Hydrangea

These hydrangea bushes are in the Bethesda, MD, garden of friends, and they’re just a small part of the wonderful expanse of blooming bushes that my friends cultivate. For bright blue blossoms, the soil must be kept acidic.

And it isn’t even August

In true Washington fashion, we went from spring to summer almost overnight. It was 90 deg. F/32 deg. C today—and the air conditioning wasn’t working (or maybe hasn’t been switched on) in the building where I work. If it’s equally hot tomorrow, at least I can cool off by looking at this photograph!

David and Goliath

Honest-to-goodness hardware stores aren’t that easy to find around here. Many have been put out of business by the chains of huge stores like Home Depot and Lowes that carry more inventory at lower prices—but where you have to roam around before you can find someone (if you’re lucky) to help you and when you do, the person most likely can’t answer your questions. I’d rather pay a bit more in a shop like this one, where the owners are always on hand and take an interest in their customers, and where I can often find just the item I need when the mega-stores don’t carry it.

If you go out in the woods today

You’re sure of a big surprise, but it won’t be a bunch of teddy bears having a picnic. Wander the woodland trails at Adkins Arboretum in Ridgely, MD, between June and August, and every so often you’ll come upon an unexpected piece of sculpture. It’s the Arboretum’s 2006 Outdoor Sculpture Invitational entitled Artists in Dialogue with Landscape. Some of the artists were installing their works today. I found this piece—a mature woman’s head on a naked child’s body—very disturbing.

The Surgeon General warns …

Delicious? Hardly the adjective I would have applied to sucking carcinogens into your lungs. Much more appropriate for a Krispy Kreme doughnut.

Krispy Kreme

The Krispy Kreme Doughnut shop on Richmond Highway in Alexandria is a landmark. Stand at the side of the building and look through the window into the bakery, and you can watch the legions of doughnuts marching along the conveyer belts from one process to the next, finally flipping over and passing through a curtain of white frosting. Even if you’re nowhere near a Krispy Kreme store, you can still see the process here. Choose the link that says “Our Doughnut Theater.”

The time to visit Krispy Kreme is when the “Hot” sign outside is lit. That tells you freshly baked, warm doughnuts are coming out of the bakery into the shop. They are terrible for you, nothing but sugar and fat—and they are irresistible!

I should add that, alas, it doesn’t look like this any longer. I took this photograph around 15 or 20 years ago, and sometime fairly recently, the old building was pulled down and a new, improved (and featureless) KK coffee and doughnut shop has gone up in its place. The doughnuts are still wonderful, though.

Roadside memorial

These little roadside memorials to victims of traffic accidents are usually transitory. The flags and flowers and other items blow away or are carried off by animals; what doesn’t disappear gets weatherbeaten, and eventually road-cleaning crews remove the remains. This one—which is on my drive home—is different. Since I first noticed it a couple of years ago, it has become more elaborate, and when I got out of my car to look at it yesterday, I could see that it is tended regularly. The silk flowers are fresh, two little ceramic dogs nestle among the flowers, and at either end is a small solar-powered lantern. I find it heartening that these things are not stolen.

Red, white, and blue

A patriotic house in Old Town Alexandria.

Honeysuckle

I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,
Quite overcanopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine:
There sleeps Titania sometime of the night,
Lulled in these flowers with dances and delight.

Midsummer Night’s Dream

Eglantine is the poetic name for both briar rose and honeysuckle. The latter is in bloom now in the Washington area, where it’s classified as an invasive, undesirable weed. This I choose to forget when I walk by a hedgerow and breathe its delicately intoxicating perfume.

Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts

In 1958, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed legislation creating a National Cultural Center, which was to be privately funded and self-sustaining. Fundraising began immediately. During his tenure, President Kennedy, a strong supporter of the arts, was prominent in fundraising, and two months after his assassination in November 1963, Congress designated the National Cultural Center as a “living memorial” to the late president and renamed it the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Ground was broken in 1965, and the Kennedy Center opened to the public in 1971.

Leading off the Grand Foyer, pictured above, are the Concert Hall (the home of the National Symphony Orchestra), the Opera House, and the Eisenhower Theater. Halfway down the foyer on the right, opposite the entrance to the Concert Hall, is an 8-foot bronze bust of President Kennedy, the work of American sculptor Robert Berks.