For this week's column I was going to write about swimming but rather suddenly, sometime after 5:05 a.m., I changed my mind. That's when I woke up to hear a loud rumbling, which sounded something like a helicopter landing on the roof. The whole house shook. I came sharply awake just as the shaking and the noise stopped. I remember falling back asleep, thinking, "Well, whatever that was, it's over now, but I should remember to find out what happened in the morning." A couple of hours later, when I was up for the day, I checked my computer for news and learned that that rumbling had been an earthquake, 3.6 on the Richter scale. A respectable sized earthquake for a part of the world I had previously -- and erroneously -- believed to be earthquake-free.
This wasn't my first experience of an earthquake. I went to college at UC Berkeley in the mid-'70s and I continued to live in the Bay Area for a couple of years afterward. In January of 1977, I was thinking of moving back to DC, but was still mulling over the pros and cons in my mind. Settling for good back on the east coast would mean having to get used to sweltering summers again, plus the occasional threat of a hurricane, and every now and then in wintertime, the odd blizzard. It was in this undecided state of mind that I found myself up in the wee hours of the morning, restless in my little rented bungalow, and so I switched on the TV to see what was on the late movie. It was "For Whom the Bell Tolls," starring Gary Cooper and Ingrid Bergman. There's a scene in that movie where the hero spends the night under the stars with the heroine. In the book, this is the scene where they make love for the first time, and then afterward, the heroine declares: "The earth moved." In the Hollywood version of the story, they just kiss passionately for a minute or so, and that's it. The famous line from the book has been cut; it was just too explicit for 1943 when the movie was made. But it was just at that point in my viewing when I was expecting the line to be said, that the earth actually moved! The TV was shaking on its stand. What timing!
While I started out laughing at the irony of it all, a minute later I was in panic. Cracks were appearing in the walls of the house. The windows were rattling so hard I thought any second there'd be flying glass. I had no idea what I was supposed to do, how to protect myself. All three of my housemates, who were native Californians, were away at the time, and I was alone. What if the house collapsed? Should I run outside? Where do you go when the earth itself is unstable under your feet?
After few more minutes the main quake was over. I later found out that it measured 5.3, and when my housemates returned the next day, they shrugged and agreed with each other that 5.3 is nothing. They'd all experienced far bigger ones than that. One had been in L.A. during the 1971 San Fernando quake, a 6.8. Now that was a real earthquake. I also learned from them that during the shaking I should have been looking for a strong table to hide beneath, or I should have braced myself under a doorway. That's what you should do the next time, they told me, and I remember thinking, "Yeah, well, there isn't going to be a next time." That was it. I had finally made my decision about where I would spend the rest of my life, and it would not be in California. The decision that I'd been unable to make for the past few weeks was made, and I began to prepare for the move back to DC -- where earthquakes never happen.
Now jump ahead 33 years, and it's happened. But I'm dedicated to my hometown, Washington, DC come Snowmaggedon, come hurricane, come floods, come 17-year-locusts, and now earthquakes. Still, you can't stop me from playing the Californian for a moment as I say: "Three point six – that's nothing! I've been in a five point three!"
--------------------------
Published on the Cleveland Park Listserv, July 16, 2010.
Showing posts with label DC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label DC. Show all posts
Friday, July 16, 2010
Friday, May 21, 2010
Wedding Present, Column #2
In last week's column I asked for your help in choosing a wedding present for my cousin and her fiance, who are getting married tomorrow (May 22) in Texas. I listed four choices from their registry but said I'd consider off-registry ideas as well. I thought I'd get 20 or 30 emails in response and would simply report the totals at the end of this week's column, which would mainly be about something else. However, I was surprised to get 58 responses, and more than enough feedback to take up a whole column. Apparently, this is something many of you have strong opinions about! I had no idea it would be such a hot-button topic.
First, to the numerical results:
Coming in first place, with 10 votes, was the Martha Stewart Cutlery Set. (There were also 3 votes that specifically went against this item, or more accurately, against Martha Stewart herself, but I did not deduct any points for negative votes.)
Second, only one vote behind, at 9 votes, was the set of Pilsner beer glasses.
Third, with 8 votes, was money -- that is, cash, a check, or a gift card.
Fourth, with 5 votes, was the toaster oven.
In a tie for fifth place, at 3 votes apiece: the cordless hand vac, versus something else from the couple's registry other than the 4 options I listed. For example, someone said, "Buy them extra dishes from their china pattern. Dishes break. Also, if you want to invite more than 10 dinner guests, it's good to have more than the typical number of plates shown on the registry." Someone else suggested buying more pots and pans than requested, and a third vote went to a collection of practical kitchen things from the registry, such as potholders, dish towels, and small hand utensils.
The total number of votes for sticking to the registry was 38 out of 58, or 65 percent. People like using a registries because you know the couple won't have to return duplicates of anything. "Just give them what they want!" the pro-registry side writes. If it's something they will use everyday, they will think of you every time they use it. They won't re-gift it to someone else or let it sit in a closet until it finally goes off to Goodwill.
Now let me get to the 35 percent of you who hate registries. In a nutshell, registry gifts are: unimaginative, unmemorable, impersonal, and just plain boring. Many of the votes for cash or a check contained some version of this comment: "Why buy them something that they've picked from a registry? Just give them the cash and let them spend it themselves." The argument for gift cards instead of cash is that the couple must actually go out and buy themselves something with the card, but with a check, they might just spend it on their utility bills. You do want them to get themselves something nice, something they'll take pleasure from owning and using in their life together.
Seventeen of you, however, argued that a wedding present should be some special item that the guest chooses for the couple, thoughtfully, lovingly, as a token of your feeling for them, perhaps to become an heirloom to be passed down from generation to generation. Since people took the time to send in their creative ideas, I thought I would list all 17 of them:
- a work of art by a local Cleveland Park artist
- homemade cookbook with old family recipes
- 2 votes for a silver picture frame from Tiffany's
- a ceramic pitcher
- a unique serving dish
- an antique or unique piece of tableware from the Opportunity Shop in Georgetown
- a beautiful wooden cheese board
- a wooden box or bowl
- silver serving pieces
- a set of Wusthof knives (better quality than the Martha Stewart knives, according to Consumer Reports)
- a portable grill
- a picnic basket with nice, reusable plastic ware and a ground cloth
- a weekend stay at a romantic B&B or a dinner for 2 at a fine restaurant
- beer of the month club membership (since we know they drink beer, evidenced by the request for the Pilsner glasses)
- a unique or artistically designed vase or bowl
- a donation to a charity in their name
Some of the messages told charming or instructive stories about wedding presents given or received. Here are three of them:
"We were given a set of ceviche serving bowls, with handles in the shape of porcelain fish. The only trouble is my husband is severely allergic to fish. The bowls really aren't practical for anything else. I think they may have come from a shop that imports handmade goods from Latin America, no chance of returning them. So they sit, never used, on a back shelf in my pantry."
"I remember one gift, an unusual vase. I know my wife's friend took care in picking it out, but it just wasn't our style. But we knew of another couple getting married, and we thought they might like it. Just as my wife was carefully packing it up in bubble wrap to send to them as a wedding present, I noticed that on the underside of the vase, engraved in teeny-tiny lettering, were our names and our wedding date. Yikes! What a mistake that would have been! It's the registry for us from now on."
And here's one that explains why a set of knives might not always be a good choice for a wedding present:
"When my daughter married a man of Chinese descent, a friend gave them a gorgeous antique knife. I thought it was stunning, but my daughter's new in-laws were HORRIFIED. In the Chinese culture, a man and a woman are tied together -- symbolically -- by a red thread. A knife would imply a severing of that thread. The friend is a great person, but the in-laws will never get over this gift!"
Thanks to all who took the time to send me your thoughts, arguments, pet peeves, and deep-seated beliefs on this topic. And now...drumroll, please! The result: I decided to go with the second-choice winner, the Pilsner beer glasses. They look pretty in the registry picture. And when it's hot in Texas (when isn't it?) a cold brew is refreshing, served in chilled glasses. So this morning I went back to the registry, prepared to click and send. What I found was this: "Item Fulfilled." Rats! On to the toaster oven: Fulfilled. The Martha Stewart knives: Fulfilled. Even the hand-vac! And everything else, fulfilled, fulfilled, fulfilled. Lucky couple. But now what? Suddenly I see the virtue in the number three vote getter, the gift certificate. To my mind the most practical one is from Amazon.com. It can be used for anything at all: books (always useful for grad students), electronics, housewares, you name it. Problem solved, and I don't even need to worry about shipping, as the gift simply shows up instantaneously in my cousin's inbox. Just to make sure she doesn't miss it, I'll tuck a copy of the printed order form inside the lovely, handmade wedding card I'm bringing with me to the event.
I'm sure she'll love it.
---------------------
Published on the Cleveland Park Listserv on May 21, 2010.
First, to the numerical results:
Coming in first place, with 10 votes, was the Martha Stewart Cutlery Set. (There were also 3 votes that specifically went against this item, or more accurately, against Martha Stewart herself, but I did not deduct any points for negative votes.)
Second, only one vote behind, at 9 votes, was the set of Pilsner beer glasses.
Third, with 8 votes, was money -- that is, cash, a check, or a gift card.
Fourth, with 5 votes, was the toaster oven.
In a tie for fifth place, at 3 votes apiece: the cordless hand vac, versus something else from the couple's registry other than the 4 options I listed. For example, someone said, "Buy them extra dishes from their china pattern. Dishes break. Also, if you want to invite more than 10 dinner guests, it's good to have more than the typical number of plates shown on the registry." Someone else suggested buying more pots and pans than requested, and a third vote went to a collection of practical kitchen things from the registry, such as potholders, dish towels, and small hand utensils.
The total number of votes for sticking to the registry was 38 out of 58, or 65 percent. People like using a registries because you know the couple won't have to return duplicates of anything. "Just give them what they want!" the pro-registry side writes. If it's something they will use everyday, they will think of you every time they use it. They won't re-gift it to someone else or let it sit in a closet until it finally goes off to Goodwill.
Now let me get to the 35 percent of you who hate registries. In a nutshell, registry gifts are: unimaginative, unmemorable, impersonal, and just plain boring. Many of the votes for cash or a check contained some version of this comment: "Why buy them something that they've picked from a registry? Just give them the cash and let them spend it themselves." The argument for gift cards instead of cash is that the couple must actually go out and buy themselves something with the card, but with a check, they might just spend it on their utility bills. You do want them to get themselves something nice, something they'll take pleasure from owning and using in their life together.
Seventeen of you, however, argued that a wedding present should be some special item that the guest chooses for the couple, thoughtfully, lovingly, as a token of your feeling for them, perhaps to become an heirloom to be passed down from generation to generation. Since people took the time to send in their creative ideas, I thought I would list all 17 of them:
- a work of art by a local Cleveland Park artist
- homemade cookbook with old family recipes
- 2 votes for a silver picture frame from Tiffany's
- a ceramic pitcher
- a unique serving dish
- an antique or unique piece of tableware from the Opportunity Shop in Georgetown
- a beautiful wooden cheese board
- a wooden box or bowl
- silver serving pieces
- a set of Wusthof knives (better quality than the Martha Stewart knives, according to Consumer Reports)
- a portable grill
- a picnic basket with nice, reusable plastic ware and a ground cloth
- a weekend stay at a romantic B&B or a dinner for 2 at a fine restaurant
- beer of the month club membership (since we know they drink beer, evidenced by the request for the Pilsner glasses)
- a unique or artistically designed vase or bowl
- a donation to a charity in their name
Some of the messages told charming or instructive stories about wedding presents given or received. Here are three of them:
"We were given a set of ceviche serving bowls, with handles in the shape of porcelain fish. The only trouble is my husband is severely allergic to fish. The bowls really aren't practical for anything else. I think they may have come from a shop that imports handmade goods from Latin America, no chance of returning them. So they sit, never used, on a back shelf in my pantry."
"I remember one gift, an unusual vase. I know my wife's friend took care in picking it out, but it just wasn't our style. But we knew of another couple getting married, and we thought they might like it. Just as my wife was carefully packing it up in bubble wrap to send to them as a wedding present, I noticed that on the underside of the vase, engraved in teeny-tiny lettering, were our names and our wedding date. Yikes! What a mistake that would have been! It's the registry for us from now on."
And here's one that explains why a set of knives might not always be a good choice for a wedding present:
"When my daughter married a man of Chinese descent, a friend gave them a gorgeous antique knife. I thought it was stunning, but my daughter's new in-laws were HORRIFIED. In the Chinese culture, a man and a woman are tied together -- symbolically -- by a red thread. A knife would imply a severing of that thread. The friend is a great person, but the in-laws will never get over this gift!"
Thanks to all who took the time to send me your thoughts, arguments, pet peeves, and deep-seated beliefs on this topic. And now...drumroll, please! The result: I decided to go with the second-choice winner, the Pilsner beer glasses. They look pretty in the registry picture. And when it's hot in Texas (when isn't it?) a cold brew is refreshing, served in chilled glasses. So this morning I went back to the registry, prepared to click and send. What I found was this: "Item Fulfilled." Rats! On to the toaster oven: Fulfilled. The Martha Stewart knives: Fulfilled. Even the hand-vac! And everything else, fulfilled, fulfilled, fulfilled. Lucky couple. But now what? Suddenly I see the virtue in the number three vote getter, the gift certificate. To my mind the most practical one is from Amazon.com. It can be used for anything at all: books (always useful for grad students), electronics, housewares, you name it. Problem solved, and I don't even need to worry about shipping, as the gift simply shows up instantaneously in my cousin's inbox. Just to make sure she doesn't miss it, I'll tuck a copy of the printed order form inside the lovely, handmade wedding card I'm bringing with me to the event.
I'm sure she'll love it.
---------------------
Published on the Cleveland Park Listserv on May 21, 2010.
Friday, April 23, 2010
You Call That a Bargain?
Like everyone else I love a good deal. But perhaps even more, I hate losing out on the chance to get a good deal when it's offered. So when an email arrived from Air Tran telling me I had enough points for a free flight, I was delighted. Then I read on and immediately had to worry that I'd lose the deal: My points would expire unless I booked a flight within the next 45 days. So now I have to go somewhere. Well, I earned those points by frequent trips to Boston, and I have to go again in a month, so why not make the next flight free? Sounds good, right? But here's the thing: If you book on Air Tran at least a couple of weeks in advance, flights to Boston from BWI are ridiculously cheap, just thirty-nine bucks. Still, a free flight is a free flight, and if I don't book that flight, the points are gone for good. Booking now seems the thing to do. As I'm planning my trip, I realize there's a wrinkle that makes this bargain less than it would appear. Air Tran charges $15 per bag for luggage, and on this particular trip, I need to bring some large items with me, things that are better brought in person than shipped. Which means that I'll pay $30 for the two bags I'll need to check. My $39 free flight will now cost me $30. And that makes the value of my spent points a measly nine bucks! I've blown that much on bad airport coffee and a bagel.
On the other hand, if I reject the deal, I've got to find some other use for the points. I just can't let them fade into nothingness. I take a look at Air Tran's route map. Hey, they fly to Aruba. Maybe the thing to do is to take an impromptu island vacation. Then I start looking up hotels in Aruba. Yes, I can fly to Aruba for free, but it's not gonna be cheap to stay if we pick a nice place. And it does have to be "we," because I'm certainly not going solo. Now the bill is mounting: $368 for additional airfare, plus $312 a night for hotel times four nights, plus dining and cab fare, and airport taxes (not included when you use points for your flights), and we're looking at a bill for over $2,000, easy. All to avoid losing a free flight. Such a bargain, I realize I can't afford.
So it's back to Plan A, use the freebie for the flight to Boston that I'd have to pay for, one way or another. That nine dollar savings isn't looking so bad. However, it is a dollar less than I'm saving on another great offer that I feel I can't pass up, this one from Office Depot. If I spend fifty dollars there by May 15, I get ten dollars off. The trouble is, I earned that ten-dollars-off coupon by buying a ton of office supplies just last week -- enough to last me the rest of the year. I don't even have the storage room to hold any more office stuff. So...if you're with a nonprofit and you have at least fifty bucks worth of office supply shopping that you need to do within the next couple of weeks, drop me a line. I'd rather give away this deal than see it go to waste.
I guess it's my own fault that I keep getting these offers that do me so little good. I get them by signing up for award miles programs with every airline I fly and frequent buyer programs with every store I visit more than once. I should just say no. Here's how it happens that I don't: I'm at World Market in Chevy Chase Pavilion. I am buying some exotic food items, and I happen to see some wines on sale. I pick up a fair number of bottles. Next I see a tea kettle and realize that I've been meaning to replace my old one. Then I notice that World Market carries the hard-to-find brand of decaf tea that I like. By the time I've reached the checkout counter, I have more than a hundred dollars worth of stuff in my cart. But it is all good and useful. No regrets for the purchases. The next thing that happens, the checkout clerk says to me, "If you join our World Market Club, you will instantly get ten percent off this order." It's like being offered a ten dollar bill; why would you say no? So I sign on the dotted line and provide my email address. Now every week, week in and week out, I get an email from World Market with offers. And coupons. It's not the amount of email that bugs me. I have the emails set to go straight into a folder just for these offers. I can look at it at my leisure. It's just that when I do, I see they have me pegged. They know exactly what I want to buy, and they have just the right offers to lure me back to the store. Well, why wouldn't they know? When I signed up, I gave them permission to track my purchases. Now they know more about me than anyone except my mother. Wait, even she doesn't know what brand of decaf tea I prefer. So now, every week, I find that, for example, I can get that strange tea that I like at an incredible price -- if I will just buy enough of it at once to last me till 2012. What to do?
Yes, I know, the right answer is to trash these emails unread. A bargain isn't a bargain if you didn't really need the stuff in the first place. But somehow they've got me convinced that if I don't act, I'm throwing away big savings. It's a head game...and they're ahead. Now it's my move. It's off to Amazon, where I'm such a frequent buyer that I'd never dream of letting my membership in the Amazon Prime Club lapse. (Free shipping on every purchase!) I'm looking for a book to tell me how to spend less and simplify my life. I see I can get a book called Living with Less: The Upside of Downsizing Your Life, by Mark Tabb, for $10.39, rated four and a half stars out of five. But wait, if I buy that book together with two others, Not Buying It: My Year Without Shopping, by Judith Levine, and Give It Up!: My Year of Learning to Live Better with Less, by Mary Carlomagno, I can get three books with a cumulative worth of $41.94 for a total of $27.50 -- a savings of $14.44! And I can have all three the day after tomorrow, no shipping charge, with one click.
My finger is hovering over the mouse click. Is this a bargain or isn't it? Should I click? Or empty my cart? Tune in next week to find out.
--------------------
Correction to my 4/16 column on holidays: Emancipation Day is not, as a public school parent pointed out, a regular school day for kids in DC public schools, and the libraries and rec centers don't stay open, either. So that knocks it down a few pegs on my ranking of good-but-little-known holidays.
---------------------
Published on the Cleveland Park Listserv on April 23, 2010.
Got a local story? Overheard a funny conversation on the Metro? Traveled somewhere that made you wonder why we can't do things as well here as they do there? These and more may be fodder for future columns on All Life Is Local, so by all means, send them my way: (alllifeislocal @ fastmail.net).
On the other hand, if I reject the deal, I've got to find some other use for the points. I just can't let them fade into nothingness. I take a look at Air Tran's route map. Hey, they fly to Aruba. Maybe the thing to do is to take an impromptu island vacation. Then I start looking up hotels in Aruba. Yes, I can fly to Aruba for free, but it's not gonna be cheap to stay if we pick a nice place. And it does have to be "we," because I'm certainly not going solo. Now the bill is mounting: $368 for additional airfare, plus $312 a night for hotel times four nights, plus dining and cab fare, and airport taxes (not included when you use points for your flights), and we're looking at a bill for over $2,000, easy. All to avoid losing a free flight. Such a bargain, I realize I can't afford.
So it's back to Plan A, use the freebie for the flight to Boston that I'd have to pay for, one way or another. That nine dollar savings isn't looking so bad. However, it is a dollar less than I'm saving on another great offer that I feel I can't pass up, this one from Office Depot. If I spend fifty dollars there by May 15, I get ten dollars off. The trouble is, I earned that ten-dollars-off coupon by buying a ton of office supplies just last week -- enough to last me the rest of the year. I don't even have the storage room to hold any more office stuff. So...if you're with a nonprofit and you have at least fifty bucks worth of office supply shopping that you need to do within the next couple of weeks, drop me a line. I'd rather give away this deal than see it go to waste.
I guess it's my own fault that I keep getting these offers that do me so little good. I get them by signing up for award miles programs with every airline I fly and frequent buyer programs with every store I visit more than once. I should just say no. Here's how it happens that I don't: I'm at World Market in Chevy Chase Pavilion. I am buying some exotic food items, and I happen to see some wines on sale. I pick up a fair number of bottles. Next I see a tea kettle and realize that I've been meaning to replace my old one. Then I notice that World Market carries the hard-to-find brand of decaf tea that I like. By the time I've reached the checkout counter, I have more than a hundred dollars worth of stuff in my cart. But it is all good and useful. No regrets for the purchases. The next thing that happens, the checkout clerk says to me, "If you join our World Market Club, you will instantly get ten percent off this order." It's like being offered a ten dollar bill; why would you say no? So I sign on the dotted line and provide my email address. Now every week, week in and week out, I get an email from World Market with offers. And coupons. It's not the amount of email that bugs me. I have the emails set to go straight into a folder just for these offers. I can look at it at my leisure. It's just that when I do, I see they have me pegged. They know exactly what I want to buy, and they have just the right offers to lure me back to the store. Well, why wouldn't they know? When I signed up, I gave them permission to track my purchases. Now they know more about me than anyone except my mother. Wait, even she doesn't know what brand of decaf tea I prefer. So now, every week, I find that, for example, I can get that strange tea that I like at an incredible price -- if I will just buy enough of it at once to last me till 2012. What to do?
Yes, I know, the right answer is to trash these emails unread. A bargain isn't a bargain if you didn't really need the stuff in the first place. But somehow they've got me convinced that if I don't act, I'm throwing away big savings. It's a head game...and they're ahead. Now it's my move. It's off to Amazon, where I'm such a frequent buyer that I'd never dream of letting my membership in the Amazon Prime Club lapse. (Free shipping on every purchase!) I'm looking for a book to tell me how to spend less and simplify my life. I see I can get a book called Living with Less: The Upside of Downsizing Your Life, by Mark Tabb, for $10.39, rated four and a half stars out of five. But wait, if I buy that book together with two others, Not Buying It: My Year Without Shopping, by Judith Levine, and Give It Up!: My Year of Learning to Live Better with Less, by Mary Carlomagno, I can get three books with a cumulative worth of $41.94 for a total of $27.50 -- a savings of $14.44! And I can have all three the day after tomorrow, no shipping charge, with one click.
My finger is hovering over the mouse click. Is this a bargain or isn't it? Should I click? Or empty my cart? Tune in next week to find out.
--------------------
Correction to my 4/16 column on holidays: Emancipation Day is not, as a public school parent pointed out, a regular school day for kids in DC public schools, and the libraries and rec centers don't stay open, either. So that knocks it down a few pegs on my ranking of good-but-little-known holidays.
---------------------
Published on the Cleveland Park Listserv on April 23, 2010.
Got a local story? Overheard a funny conversation on the Metro? Traveled somewhere that made you wonder why we can't do things as well here as they do there? These and more may be fodder for future columns on All Life Is Local, so by all means, send them my way: (alllifeislocal @ fastmail.net).
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