weekend

Last weekend, it was 75 degrees and beautiful. Tim and I went to spend Saturday in D.C.. When we got to Greenbelt, Maryland where we take the metro in, there were a bunch of tea party protesters there clogging up the station unfortunately. But we got there unscathed.

We first went to the National Portrait Gallery. Our favorite part was the gallery of presidents.

Tim's favorite president, Andrew Jackson.

John Kennedy's portrait was definitely the most unique and pretty.

After the art museum, we walked over to Georgetown. It's so beautiful and quaint there! And historic, of course. After walking around the neighborhood and admiring all of the old houses and brick sidewalks, we went down by the waterfront area and sat on the ledge on the river watching the planes flying overhead and enjoying the sun.




After church on Sunday, we played tennis with our friends Greg and Stephen; it was so much fun! Then we watched Cornell beat Wicsonsin, advancing themselves to the Sweet 16. It was a sweet day.

Hopefully Cornell can beat Kentucky tonight. My two uncles who are college basketball fans live in Lexington, KY, so it will be nice to be able to brag to them if Cornell wins.

walk to work

I walked to work today because it was so nice out and because it's now light when I leave at night. I only work about 2 miles from our house, so it's only about a half an hour walk, which is convenient. I hadn't been walking to work previously because it would be dark or near dark out when I got out of work and because it's been cold and snowy.

I enjoy walking to and from work. It makes me feel more a part of the city. Plus, I get to look at all the interesting row houses and people and such.

For example, I walk by the Baltimore Museum of Art, which is very close to our house, and today I noticed that there are flowering trees that have already bloomed! I wouldn't have noticed that if I just drove by.

st. patrick's day craic

Happy St. Patty's Day, everyone.

Tim and I celebrated by eating Indian food.


Yes, that's right; we ate it on our porch because it was so nice outside tonight. Tim actually made the food; it was sort of like chicken masala.

After we ate, we (I) felt guilty about not really celebrating St. Patrick's Day, so we went down to Fells Point, a historic neighborhood on the waterfront, to an Irish pub to listen to some Irish music.

Said pub. Pic via tripadvisor.com

Even though it was so crowded, we got a good spot near the front window which opened up to the harbor.

Tim's Guinness on the windowsill with the water in the background.

As the Irish say, we had loads of craic.

a million miles in a thousand years

I recently read Donald Miller's new book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. It's a great book, as are all of his others. I'll simply leave you with an excerpt that I liked:

"The oldest book of the Bible is supposedly the book of Job. It is a book about suffering, and it reads as though God is saying to the world, Before we get started, there's this one thing I have to tell you. Things are going to get bad.

Job is a good man whom God allows to be destroyed except for his life. God allows Job's family to be taken, along with his wealth and his health. Job calls out to God, asking why God would let this happen.

God does not answer Job's question. It's as though God starts off his message to the world by explaining there are painful realities in life we cannot and will never understand. Instead, he appears to Job in a whirlwind and asks if Job knows who stops the waves on the shore or stores the snow in Wichita every winter. He asks Job who manages the constellations that reel through the night sky.

And that is essentially all God says to Job. God doesn't explain pain philosophically or even list its benefits. God says to Job, Job, I know what I am doing, and this whole thing isn't about you.
Job responds, even before his health and wealth are restored by saying, "All of this is too wonderful for me." Job found contentment and even joy, outside the context of comfort, health or stability. He understood the story was not about him, and he cared more about the story than he did about himself."

Don then talks about an analogy someone once told him:

"He said to me I was a tree in a story about a forest, and that it was arrogant of me to believe any differently. And he told me the story of the forest is better than the story of the tree [...] I sat by the fire until the sun came up;. and asked God to help me understand the story of the forest and what it meant to be a tree in that story."

I too pray we will know what it means to be trees in God's great forest.

plants and ironing

We went to a nursery yesterday to get some plants! We ended up getting some ivy and a zebra plant, which I've never heard of before. We added them to our little corner near our window in the living room where we had our succulents, and we really appreciate the greenery.

Isn't this zebra plant so interesting-looking?

After dinner, I switched out my winter clothes for my spring clothes; I think it may have been the earliest I've done that since I lived in Virginia like 16 years ago. It's supposed to be in the 60s the next couple of days. I also did some ironing, which I never do.



Woohoo.

Opera, Pit Beef, etc.

Opera

Last night, Tim and I went to see the opera Die Fledermaus at the Peabody Institute. Our friend, Stephen, who is currently a grad student studying opera performance at Peabody, was the lead actor/singer, which was pretty neat because I've never known anyone personally who has been in a big production of anything that I've seen. We had never heard him sing before, and it was a big surprise because Stephen has a very big, strong and wonderful voice, even though he's sort of a slight guy. I felt so proud of him. It makes me look forward to when Tim and I have kids who are doing sports or music or art or dance or whatever--it will be fun to watch them perform and feel proud. Anyway, keep your eyes out for Stephen Campbell in the future; he's going to be famous.

pic courtesy of the Baltimore Sun

picture courtesy of my low-quality camera phone

Pit Beef

Tonight, we went to Chaps's Pit Beef here in Baltimore, which was featured on the Food Network show Diners, Drive-ins and Dives. It's a real hole in the wall, but the food is delicious. I ordered their classic pit beef sandwich and Tim had the pit beef/corned beef combo sandwich. I bet my parents would love this place, especially my mom.

Vase

I acquired an antique green glass bottle/jar/vase the other day. Isn't it pretty?

Snowmageddon

Here are some pictures from the huge snow storm last month...

Tim buried under the snow

A car buried under the snow



Charles Street, a major thoroughfare in Baltimore, completely shut down


Dragon made of snow