looking out an apartment window (below).



Omaha was incredibly laid back--it made me feel like I must have become a big city girl somewhere in the last five years. I felt like everyone was moving too slowly and talking too much.

Philly, Again

I love the top of this skyscraper.

And the disjunction between this building and the mural on its side.

Bartram's Garden Or Philly, Again

This weekend I visited Bartram's Garden and his house. John Bartram, an early American naturalist, rebuilt an existing house in the 1760's or 70s--it's fascinating and odd, with hand-carved decoration and three stone pillars.

Below one window, Bartram carved a neat Puritan rhyme: "It is God alone, Almighty Lord / The Holy One by me adord / John Bartram 1770."

Above a window on the original house, he engraved, "John Ann Bartram 1731."

Bartram supplied seed to George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, among others. The gardens were overgrown, but it was obvious that it held a lot of exotic plants in his day; you can still see there the oldest gingko in North America.

We discovered an old cider press carved out of a gigantic rock down by the river. A wheel used to sit in the groove and mash the apples.

Philadelphia, Again

The Provident Mutual Life Insurance Building was built in 1926 and now sits in West Philly, largely abandoned (the windows on the first floor are boarded up). So I was thrilled to hear that the Philadelphia Police Department plans to move into the building. It's hard to believe that this grand building was originally built to be the headquarters for a life insurance company.

This door is from a house in the Fairmount neighborhood of Philly. 

I have no pictures, but I also want to tell you about Victor's Cafe, an Italian restaurant in the heart of South Philly, which is to say, the farthest south I've been in Philadelphia. Victor's Cafe features waiters and waitresses who double as opera singers and perform during dinner. We were treated to two up-close arias--it was really thrilling. And the food was delicious--this was, embarrassingly, the first time I've eaten Italian food in Philadelphia, and, goodness, I loved the ravioli. In addition to the opera singers, the ambiance of the restaurant is charming--there are intricately patterned tin ceilings, walls papered with framed pictures of opera singers, and Tiffany-style lamps.

Philadelphia

One of the many things that I'm going to miss about Philadelphia is how many gorgeous Catholic churches are around every corner, such as the church half a mile down the road from my house.

And the seminary down the road. The chapel's Italianate facade is lovely; unfortunately, the inside was renovated in the 70s.

Mildly Proud

I'm going to a baby shower this weekend, and am leaving Philly shortly after. I don't own a scrap of wrapping paper here (and don't really want to buy some and cart it around), so I had to make do with what I could find in the house--namely, some tissue paper and some colored doilies (I love doilies!). I'm not that crafty of a person, but what is it they say?: Necessity is the mother of invention.

(Of course, one of the gifts is my favorite children's book: Roxaboxen.)

Estia

I enjoyed dinner last night at Estia, one of Philly's many fine restaurants. The meal was enormous and delicious and had wonderfully personal touches.

We ordered so many appetizers that we weren't sure if we'd be hungry when our entrees arrived. The best appetizer was some eggplant and zucchini chips with dip, presented in a fancy tower-pile. I asked the man to my left what he thought they were and he guessed that they were homemade potato chips, which of course they were in a way. Although he seemed surprised and disappointed to discover that they were made out of vegetables. The wine was excellent, but I'm sure that's because we had a vintner and a sommelier in our group.

We prayed before eating our entrees and the head server at our table was thrilled. He rolled up his sleeve, shoved his hairy arm in our faces, and said, "Look, you gave me goosebumps." I'm pretty sure this lead to the desserts on the house at the end. My meal was Chilean sea bass, surrounded by vegetables. The man to my left pointed out, with the help of his smart phone, that the real name of Chilean sea bass is Patagonian toothfish. I can see why they changed the name for the menu. Estia prides itself on super fresh fish. (The whole fish, which I was too scared to try, are cooked with only olive oil and lemon. I've eaten whole fish before, but I don't prefer to deal with the skin and the bones and the staring-the previously live thing in the face.)

The desserts were incredible--our waiter brought us several platters full. The baklava was incredible, as was a house dessert with custard and cream layers on top of shredded phylo, which reminded me of shredded wheat. And there was yogurt topped with wild cherries from an island off the coast of Greece. All in all, the meal and the company were delightful--I sat by one man who is a lobbyist intricately involved recently with Vanderbuilt v. the Tennessee legislature, a fascinating and complex issue. And another who explained fundraising to me--that's one job that I can't imagine ever doing: the problem is, when I don't like someone, it doesn't matter how much money he or she has.

Francisco

Since I'm in the being-thankful mood, I think I'd better say something about Francisco. I arrived into town some time ago to see a little Emily-shrine of all of my favorite things: Reese's Pieces (which I guess I pronounce wrong--I always say Reeses [with two long e's] and make "Pieces" rhyme with that; of course, with the number of them that I've eaten in my life, I think I should have naming rights), bread, and flowers. The boy is sure generous and thoughtful.

(I photoshopped the words off the card--I figure not everything in my life needs to be wide open for the whole internet to see. But they were nice words: the boy's not a writer for nothin'.)

I feel like the richest girl in the world when I wake up to flowers in my big, curved window.

Chanticleer.2 and Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to Mama Leopard. Here are some flowers for you, since I'm not there to give them to you in person.

I realized the other day that it's still, after all these years, my mother who I want to talk to when I have to make a confusing decision or when things aren't going the way I'd like. She's always happy to talk when I call.

I mean, Mama Leopard tells it how it is (for instance the first thing she usually tells me when I come home is that I need to get a hair cut), but once you convince her that humankind can only bear so much reality, she says lots of encouraging things.

Thanks for putting up with loads of nonsense from me from when I was little until probably now (I just can't tell it's nonsense yet)--from the fights we had when I was 6 over what I was going to wear to school each day to you chasing me across the house to try to peroxide my ears (I won that one). I miss following you around the house, talking your ear off. Happy Mother's Day!

Chanticleer

Yesterday, to ease the stress of the semester ending, Cardigan and I took a walk in Chanticleer, a garden outside of Philadelphia. It was lovely and peaceful and overflowing with things I'd never seen, like red and hot pink clover (red and pink on the same clover flower!). It was perfectly relaxing, except for one truly horrid brand new modernist bridge (no picture here).

Cardigan was pretending to feed the enormous goldfish. She fooled them. They were so aggressive that I envisioned them growing legs and walking up on dry land to take any food we had on us (we didn't have any). They were like brightly colored sharks swarming around.

Chanticleer has an accompanying "ruin," specially built. It was the newest, spiffiest ruin I've ever seen. It was funny to see a ruin so carefully kept up--the decay was all on purpose. Honestly: a staff person at Chanticleer explained that some regulation prevented them from ruining the house already on the property, so they had to tear it entirely down and then build a new ruin from scratch.

Even the way out is beautiful: there is a large open field across the road from Chanticleer.

St. Francis de Sales

The scaffolding at the church that I attend in Philadelphia when I'm staying with Sayers and Mr. Sayers is decorated with a wreath. I'm not sure about the whole story, but over the 3ish years that I've visited this church, the scaffolding has been a permanent fixture. It seems that the church needs substantial repairs that it cannot afford. It's very sad: it is an enormous Orthodox-influenced building (wikipedia says Byzantine Revival Style) with lovely stained glass windows and mosaics. However, it is sparsely attended, and the neighborhood is not wealthy. The church even has to rent the scaffolding, which costs tens of thousands of dollars a year (it would be more than a hundred thousand to even purchase the scaffolding).

Twitter

Overwhelmed.

My New Pin-Up Boy

Due to this unfortunate event (above), which has taken me a year to adjust to, I decided it's time for me to find a new pin-up boy.

Who better to choose than the male lead from my new favorite tv show? (Thanks for the recommendation, Myrrh!) (My other favorite tv show is Parks and Recreation, and I just don't find Ben to be that attractive, neither in personality nor in looks.) Jake's scruffy (a requirement), with a silly half-goatee. And I like his personality on New Girl: frugal to a fault, handy at fixing things, and adorably awkward and shy. And that voice--scratchy and slightly high pitched. Too cute.

Plus, I like a boy who plays around with his facial hair (what else is it there for but to shock people?). (Given the things I like in a man, maybe you should be a little worried if I like you?)

On Friendship

 I've been busier than ever this year, and particularly the last few months, which means less socializing and almost no traveling. However, I have gotten to catch up with two old friends in the last couple of weeks, Percy and Elizabeth Bennett. I introduced Percy to scrapple at Bob and Edith's late into the night (which is evidently the only time you can get a table there), just like old times, when we used to be friends with our waiter at IHOP and have our own table there.

I showed Elizabeth Bennett a little bit of Philadelphia (not nearly as much as I wished, since it was in the middle of the week and I had to work). But we added to the list of cities we've seen together, which ranges from Boston to Vienna to Budapest to Bratislava. She's one of my favorite traveling partners, mostly because I think that even if we spent twenty-four hours a day together for many years, we still wouldn't run out of things to say.

This is the main reason that I hate change--because although there are always new, delightful friends to make, when I'm away from the old ones my heart hurts pretty bad. That sounds like a cliche, but I mean that literally, it aches in my chest. Well, thank goodness for letters.

Outrage!

This is almost certainly only a gigantic inside joke (sorry!), but yesterday we had delightful brunch to send Fr. OP off on his first assignment as a priest. This story came up ("Rescued Elephant Herds Inexplicably Gather to Mourn South Africa's Elephant Whisperer"):

“A good man died suddenly,” says Rabbi Leila Gal Berner, Ph.D., “and from miles and miles away, two herds of elephants, sensing that they had lost a beloved human friend, moved in a solemn, almost ‘funereal’ procession to make a call on the bereaved family at the deceased man’s home.”

“If there ever were a time, when we can truly sense the wondrous ‘interconnectedness of all beings,’ it is when we reflect on the elephants of Thula Thula. A man’s heart’s stops, and hundreds of elephants’ hearts are grieving. This man’s oh-so-abundantly loving heart offered healing to these elephants, and now, they came to pay loving homage to their friend.”

It turns out that Little Giddingites really enjoy making fun of their guests, especially to their face. As you may imagine, we made a good bit of fun of that story, among other things.

Fr. OP graced us with "My Old Kentucky Home" on the guitar (since we were almost half Kentuckians) and with his valiant efforts at learning to play the flute. We learned a bit about horse racing, and commemorated the first anniversary of the Royal Wedding. And ate Stearns' strata, one of my favorite foods. I taught everyone about the problems with windmills, of which there are many, and I learned a bit from the others about outer space (it's a vacuum! How does that even work?!). Then we took a while and expressed our outrage at all of the things that bother us. How wonderful it is to just fuss about all of the random things that bother you! Sort of like blogging.

So I'll add another one here (HT: Francisco): The crunchy con who made a big deal out of moving to Louisiana so he could sit on the front porch is now moving to France. I have no problem with moving to France, only with doing it after talking about how crunchy you are for moving to Louisiana. This is, once again, why I love Wendell Berry--he really sticks.

TV

I try not to admit to the terrible television I watch on this blog, but what the heck, it's an anonymous blog anyway:

So Suburgatory is not that bad, despite its terrible name and its all around oddness. Maybe I like it because it's wacked out like Pushing Daisies. I don't know. But this last episode mentioned Fellini and The Potting Shed. Not sure if the potting shed reference was intentional or not (I guess probably not--I tend to see connections that don't exist), but "all the family secrets are in the potting shed" just seemed to be too real and dramatic not to be connected to Graham Greene. And it's a great moment when the woman doing Tess's nails says dismissively that she doesn't like Fellini because he's “too quirky for the sake of being quirky.”

A Random Assortment

~ I have always worried about the problems that will probably follow wind farms ("Wind can cause climate change"). I'm sure wind farms are still better sources of energy, but the thing is, we just have the idea that the solution to energy problems never need involve conservation, when conservation is precisely the point.

~ A new Obama biography deals with some of his early relationships. It includes this excerpt from a letter to a girlfriend in which he reflects on T.S. Eliot:

"I haven’t read “The Waste Land” for a year, and I never did bother to check all the footnotes. But I will hazard these statements—Eliot contains the same ecstatic vision which runs from Münzer to Yeats. However, he retains a grounding in the social reality/order of his time. Facing what he perceives as a choice between ecstatic chaos and lifeless mechanistic order, he accedes to maintaining a separation of asexual purity and brutal sexual reality. And he wears a stoical face before this. Read his essay on Tradition and the Individual Talent, as well as Four Quartets, when he’s less concerned with depicting moribund Europe, to catch a sense of what I speak. Remember how I said there’s a certain kind of conservatism which I respect more than bourgeois liberalism—Eliot is of this type. Of course, the dichotomy he maintains is reactionary, but it’s due to a deep fatalism, not ignorance. (Counter him with Yeats or Pound, who, arising from the same milieu, opted to support Hitler and Mussolini.) And this fatalism is born out of the relation between fertility and death, which I touched on in my last letter—life feeds on itself. A fatalism I share with the western tradition at times. You seem surprised at Eliot’s irreconcilable ambivalence; don’t you share this ambivalence yourself, Alex?"

~ Flannery O'Connor's cartoons.

~ Nick at the Phillies! All my friends were at the Phillies game that night--now I wish I had been there, too! I love New Girl, and I can't wait for Jess and Nick to get together.

~ I love theater marquees. 

~ George Will writes a touching column about his son, Jon, who has Down Syndrome, and baseball.