A Photo Essay of a Fabulous Weekend

Friday
The end of a long week brought an abundance of alliteration with Mamma Mia, henna hair-dye, and summer surprises. I didn't know much about Mamma Mia going into it, so I was very pleasantly surprised. It was a really fun movie!

I've started to use this hair tint that is henna. The first time was a little too similar to smearing mud into my hair and then letting in cake for an hour. I think the positive effects on the environment for using a non-chemical product were offset by the amount of water it took to wash it all out. This second time was much more successful as I mixed my own cocktail of sherry and light brown.


Cheers!
Summer Surprise:
1/4 Smirnoff raspberry vodka
1/2 Whole Foods lemonade
1/4 Enjoy sparkling lemonade
squirt of 1/2 a lime

rim the glass with lime juice and then sugar and serve chilled :)



Saturday
Kelsey and Sean came to Silver Spring's Crafty Bastards a few weekends ago, so I decided to drive up to Baltimore to give their Artscape a try.

Don't let this token cloud fool you, it was Florida-hot out there for the 5 hours we traipsed around Mount Vernon.


We came up Charles street and were greeted with the car parade. There were vehicles decorated to be a telephone, a tree, a lobster, and all kinds of other unusual things.


The hands-down fan favorite was the car that was covered with those "take me to the river" robotic fish and similar lobsters and catfish. Then there was a man in the car controlling a lobster on a robotic arm above the hood who was the conductor: dancing around and waving a straw to conduct all of the little lobsters and fish who danced and moved to the music. It was fantastic on so many levels.


We walked a little further to the performance art section. There was a clown show. By the time we got up a few tents to the Heartbreak Cafe (where you were invited to sit at the cafe table and get broken up with) the clown show was over and jumped into the performer's chair to break up with a girl.


Two speakers set up with music pounding causing the sand to slowly expel from the speaker. We all agreed that it fell short of it's potential. Perhaps we missed something?


Up the road some more, there was a clothesline with some pieces of colored plastic hanging from it. This is the reflection on the pavement.


In this picture, I believe Sean is saying "awww, yea...I've got a way with the moms!"


There are two pictures in this post that I don't want to stifle your creativity by putting my own label on them. This is the first:


Such a crafty couple.


Captain James' Crab House on the water. It was a consensus among the three of us who actually braved ripping the crabs apart that it is required to have a beer buzz to do it, to get over thinking about what you're actually doing to get your meal.


Kelsey's mom, Patti. Right before this picture: as she's tearing into a crab, "hey guys, I think I'm really getting the hang of this. Oh wait, I can't find his asshole". I'll let you try eating crabs to figure out why that was a grossly appropriate comment.


Kelsey tore right into them...


And beat Sean with the mallet.


Myself, Kelsey, and Sean...the three stooges. Dibbs on Curly.


Rita's water ice and falling asleep on the couch to Batman just to round off another awesome Saturday in Baltimore.

A shout out to Sean for rescuing me from the tall thin man with a huge beard, shirt unbuttoned to his belly button, and turban who grabbed my hand and introduced himself on the sidewalk at Artscape. Sean scared him off quickly enough.

And a shout out to Kelsey when that same guy grabbed my hand 15 minutes later and started to spin around and dance ending with "and that's what they call the Samba" and Kelsey got on her phone, feigning a conversation and handed it to me, as someone really needed to talk to me.

Where do these people come from? You know you have good friends when they come to the rescue so that you can all laugh about it together instead of standing by and getting a really good laugh themselves.


Sunday
means Farmer's Market. My first in Baltimore since the winter and the fresh donuts were all that I remembered them to be and more.


Ben's falafel looks good too!


Some great musicians. Felt a little bit like I was back in Ireland :)


Kelsey threw stuff at me to stop me from taking pictures. Too bad.


Ben is photo shy as well. At least he doesn't throw things.

A juicer booth. But more importantly, grass poop.


Ben is so shy! On the walk back we recounted the story of how we met. I'll give the cliff notes version. One day in November I packed up my car and drove out of Florida. Many hours later I arrived in Baltimore and to the apartment of Kelsey and Sean. I needed a toothbrush, so I went downstairs to the grocery store in their complex. Over the meat coolers, Ben and I locked eyes. Me in a pink dress and oversize Bulius hoodie; him in black skinny jeans, a scarf, and fantastic green shoes. We had a moment. Then we both went about our business. Back in the apartment Kelsey announces that their friend Ben, who I've heard so much about, is coming over. Then Ben walks in and we were both "oh my god! it's YOU". ahhhhhhh....magic.


Next to Ben was a really cool old weathered meter machine. But the lighting was terrible. It desperately needs some photoshop work that I'm not going to do tonight.


And of course, lots and lots of produce:











This is the second photo that will remain without label:



More Ireland pictures are up on flickr. Some are into albums along the right side. Thanks for reading all of this really long post. The new camera has turned me into a bit of a photo-holic.