weekend

We missed out on the really nice fall colors when the weather was still nice, but this weekend Kirsten and I did manage to sneak in a short walk in the woods of Rock Creek Park before the truly freezing temperatures arrived (there were actual snowflakes in the air today, although none of them survived the trip to the ground). Rock Creek remains one of my favorite things about the city - there's something soul-cleansing about being able to travel less than a mile from our house and end up on a trail in the forest without visible signs of being in the heart of the city. It's a shame we haven't taken advantage of the park's picnic areas, which include fire pits - a barbecue must be on the agenda for the spring.

We had grand ideas about hitting up some culture this weekend (it's been a while since I just spent a day wandering the museums) but instead we defaulted to crass commercialism when we heard National Geographic was holding a warehouse sale. Basically, cheap books piled up by the pallet load. Not a good idea to put me in the middle of a book sale for science, history and nature books but I managed to have enough self-discipline to keep the tab relatively low (at $10 a book - the big ones - not too bad).

It was a National Geographic-themed day, as our next stop was the NG museum downtown. Te Papa (New Zealand's national museum, and a frequent stop for my Wellington wanderings, as well as the venue for one of my many temp jobs down there) was holding a traveling exhibition on whales in conjunction with NatGeo. In keeping with NZ official policy, all the exhibits had Maori translations - a nice way to send my mind traveling back to the islands.

We also had big plans to hit up a few galleries participating in FotoWeek, although those were sacrificed to time issues. Maybe before the week is out.