Here’s a name for you: Kluge-Ruhe. The Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collection at the University of Virginia, a depository of over 3600 Australian Aboriginal art objects, is the only museum in the United States dedicated solely to Aboriginal art. Is that a claim to fame? I dunno. I guess you use whatever you’ve got to attract visitors…
Youch, it’s hot!
Right now, mid afternoon, the temperature is 93°, “feels like” 99° Hot and stuffy. This morning, in the relative cool of 8am, 80°, I took a walk down the road from our AirBnB. We are very close to Veritas Winery. There is a road which climbs steeply around the fields of vines.
Global threads of inhumanity
Is “enslavement” built into human evolutionary genetics? Having so much exposure in the last few days to the condition of enslavement, our period of servitude where more than one of our Presidents found slavery abhorrent yet were unable to free their own enslaved people. But we are just babies on the timeline of human enslavement….
Semantics: Slave or enslaved?
You may have already heard the term “enslaved people” as a replacement for “slaves” This was new to me though. The linguistic shift from “slaves” to “enslaved” is deliberate. The thinking is this: “slave” defines a person by their condition and becomes their primary identity. “Enslaved person” describes the condition of slavery as something imposed on a…
Mount Pleasant
Montpelier, home of James Madison. Like Jefferson, Madison spoke of his abhorrence of slavery but never freed his own enslaved people. Truly I wanted to hear more about Dolly Madison but I have to admit it was awe inspiring to see the small desk Madison used to pen the most important document in our history.
Honey Whiskey caps the day
Today we took a spin on Skyline Drive. 105 miles long, winding along the ridge of the Blue Ridge Mountains, with numerous pullouts for admiring views and hiking trails for attaining summits. With a speed limit of 35 mph, we thought perhaps we’d take in the first 20 miles or so then turn around. We discovered…
IX
Yesterday, after our Monticello visit, we had a couple hours to kill before our dinner reservation at an establishment called The Local so we drove back into Charlottesville and took a wander to the IX park (as far as I can tell, one pronounces it “Icks”). A place for murals with a brewery and a…
Clever Thomas
Our visit yesterday to Monticello was surprising in a number of ways. I had not realized how clever he was. He invented several gadgets that were on display. Jefferson positioned his bed in an alcove between his bedroom and study so he could roll out of bed into either room, maximizing work time. And when…
The conflicted splendor of Monticello
Thomas Jefferson, the brilliant but conflicted (some might say hypocritical) man. This was the subject of our outing today. Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, located on a hilltop just south of Charlottesville, encompassing 5,000 acres. Above: from the pond at the visitors center The epitaph on the obelisk marking Jefferson’s grave and etched as dictated by Jefferson…
Marvelous clouds
A little walk yesterday evening
Glass and Mead
Uncomfortably hot and humid, we opted not to attempt a hike today. After a low-key morning walk we decided to visit a local glass blowing studio called Glass Hollow. A glass shaping lesson was in progress so we only watched for a few moments and then stepped into the air conditioned gallery. The gallery is…
Elderly mountains
While there are a few thousands of years of human settlement here (the Monacan Nation and other indigenous communities) the Blue Ridge Mountains, forming the eastern front range of the Appalachians, date back roughly 460 million years and stretch about 550 miles from southern Pennsylvania down through Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and into northern Georgia….
West to Virginia
Our route took us from Bethesda, Maryland, past Dulles airport and westward for a first stop in Middleburg. As mentioned previously, Middleburg is a tiny town with a population of 700. White, wealthy strongly right leaning politically but situated within a county that is fast moving left. Our intention was to stretch our legs and…
About those liquor laws
I got seriously addicted to Aperol Spritz’s while in Belgium and wanted to recreate the drink for my friends. All part of the lounge and sip program. We discovered the liquor laws in Maryland made it more difficult to scout out Aperol. Today we head to Virginia so where would we find this lovely elixir?…
Into Africa
We took another DC outing yesterday, Parking in Bethesda is problematic so as we did the day before, we hailed an Uber to a Red line station and hopped on the metro ending in DC a couple blocks from The Mall. What should have been a short walk across the Mall to our destination turned…