The dog park that we take Bowser to (17th, S, and New Hampshire) has been reopened for awhile now after it was renovated at the beginning of the year. For the longest time, I thought that this sign at the corner of the park was accompanying these renovations. And I thought it was a little ridiculous because it’s a huge announcement just for a dog park. Don’t get me wrong, it’s nice to know what the ‘Recovery and Reinvestment Act’ is paying for, but maybe put more money into the thing itself instead of enormous temporary signage. However, I walked closer to it the other day, and it’s actually there to indicate the re-paving of 17th Street. The project will resurface the street from New Hampshire Ave to Massachusetts Ave and improve pedestrian spaces to the tune of $8.20M.
Tomorrow Clark is scheduled to take down the last remaining tower crane from Constitution Square. We had five swinging around for most of the project. I had always intended to climb up to the top (150 feet above terra firma) but had not gotten around to pulling the trigger. As the window of opportunity closed I jumped at the chance to give it a go this morning. The picture above is my view from the bottom level of the garage looking up on my 180′ vertical climb.
Very happy I got around to doing it. The views of the city are phenomenal and it was a good “check of the life list”.
Spent a while up top talking Paul, the crane operator. He is from the Caymans by way of Columbia Heights and has been working as an operator for about 12 years now. Paul is a fan of the city, loves living here, but is troubled by the crime that continues to plague the city despite apparent physical improvements. He has seen huge changes in the Columbia Heights neighborhood but still has high hopes for continued improvement. A very nice guy and I’m happy to have been able to chat with him way way up high.
Early this morning, Matt took me up onto the roof of his current work project, Constitution Square, so that I could shoot some video footage of the DC skyline for my final compositing project this semester. We just missed the beautiful sunrise by about 20 minutes, but I still got some great footage and views of the Capitol, Washington monument, and the NoMA Station Water Tower, pictured above.
Tomorrow, Matt and I are volunteering at the National Museum for the Festival of the Building Arts (FOBA). It runs from 10am to 4:30pm and, from their website , involves the A,B,C’s, and D’s of the built environment: Artisans and Architects, Builders, Craftsmen, Contractors, and Construction Workers, Designers and Decorators. There will be tons of demonstrations, hands-on, and activities for kids. Come check it out if you’re free tomorrow! (red line, Judiciary Square metro)
I took this photo of Virginia Tech’s solar decathlon house, LumenHaus, this past weekend as it was being constructed on the 5th St lawn outside the National Building Museum. It will be there until Sept 27th, when it will then move to the National Mall for October 9-13 and 15-18. The house features the sliding glass doors (seen in the picture) on the north and south facades, which are all about allowing in the *light*. But more importantly, there’s an app for that — the heating, cooling, lighting, insulation, and sunshades can be controlled by using a computer or iPhone. Now we’re talking! Good luck to the team as they participate in Solar Decathlon Europe in Madrid next summer! US represent.
This sign on Pierce St NE (a few blocks north of Union Station) is a little depressing, but at least it’s not giving anyone a false sense of hope. Did everyone watch Obama’s speech last night? I thought the most rousing part was this:
…It is our responsibility as lawmakers and educators to make this system work. But it is the responsibility of every citizen to participate in it. And so tonight, I ask every American to commit to at least one year or more of higher education or career training. This can be community college or a four-year school; vocational training or an apprenticeship. But whatever the training may be, every American will need to get more than a high school diploma. And dropping out of high school is no longer an option. It’s not just quitting on yourself, it’s quitting on your country – and this country needs and values the talents of every American. That is why we will provide the support necessary for you to complete college and meet a new goal: by 2020, America will once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.
-Barack Obama, Feb 24th, 2009
It’s not Republican or Democrat, it’s just message to people to get up and do something to better themselves, and ultimately their country.
It’s Friday the 13th… are you superstitious? Would you walk under that stack of ladders without worrying about it bringing you a string of bad luck? Or, perhaps, you think like me and see that there are 6 ladders — an even number — and they obviously cancel each other out, so you wouldn’t have to worry.
I’ll admit that when it comes to my superstitions, it’s more of a numbers game than anything else. Evens, especially multiples of 10 or any number with an 8 in it being the far superior types of number. Maybe this is more of an obsessive-compulsive trait than a superstition, but something about me just feels off when there are odd numbers present. I don’t like to set my alarms for random times, example 6:37 am, that freaks me out, but 6:40 is perfectly acceptable. The television volume has to be on an even number as well, preferably 18, but 22 if the dishwasher is running. I like even-numbered addresses, like Matt’s old address at 8508 Summit Hills, but not my work address 8505.
I guess has more to do with my quirks than it does with Friday the 13th. What are your superstitions?
Yesterday we walked over to 11th and Park Ave. to check out a street art project called Albus Cavus (meaning white cave in Latin). The basic premise is to beautify streets in need of some prettying, in this case, they had a construction fence that was surrounding a run down liquor store. The developer donated the fence space to these artists for the next 6 months, until the new project is built.
It looks like the artists were out there for most of the day Sunday, painting and cutting out their designs. By the time we got there in the afternoon, they were just starting to hang the images on the fence.
Another construction related photo today – only this one is screaming Halloween to me. Maybe it’s the orange color, or the triangular pieces that make me think of Jack-O-Lantern eye cutouts… or perhaps it’s the creeeepppyyy black fingerprints… hmmm did you notice those??
