Folk Life

left to right -
 Ginny, Gail, Henry, Jim, Terri, Wendy, Kate, Bill

Henry, who you can't see in this photo because my head is in front of him, came down from Philadelphia on Saturday for a quick visit.

I met Henry back in 1979 when I first moved to DC. He lived in the group house I moved into, and shortly moved out with a crowd who rented a huge house on Longfellow Street. He is a Vietnam Viet, and is missing some fingers to prove it.  He worked as a bike courier when he lived in DC, but eventually moved back to Philadelphia where he got on with the Post Office.  At this point he's probably almost ready to retire from there.

Without my head! left to right -
Gail, Henry, Wendy, Kate, Bill

Since he wasn't in town for long we arranged to meet in DC at a Thai restaurant for lunch.  Then everybody went over to the Mall where the Smithsonian was running the Folk Life Festival.  Kate and Bill's daughter, Elizabeth, who is a doctoral candidate at Columbia in ethomusicology, has a summer internship there tending to a donkey that's part of the show.  So much for the value of a Ph.d!

I was running late and drove down which was not a time-saver.  The restaurant was on Capital Hill which is a part of the city I never get to.  It's very quaint with lots of brick row houses. The gardens in front of the houses are small so many are elaborate. The Capital itself is a fortress with rolling gates and guards.  That's another place I've never been in all the years I've lived here.

The highlight of my meal, which was very good, was the Thai coffee.  That's iced coffee with a big shot of sweetened condensed milk.  Sweetened condensed milk improves everything!