The student adventures of Philippa, Richard and Tom in Harvard - and on the road.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Saturday soccer
Jumpers for goalposts etc... Saturday's scrimmage was, nicely for us, right next to the local farmer's market. Then onto a rooftop bar for lunch under blue skies. Next week I
get Pittsburgh and the G20 ... rain rallies and tear gas?
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Saturday, September 12, 2009
I am a soccer mom
An action-packed start to the weekend after a wearying work week. We signed Tom up for the local children's soccer league. THEN found out it was a twenty minute drive for an 0830 game. On Saturday. When we normally stay in our PJs all morning and breakfast on blueberry pancakes. So the Lister family has turned over a new leaf, and soccer it was. Which - after starting by running the wrong way entirely - Tom totally took to. He ran like a mad thing and got in some great kicks. I don't know why I took a copy of the New York Times with me because we both found ourselves cheering from the sidelines ("GET THE BALL Tom!"). And it was actually very sociable. We met Swedish Peter, a fellow Hyde parent, first. Then Maya, who'd so encouraged us to sign up, along with Liam & Alia in their football kit. Then we were surprised to see our friend Tim (of Tim & Helena) out there coaching. It felt like half of DC was out there on the field, with at least a dozen kickabouts going on simultaneously. It was actually fun. Though ask me again when it's cold and raining....
We felt we deserved brunch after, so driving back into DC, stopped off in Adams Morgan and had lovely coffees and granola (R)/ pain au chocolat (T)/ bagel (P) in a very mellow caff called Tryst.
Remember at this point we're usually still in bed.... Today it was onto the Kennedy Center which was holding its annual Open House. The theme was Street Performers and it was FANTASTIC.
Some of it was on a huge scale - one of the Kennedy's wide formal terraces was entirely filled with hundreds and hundreds of empty cardboard boxes. It was called We Built This City and you were all encouraged to pile in there - seriously there were more adults than children - constructing houses and igloos and dens and winding corridors.
Some of it was tiny - like Alberti's Flea Circus, complete with miniature cannon to 'fire out' one intrepid flea, and a flag to be 'waved' by another. (Tom was completely convinced that the flying flea had smashed through its tissue paper hoop). There was a brilliant demonstration of dances from salsa to hiphop to breakdancing from a group called Urban Artistry. There were surreal 'strolling players' from a chatty French puppet booth to a couple of actors with TVs for heads. Oh and the two Tonys, giant comedy 'bodyguards' with pinhead puppet heads, dark glasses and earpieces, who pretended to take over security, with great ad libs like the moment they unrolled a stream of yellow security tape and pinned back the crowd to the sidewalk. (And everybody did as they were told!)
Our best moment came after watching acrobatic skipping from a group called the Greenbelt C.I.T.Y. Jump Rope team. After their own bravura performance, they started up a double dutch exercise and called for volunteers. Tom ran up, but didnt know how to get into the two ropes as they whirled around past each other. They stopped still for him to get in, started up again and he got his rhythm, jumping up and down madly in the middle of the swirl, grinning away like anything as the entire audience roared and applauded him for trying. We Were So Proud.
My camera battery had died. We were dead on our feet. And so by four, we sloped back to the car, and home, for a quiet night in.
We felt we deserved brunch after, so driving back into DC, stopped off in Adams Morgan and had lovely coffees and granola (R)/ pain au chocolat (T)/ bagel (P) in a very mellow caff called Tryst.
Remember at this point we're usually still in bed.... Today it was onto the Kennedy Center which was holding its annual Open House. The theme was Street Performers and it was FANTASTIC.
Some of it was on a huge scale - one of the Kennedy's wide formal terraces was entirely filled with hundreds and hundreds of empty cardboard boxes. It was called We Built This City and you were all encouraged to pile in there - seriously there were more adults than children - constructing houses and igloos and dens and winding corridors.
Some of it was tiny - like Alberti's Flea Circus, complete with miniature cannon to 'fire out' one intrepid flea, and a flag to be 'waved' by another. (Tom was completely convinced that the flying flea had smashed through its tissue paper hoop). There was a brilliant demonstration of dances from salsa to hiphop to breakdancing from a group called Urban Artistry. There were surreal 'strolling players' from a chatty French puppet booth to a couple of actors with TVs for heads. Oh and the two Tonys, giant comedy 'bodyguards' with pinhead puppet heads, dark glasses and earpieces, who pretended to take over security, with great ad libs like the moment they unrolled a stream of yellow security tape and pinned back the crowd to the sidewalk. (And everybody did as they were told!)
Our best moment came after watching acrobatic skipping from a group called the Greenbelt C.I.T.Y. Jump Rope team. After their own bravura performance, they started up a double dutch exercise and called for volunteers. Tom ran up, but didnt know how to get into the two ropes as they whirled around past each other. They stopped still for him to get in, started up again and he got his rhythm, jumping up and down madly in the middle of the swirl, grinning away like anything as the entire audience roared and applauded him for trying. We Were So Proud.
My camera battery had died. We were dead on our feet. And so by four, we sloped back to the car, and home, for a quiet night in.
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