THE SPIRIT OF THE NEW YEAR

Happy New Year! As I was driving home last night, something reminded me of New Year's Eve, 1999. I had just moved to Washington, and that year we thought the lights just might go out at midnight. That year I attended the New Year's celebration on the Mall in DC called "America's Millennium." It was a pretty good time, but apparently someone wasn't exactly having any fun. On the way home, I saw Uncle Sam here, in the Metro station (the DC subway) and Sam did not look happy. I'm not sure what his problem was, but one thing's for sure - he's not camera shy.

THE HOUSE THAT CHRISTMAS SHAT UPON

My last entry was inappropriately called "I'M BACK." Well, I guess I lied as that was two months ago. Allow me to explain. I was put in charge of a very big project at work that required me to put in some insane hours over the last three months. The craziness is nearly over, and I'm now beginning to get back to a somewhat normal life.

Since that last entry, not much has really happened. "Snipes" has been caught (see last entry) and the thought of getting shot in a parking lot is just a bad memory for most of us around Washington. I've been taking a silversmithing class, which I've really been enjoying. I've been learning a lot of new techniques, and I've made a couple of silver rings, and a copper pendant which I gave to my mother for Christmas.

And speaking of Christmas, the holiday season was really nice this year. My parents drove down from Pennsylvania during a wicked snow storm, and survived a spectacular 360 on the interstate without a scratch. While they were here, we stopped at the house just up the road from me which I call, "The House That Christmas Shat Upon." I don't know who the owners of this house are, but they certainly take their holiday decorating very seriously. They live on a corner in a nice residential neighborhood, and each year they put up a display that would make Clark W. Griswold blush.

This display, which can probably be seen from space, has become very popular over the years. Every time I go by, there are people everywhere - in the street, on people's lawns, and they come by the bus loads... I'm not kidding.

Now the way I see it, if you're this family's neighbor, you cannot be happy about this. Even if you like the lights, there's no way you can put up a display to compete with them, and you certainly cannot be happy about the hundreds (I'm not exaggerating here) of people who stop by every night to wonder around and admire the lights. So, my hat goes off to the neighbors across the street that came up with the perfect 'counter-decoration' - a 10 foot inflatable Grinch. Brilliant!

I'M BACK

I haven't posted any updates in over a month. Things have been absolutely crazy here. We're in a huge crunch at work, so I've been putting in some tremendous hours. Last Monday for instance, I worked a 20.5 hour day. There's also been a problem with blogger, the online tool I use to post these updates. There was an upgrade made to the blogger server, and that somehow broke any page that had a custom template like mine. I waited for some time for blogger to be fixed, but I've given up and will be hard-coding this journal from now on.

Of course the biggest development lately has been the sniper that's been murdering people all over the D.C. area. This has been, and continues to be a bizarre situation, and as I write, they've just released the names of two suspects. This whole drama has truly hit close to home for me. One of the shootings was just a half-mile from where I live. I frequently drive past several of the locations where people have been killed, and from time to time, I get art supplies at the Michael's craft store where one of the shootings took place. The news reports would have you believe that everyone in the area is in complete lockdown, and that's not the case at all. People still have to go to work, buy groceries and get gas. Even today I still saw kids playing outside even though the sniper has stated that they are not safe. That's not to say that people aren't nervous. They're just going about their lives and constantly looking over their shoulders. Of course, if you're driving a white van, it's guaranteed that you're going to be stopped. Even I got checked out at a police roadblock this past Monday (and I don't drive a van). That traffic mess turned my half hour commute to work into an hour and a half trip. The shootings are pretty much the only topic of discussion right now. Everywhere I go, I hear people talking about the sniper - one of my coworkers calls him "Snipes." Only time will tell how this whole thing will end. I just hope that the authorities catch this guy (if he is a guy) soon because too many people have died around here lately.

As I said, things have been crazy, but I'm back, and in the coming days, I'll be posting some photos from the last month. I'm curious to find out who's reading my photojournal, so please drop me a line here.