Apocalypse in Suburbia

Written by Shuttermecki on May 20th, 2011

Followers of Harold Camping are expecting tomorrow to be a pretty exciting day.

Tomorrow, according to some who claim to be in the know, the Apocalypse will arrive.  As predicted by the currently-incredibly-slammed familyradio.com, and reported just about everywhere, it’s the umpteenth prediction of the second coming.  It should come as no surprise to any of us living here that Suburbia is not to be spared.

 

When the apocalypse comes here, though, we don’t seem to get mass marches, protests, folks with bullhorns, like they do downtown- not even that old guy in a sheet from The Far Side, carrying a sign reading “The End is Near.”  Instead, you park a nicely painted SUV outside your house starting many, many months ahead of the event, like our neighbors down the street.  Very quiet, very neighborly, very suburban. (Ok, it’s a Nissan. But you get my point)

TheEndIsNigh

Next Trash/Recycling pickup for our neighborhood: May 24.

 

So many things to wonder about.  Like ‘What will happen to the garbage and recycling trucks?’  But I also wonder whether, if I thought my world was really going to end tomorrow, would I put out the trash and the recycling?

 

 

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In the future…

Written by Shuttermecki on March 25th, 2011

… you will get to pick six flavors of Diet Coke, but apparently only three of Coke Zero. Meanwhile, in case you missed it, Zero is the new Diet.  Or perhaps the new Lite.  As in: {Coke, Sprite, Mr. Pibb, Fanta,Powerade} Zero.

wait. THREE kinds of water?

The Future can now be found at the Hybla Valley 5 Guys.

 

....but if you select three cherry drinks in a row, you don't actually win a prize.

The Future, here seen dispensing sodas.

Fortunately for those fearing menu overload, first you only pick one of twenty choices. THEN you get to decide whether to have a soda straight up, with lime, vanilla, cherry, raspberry, orange….

I wonder.  Can we extrapolate from our understanding of inkjet toner cartridges? (more cartridges, for a smaller color range seems to mean *more* cartridge swapping than before, albeit with hopefully less waste)  Perhaps there’s a direct feed line to the Coke Bottling plant up in the City of Alexandria.  Or perhaps, a constant feed is kept connected by teeny worker gnomes at the base of the machine, there.

 

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No.

Written by Shuttermecki on September 12th, 2010

What you can't do at Market Commons, in the Fair Lakes region of Fairfax Co. VA

3 guesses who the undesirable demographic is here, and the first two don’t count.    Kids should be staying at home playing Playstation, I guess.    If you want to bike to Whole Foods (directly behind me) to get groceries, you are not following The Rules.  Use Your Car.

 

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Disc and Mushrooms

Written by Shuttermecki on August 27th, 2010

Under the trees, Hole 5 of the disc golf course, Pohick Bay Regional Park. Mason Neck, Virginia.

Shot a great game, except for those times when the trees would leap out in front of my disc, sending it careening (again) into the undergrowth.  What a great way to spend a late summer Friday afternoon!

 

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fall is on the way

Written by Shuttermecki on August 23rd, 2010

It's been a long, hot summer. But fall (and by association, football season) is on the way.

 

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Numbers

Written by Shuttermecki on July 21st, 2010
Window of "Advance America" at sunset

The window of the Hybla Valley "Advance America" as the sun sets across Richmond Highway

How many times in how many math classes did someone tell me, “numbers are the universal language?”

Extraneous words

It doesn’t, however, generally seem to meet language requirements for graduation. Occasionally there’s the fun reason: “Well, you can compute batting averages…..”  and I certainly do arithmetic with my camera- nothing fancy, just doubling and halving exposure value factors, or reading how many shots left on my card.

For those who don’t innately gravitate to math for the enjoyment, it seems it’s there because one day, you’re going to have a job and have to buy your own food, pay your own rent- and you’d better be able to keep it all straight!

Math one encounters along Richmond Highway primarily falls into that last category: No more than arithmetic, no fancy, higher language,  a means to express an end where said end is “money.”

For people who want English to be the sole Lingua Franca, I perceive this poses a bit of a problem.  English, Spanish, Urdu, French, whatever, it doesn’t seem to matter so much.  Why even bother with the word “thirsty” in any language when a photo of an ice cold bottle of cola, plus a price 2/3 of that of a soda machine’s probably does the trick just fine?

The cash advance place clearly doesn’t care what language their customer speaks, happy to take the money of anyone who walks in the door.  Words in both English and Spanish wrap around the all important cash values that you, too, might win!

For so many things on Richmond Highway, a number and a brand seem to suffice.

So it’s the price of gas that’s the issue, not that the station is named by a warm, fuzzy, patriotic word. (Although the needle on the irony meter gets a bit jumpy with the name ‘Liberty’ for a gas station. ) You have the Liberty to chose Exxon, Shell, BP, whoever has the lowest price today.

Special Offer

 

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water

Written by Shuttermecki on July 15th, 2010

Hayfield Secondary's athletic fields

Waiting outside while my son finished up a program at Hayfield on Thursday night.  People were out jogging and walking the track, and Little League U-14 playoffs were taking place on the baseball diamond.

 

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“Adults eat little.”

Written by Shuttermecki on July 15th, 2010

Stag beetles are nocturnal- in the past, when we’ve found them on our screen door in the morning, they tend to do the same thing as this one does: not move. Against the bright green mesh top of the bean sprout jar, it doesn’t look quite as twiglike as it must think it does.

By the next morning, it had wandered off.

Stag beetle sitting in the bean sprouter lid

A stag beetle that scampered out from behind... something, while we were working in the yard.

From my copy of the National Audubon Society Field Guide to Insects and Spiders, on the reddish-brown Stag Beetle:

“Food:  Adults eat little.”

To which I find myself asking:  ok, then- what in the name of all things chitinous are those monster jaws for,  anyway?

 

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fuzzy!

Written by Shuttermecki on June 15th, 2010

This little guy and its sibling have been hopping around our side yard the past couple of days… our neighbor said he’s seen him perched on our A/C unit. I dare say, there’s probably quieter places to hang out.

young blue jay perching on

young blue jay perching near a volunteer sumac bush

I get the sneaking suspicion, between the two of them and the hovering, scolding parents, I’m not going to be getting many more of the red currants from my bushes the next few days.

BlueAdder?

"I have a cunning, cunning plan, wherein we shall have every single one of those berries before nightfall."

Is it just me, or have I seen the expression on that bird somewhere before?

 

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Sunrise in suburbia

Written by Shuttermecki on May 14th, 2010

Morning in suburbia

Spring arrived late, this year, but arrive it did.   The grass has once again started to grow- and the unoccupied houses in subdivisions are again more recognizable as such- even as the houses become slightly less visible.

 

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