Old Town Winchester, Virginia

Word, PowerPoint, Excel - I Own You!

I found this gem while looking around my completely unorganized folder of Word docs. To put this in context, my wife and I moved to D.C. from Portland, Maine in 2006, when her marketing company offered her a promotion. We'd never even visited the capital before, but decided to make the move. I temped for a couple months before finding my current gig. The following thoughts were written down after an interview with a staffing company. I'd never heard the word blog back then; I was just angry and wanted to remember how I felt that day.

What I didn't write down at the time was that I ended up at the Tidal Basin during the peak of the Cherry Blossom Festival. So the office temp tests nearly broke my will, but I experienced one of the signature D.C. events by accident - and in my suit, I looked damn good doing it.


I am 30 years old and I suck at Excel. I suck at PowerPoint too. And for the record, I suck at Access. Am I going to let my abysmal test scores define me? Is my entire post-college existence going to be measured by my knowledge of Microsoft Office software? Am I doomed to fail because I haven't become a paper-pushing automaton?

These were the questions I contemplated as I stared at the crumbling grout between the bathroom wall tiles. The faint smell of warm chlorine permeated the air. Damp with perspiration, my heart raced, a vein throbbed in my neck, and I silently muttered a profanity-laden tirade and seethed with frustration.

My registration session with the staffing agency - my first attempt at finding a new job in our new city - had not gone well. I had been humbled by the software tests. My recruiter didn't listen to a word I had said; she'd already read my resume and pigeonholed me in her mind. The glaring fluorescent overhead lights and the tiny, windowless meeting space felt like an interrogation room. A woman erased and replaced figures on a dry-erase board with foul, pungent markers. Occasionally a bell would ring, celebrating a successfully completed task; clapping and muted cheers emanated from the cubicles. I felt claustrophobic, nauseated and out of place. I wanted to run.

Hola, Amigos!

Thanks for checking in on my blog. I've got stories in the upcoming I Am Modern holiday special and their winter edition. I'll let you know when they're available online. You may have heard that I'll be guest blogging on DullesMoms.com during the final week of each month. Set your Outlook calendar! I'm also working on an artist profile at the moment. I'll introduce you to the talented guy playing the piano in the YouTube feed to your right. And, finally, MLB is coming to an end which will leave me bored and restless. Expect more frequent posts soon.
Thanks for your time and comments.
K

Autumn Sunrise

Guest Blogging at DullesMoms This Week

I've got a new story posted on DullesMoms.com this week. Look for And You Thought Curious George Was Naughty.

Thanks for reading and sharing.

Big City, Small World

We knew the pizza and pong would be tasty and fun after seeing Comet Ping Pong featured on The Food Network's hit show Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives with Guy Fieri, but who knew date night would lead to a chat with a Pulitzer Prize nominated author about the Maharishi School in Fairfield, Iowa over Peruvian cocktails and beers in D.C.

It happened just like that. On a whim we decided to book a babysitter and take a night for ourselves. So with the man-van parked at the Springfield Metro station, we took a carefree train ride into D.C. to sample some new pizza and battle for ping pong bragging rights.

Comet's neon sign may be visible from the moon. I've never visited the lunar rock, but the sign is a bright beacon to any and all crispy crust, wood-fired pizza lovers in our corner of the solar system. Seriously, the pizza was awesome, the beer selection was more than respectable, and the ping pong action was hot.

Comet features three full-size tables and one mini table in the back, and one full-size table outside- yes, outside. The outdoor seating area was packed with pizza people! So dinner was a rockin' success, except that the online review we read had us hop off at one Metro station too soon. Luckily the cabs were prevalent and we caught a relaxing ride north. Last thing about the Comet: have fun finding the restrooms. I mean it - have fun!

So the pepperoni and cheese of this blog post was our bartender at Los Andes in Adams Morgan. The basement bar beneath the Peruvian restaurant Los Canteras caught Angie's attention because she saw a lone patron through the barred windows. Well, barred windows, dark stairs to a subterranean bar, and anything in Spanish is usually enough to draw us in for a drink.

The lone patron turned out to be the chef, and he quickly withdrew to the kitchen to prepare for the dinner rush. (We're parents, so date night starts around Boca del Vista time, i.e. early) So with the chef cooking, we had the barman's full attention. He slid me a bottle of Cusquena, which he described as a fuller beer than Peru's alternate hopped beverage option, Cristal. (Cusquena's slogan is "the gold of the Incas") My wife went with a Macchu Pisco, an egg-free twist on the bar's signature Pisco Sour cocktail.

My wife shared a story about our friends, who married themselves along the Inca trail on the way to the mountain ruins of Machu Picchu. The barman listened quietly, a knowing smirk forming in the corners of his mouth. After listening to her story, he divulged that he was co-owner of a B&B in a small Peruvian village near the Machu Picchu trailhead.

As the conversation flowed on, we learned that he had been a travel writer for the Washington Post and Time magazine. In fact, he once ran the Post's Moscow bureau in Russia. I didn't learn until later, during a Google search on the way home, that he was fluent in five languages and had been nominated for a Pulitzer for his writing. He was much too modest to brag about such an honor.

Maybe the most interesting thing to us was that one of his brothers had run a restaurant in Ames, Iowa, where we had gone to college. He couldn't remember the name of the joint, but we left our email address in case it came to him. After reading his profile on a travel writers Web site, I think he'll follow through. As a former Post reporter, I'm sure he won't be able to sleep until he knows the restaurant's name.

What a great night out! The best thing about living in and around big cities is meeting fellow transplants. Everyone has a story to tell. We were just lucky enough to be served by a well-traveled, professional storyteller and Pulitzer Prize nominee from Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Love That Setting Sun