173-193/365: The First Three Weeks of Summer

I’ve once again gotten a bit behind with posting my Project 365 photos — three weeks behind, to be specific. Loading 21 individual photos into the blog is fairly time consuming, so I decided to make a slideshow instead, which (surprisingly enough) is a ton faster. Enjoy!

“A Right Inestimable”

On my way to the airport yesterday, I happened to hear NPR’s “Morning Edition” team do their annual dramatic reading of the Declaration of Independence. At the risk of sounding hopelessly corny, this part kinda makes me mist up a little:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

It’s the most famous bit, of course, and Thomas Jefferson at his most stirring. I’ll admit that I usually zone out during the list of grievances part, but cruising up the BW Parkway allowed me time to listen. One particular item caught my attention:

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

And yet, 233 years later, the residents of the capital city of the nation formed by this declaration still have no representation, which is — to emphasize Jefferson’s words — “formidable to tyrants only.

Now, I don’t consider our goverment to be tyrants. Idiots, sometimes, to be sure, and misguided on occasion, but not tyrants. So, if you have a moment on this Independence Day, take a moment to remind your Representatives and Senators that there are 500,000 residents of the District of Columbia who are still waiting for “a right inestimable to [us].”

Visit www.dcvote.org for more information.

Oh, and Happy Independence Day!

137-151/365: Two Weeks Worth

I wrote a whole intro for this post on the Metro this morning (had plenty of time because of delays) and for some reason the damn WordPress for iPhone app ate it. It’s been such a long time since a post has vanished this way I had forgotten about this particular bug. I’m at work now and don’t have time to re-create it, alas, so I’ll just note the important items:

• I will now be posting my Project 365 photos on Mondays.
• Three Beautiful Things will move to either Tuesdays or Wednesdays. Not sure which yet.

Sorry there are so many pictures here. I’ll try to not get behind again.

May 18: The most bizarre cake I've ever seen made it's way into the kitchen next to my office.

May 19: One of my favorite buildings in my neighborhood is the Grace Church Condos, which is exactly what it sounds like - a former church converted into homes. It's a beautiful building, and seems to be a great community as well... the residents are always outside hanging out grilling or playing with their dogs.

May 20: I needed to take some pictures of my kitchen for a post for the work blog, and they ended up being the only ones I took, so - without meaning to - I killed two birds with one stone.