Folklife Festival

A wonderful weekend with family. (Loni, wish you were here!)
We especially enjoyed the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. The weather was perfect, breezy and cool, not like the usual steambath this time of year.

The Mekong 'exhibits' were inspiring: spinning, dyeing, silk weaving, embroidering, boat making, singing, fish traps, bamboo and woodwork, silver, and much more. We watched folks painting a mural on the outer walls of a "home" in the Northern Ireland section. And a Virginian with an accent I had never heard before gave whistles and quick commands to a border collie who expertly herded sheep in whatever direction was requested.

We wandered through the halls of the Natural History museum. There were lots of creatures I'd never heard of before (the pink fairy armadillo is the only one whose name I remember with any degree of certainty) and many old favorites (finally found where they stashed the dik-dik, after years of searching). Pikas turn out to be much smaller than expected; no wonder I never see them when we hike. The greater glider looks very rug-like and invites petting, if only he (she?) weren't behind glass. The IMAX lion movie will have to wait for next time.

We zipped fairly quickly through the west building of the National Gallery of Art, and dawdled a bit more in the east. I'm still convinced Dutch realists are the best painters of all.

We enjoyed "Mekong" fare one day, and purported Virginian fare the next (one of us was highly skeptical). Cold succotash, liberally doused with salad vinaigrette? Not bad. Sweet potato fries? Heavenly. Red Delicious apples for $1 each, with a requirement to buy two? Bleah, sandy.

But all in all, a very nice weekend.