The most direct walking route from work home leads me through some quiet (amazingly so for their proximity both to Arlington Boulevard and Columbia Pike), pleasant neighborhoods. The problem is that these neighborhoods, for whatever reason, have almost no street lamps. On a rainy evening like tonight, due to the combination of the return to […]

Woo-hoo! Mt-Blacklist kills spam dead! I’d posted before about the occasional spam comments I was receiving here on elf-reflection, and then I read about those who were having much more serious problems with spam comments on their blogs and journals; Mike, for example, had about 50 of them one day last week, while poor Cornelia […]

Less than two weeks ago, on Thursday the 23rd, I posted about my decision to refinance my condo. Four days later, I posted that I’d signed the initial paperwork and had sent it to the loan agent, who told me that an appraisal would follow over the next few weeks with a closing by the […]

One of the benefits of working for a federal agency bureau responsible for training diplomats in more than 60 foreign languages–especially considering my specific responsibilities include management of the multimedia language labs and the recording studio where we produce the digital audio for our language courses–is the exposure to and, theoretically, learning of additional languages. […]

Because of ongoing difficulties with the Saab, and my reluctance to drive it for great distances, I’d been borrowing Craig’s car to visit my mother on weekends. Last week, however, I decided to rent a car, so early in the week I reserved a compact car from Thrifty.com; Thrifty, along with many car rental companies, […]

$500 down, and I’m now on my way to Prius ownership: I just placed an order for a fully-loaded Prius in “Millenium Silver Metallic” with gray/burgundy interior. Jeff and I went by the Alexandria Toyota dealership this evening for an appointment with one of the salesmen with whom I’d emailed on Monday, after having seen […]

When looking at the GLCensus web site earlier today, after receiving an email about their partnership with Nielsen to conduct a three-day survey of GLBT TV viewership habits, I came across an interesting study from this summer that I’d missed at its original release. According to the study, which asked respondents first if they belong […]

Back in July, I posted about my invitation to be a Nielsen household for a week. This weekend I received another phone call from Nielsen asking me if I would be willing to participate for another week, starting November 20; this time they specifically are interested in my experiences as a PVR (TiVo) owner, and […]

The paperwork is done and on its way back to the loan agent, so the process is underway: by the end of November, I should have a new mortgage for 15 rather than 30 years, a lower, fixed interest rate, and some cash in hand. The condo tentatively has been appraised at almost 75% more […]

Ok, I admit the title is an obscure play on words on several levels. “Pied” is meant to evoke the concept of dance from the French word pied, “foot,” while “piper” is from the name of the dance troupe–“George Piper Dances”–we saw Tuesday night. And, just as the Pied Piper of fable mesmerized and enchanted […]