Virginia Hardware, before it became an authentic Irish Pub     I was sitting on the sidewalk with the Judge. He is in town to move some more stuff, since it looks like his house will actually close, and he will be free of Northern Virginia once and for all. It makes me sad, since […]

I got back from Cap City Brewery just in time for the first peal of thunder last night. I came around the corner from the elevators and looked cautiously down the corridor. My vigilance naturally has been heightened since the skirmishing began with the idiot who lives on the seventh floor.   I have no […]

’57 Chevy Birthday Cake I am a little queasy this morning. I have to be in early to talk about the vagaries of the business world. Nothing unusual about that. Happens to everyone.   The Chairman of he Fed has the same job. Unemployment is up, but Ben Bernanke had to go in front of […]

  We knew it was going to be a Code Red day- dangerous for the elderly and the very young. A glance out the window indicated that it was going to be shaping up as a competitive one for prime sunning by the pool.   Cindy, the new gal from the Sixth Floor, was out […]

  When the flashes come in the sky and there is no sound to go with them, we used to shrug and call it “heat lightning.” Growing up in Michigan, the thunderstorms would roll in from the Big Lakes, and it was not uncommon to have the night sky light up, silent as the winter […]

Grand Plaza of the Building Museum, Washington, DC   It has been a hell of a week. The claws of the storm raked the trees of leafy Arlington, and behind the rake comes the air from the Gulf, and the first heat warning of the year. One Hundred and Five today, they say breathlessly, fiery […]

Big Ugly Fat Fellow* (BUFF) with Air-launched Cruise Missiles   I don’t think the term “D-Day” meant anything specific. “D” probably just meant the notional day you were going to do something, a point of reference for planning. In the case of June 6, 1944, the decision was about hopping the Channel and invading Europe […]

Woman Watches Clinton Staff Depart the Virginia National Headquarters 04 June 2008- photo Vic Socotra   The Wings won the cup last night- but I did not know it until this morning. We lost power at three-thirty when the first of the big thunder-bumpers came roaring through. The sudden ferocity pummeled the sides of the […]

Senator Obama at Wesleyan University (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)   Thank God it is over. We have been dragged all over the United States in every one of its manifestations, Lower 48, Alaska, Hawaii, state, commonwealth and territory. Yesterday the valiant voters of Montana and North Dakota trudged to the polls, produced a split decision, and ended it.   […]

Master-Chief-Doctor-Senator the Hon. John Tower   If you like hockey, the news was good, since this was good hockey. The Red Wings put 58 shots against Marc-Andre Fleury in the crease, and came up with only three goals. I was on my feet with thirty seconds to go in regulation, Wings up by one, when […]