Showing posts with label Wolftrap. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Wolftrap. Show all posts

Thursday, May 22, 2025

August 18th 2002

 


The painter and her work
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We went to the Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts which was a short drive from where we lived at the time - 8324 Wolftrap Road, Vienna, VA 22182. Clare was inspired to paint the scene; I was inspired to take a picture of the artiste and her work. Her hair was a tousled cascade of chestnut fronds, artfully disheveled in a manner that exuded effortless bohemian charm. The unkempt strands framed her face with a carefree elegance...

Who did we see? I don't recall. It looks like a band...

Friday, March 10, 2017

Nostalgia: mid-December 2001 in Vienna, Virginia

It's December 15th 2001 in our house at Wolftrap Road, Vienna, VA 22182, USA. It's our first US Christmas (Happy Holidays!) and we're determined to do the right thing.

We had popped off to Walmart to buy seasonal reindeer. Taking a cue from IKEA, a Walmart reindeer comes in a rectangular box. Who better to handle 3D reassembly than Clare?



This is meant to be a reindeer?


Assembled, plugged-in and working. Take a bow!


"You do have permission to pop out and hunt the squirrels."

To be fair, this picture of our puzzled cats was taken a month earlier, in mid-November .. before the deep snow which would totally baffle them. We naturally let our cats roam free to the amazement of our American neighbours, who firmly believed that 'kitties' were house-animals.

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This is the third time these pictures have aired here, in case they seem over-familiar.

Saturday, November 21, 2015

Christmas Reindeer

I have begged, I have pleaded .. all to no avail; I am accused of being a kitsch-junky.

It was all so different in our American house back in November 2001.

This is how it comes out of the box .. something only a topologist could love

Genius at work!

The creatures in their natural environment ...

A Christmas treat indeed - but quite modest compared to our neighbours!

The obligatory Internet cat picture - our two, who both opted to stay in America
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These pictures have been shown before on this blog by the way, eight years ago.


Monday, April 13, 2015

Clare's paintings

During our sojourn in the States back in 2001/2, Clare had a fair amount of time on her hands while I was participating in Cable & Wireless Global's stately descent into terrain (Chapter 11 in 2004). She took up painting and here is her gallery from that time.

"Flames"

"Freesias"

"Planes over Wolftrap"

"The Matrix"

"Steel Tooth"

"Wolftrap Theater in the Woods"

A Cable & Wireless colleague once asked to buy "Freesias". She said she had always liked the "Primitive" style. I smiled demurely and declined her offer; I never had the nerve to tell Clare.

Friday, December 21, 2007

The 'Chavtivity' or 'The Xmas Reindeer'

Very amused to see this modern nativity scene, known as the 'Chavtivity' or the 'Chav Xmas Card' (see story here).




From The Argus:
"In the picture Mary and Joseph are a pair of tracksuit wearing teenagers slumped in a battered bus shelter with their baby in a pushchair and a Staffordshire bull terrier on a chain. They are being greeted by three wise chavs, who are presenting them with gifts of booze, cigarettes and a stolen car stereo. Mary is chain-smoking and there is a Crimestoppers' poster of Joseph behind his head."
We also had our chav moments back in the US in 2001. Impressed by our neighbours' luminous displays, we went to WalMart to pick up some front-garden accessories of our own. As I pushed the huge boxes around on an outsized trolley, I heard a storeman exclaim 'Oh my gawd, it's the reindeer family!' - and so it was.

Our first problem was that it was self-assembly. I naturally delegated this problem to Clare, who was unamused.




However, she performed miracles and was delighted by the result.




We duly installed our two reindeer in the front garden. They were not just pretty lights - they had little motors so that their heads went up and down, and turned around in an attentive way. We were utterly pleased with this aesthetic effect, as Clare showed posing with the reindeer family in the gloom.



However, they only truly came alive after dark.




After a while, the motors failed so they remained stuck in one position, like sufferers from an obscure medical disease. We have never risen to such heights of Christmas exuberance since.