May’s Mutterings: Rants and Ramblings
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Mele Kalikimaka (Christmas in Hawaii)
Due to the fortuitous circumstance of Christmas falling on a Sunday this year, the school’s holiday break included the week before Christmas. This allowed us the rare opportunity to spend Christmas not in Washington, DC (Jim’s business being calendar year-end intensive). To no one’s surprise, the family voted to spend Christmas in Honolulu. There is…
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The Art of the Qur’an Exhibit (Freer Sackler Museum)
For those of you looking for something to do over the holiday break in the Washington, DC area, I highly recommend The Art of Qur’an exhibit currently being shown at the Freer Sackler Museum. There are over 70 Qur’ans on display, most of them beautifully illuminated. Many are over a thousand years old. (The oldest…
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Thanksgiving 2016
We sat 26 people down for Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday. Some family but also friends. Our menu was as follows: Thai pumpkin soup Smoked organic turkey Roasted organic turkey with confit legs Fried organic turkey Roasted shrimp with rosemary Roast duck Stuffing Chili-bathed sweet potatoes Dinner rolls Rice Kimchi Gravy Orange cranberry sauce Roasted carrots…
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Restaurant review: Bazaar Miami
Our food highlight from this past weekend in Miami was dinner at Bazaar, located in the SLS hotel. We’ve been to the Bazaar in Los Angeles and while the Bazaar in Miami has many of the same dishes, there are also Miami specific dishes. As with many of Jose Andres’s restaurants, the restaurant serves small…
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Best Buddies Miami 2016
We were in Miami this past weekend attending the Best Buddies gala. Best Buddies is a non-profit that helps people with intellectual and developmental disabilities with friendships, jobs, and leadership development. The annual gala in Miami is always a fun event to attend—both in terms of helping a very worthy cause and because Miami has…
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Book review: When Gods Die by C.S. Harris
When Gods Die by C.S. Harris My rating: 4 of 5 stars This is the second in the Sebastian St. Cyr mystery series and follows up on a strong debut novel (“What Angels Fear”). There are lots of things going on in this mystery–a countess is killed, and the Prince Regent is a strong suspect,…
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Disneyworld and an 18th Birthday
In the category of “How to Make Me Feel Really Old” falls the 18th birthday of our daughter (I assume our son’s 18th birthday will fall into the category of “How to Make Me Feel Really Really Old.”) Our daughter elected to celebrate this momentous occasion of being able to sign legally binding contracts by…
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Halloween 2016
We have a Halloween family tradition of over 10 years of inviting ourselves over to a friend’s house who has considerably more trick-or-treaters than we do (given that have zero). The kids decided (very reluctantly) that they were too old to go trick-or-treating by themselves and contented themselves with giving large amounts of candy to…
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Book review: The Dark Enquiry by Deanna Raybourn
The Dark Enquiry by Deanna Raybourn My rating: 5 of 5 stars This is the final book in the Lady Julia Grey series, and I confess that I took my time reading it. I have loved this series since it came out—the first book, “Silent as the Grave” being a particular favorite. It contains one…
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Restaurant review: Chinatown Express (Washington, DC)
We were looking for a quick bite to eat before the Adele concert at the Verizon Center. Daikaya (known for its ramen) was a 40 minute wait. But then we happened upon this hole-in-the-wall that advertised fresh hand-cut noodles (called 手拉麵 in Chinese). The noodles can be either put in soup or stir-fried, and you…
Got any book recommendations?