Happenings of Autumn

Fall is definitely here - the air is crisp and the leaves have begun to turn. I think I even wore pants every day last week, which is quite a change (but it's nice to not have to shave all the time). With the advent of fall comes many of my favorite events of the year, aside from my birthday, of course! Since I got my new camera Saturday morning, I took lots of pictures of the day and thought it might be nice to bring them to the blog.

Saturday morning, I got up early to get to the post office and pick up my camera from the post office (evil post office wouldn't deliver it earlier in the week...grr). Having eagerly anticipated it's arrival all week, I ripped open the package immediately upon returning to my car. It is so beautiful and shiny! I had also purchased a memory card with the camera, so I loaded it all up and turned it on. At this point, I didn't want to take any boring pictures of downtown Thurmont; I wanted something more exciting for my first pictures of the new camera. With this in mind, I set off for PA for an 11am hair appointment. I was running a bit early, however, so I swung by my parents' house to show them the present they had purchased for me for my birthday. To my surprise, only my mother was home, but I was able to show her the camera and spend a half hour hearing about the eventful morning with stories of my brother's 8:30am hair appointment (for which he left at 8:26) and the impending move into the new house. On the way out to my appointment, I found my first pictures of the new camera...a nice scene of the backyard.

Following my hair appointment (during which there were no pictures taken), I called my teammate, Colleen, with whom I would be spending the rest of my day at Frederick's In the Streets and the DC United game. We met at my apartment about an hour later and headed downtown. Also with us was her father-in-law, Art. Art is visiting from Montana and was anxious to spend his day with us girls and enjoying whatever the day would bring! After visiting Colleen's husband, Nate, at Pit Crew, we decided one of the first things on the agenda was some lunch. Marching up Market Street almost to the end, Colleen had initially decided on some Cuban food at That Cuban Place. However, she wasn't *that* hungry and we decided to keep looking. Art did get a mango shaved ice and the reviews were good. Along the way, I stopped to snap a picture of the most awesome string bass we'd ever seen. It is on the right.

Still fascinated by the flaming instruments, we came back to our point of origin - Pit Crew. Out front, at one of the tents, we happened to notice a little sign boasting delights made with crab. Fancy that these items were from a favorite of mine, the Bentz Street Sports Bar. Colleen got the crab cake sandwich with homemade chips and I settled on the crab and corn soup. I have a thing for soups with corn.

We enjoyed our lunch in the safe confines of Pit Crew, where we met many of Nate's friends and engaged in some anticipatory conversation of the upcoming snowboard/ski season. While waiting for Art to meet all the coworkers, I relaxed in the skateboard chair.

Once Art reappeared, we headed out for some more fun. We got cool stickers from some little boys working on behalf of the YMCA and then from the Democratic Party. Colleen was super excited to get her Jennifer for Congress sticker from Jennifer herself. Too bad that Colleen votes in PA. We wore our stickers on our pant leg, thinking that was pretty cool. I saw some girls wearing stickers on the back pockets of their jeans. Of course, we saw many weird people, but I did not take any pictures of them. Our travels brought us down to the creek, which was full of life and fun music. Of course, we stopped at Ben & Jerry's! It wasn't nearly as crowded as last year (it also wasn't that hot out) and there were no rude comments being made either. The lady in front of us got 5 shakes! I gladly shared my 10% off card with her. Every little bit helps. Here are the nice boys making OUR shakes.

Colleen likes coffee way too much and passed on Ben & Jerry's to go down to La Dolce Vita for a latte. It is another new attraction on the creek and a pretty decent coffee shop! Plus, they put a little extra special something into every latte...

We were nearing the end of our adventure and set back on our way to the car. But, before we did, I got a few nice shots of the new places around the creek. First is a look down toward new La Paz from the fancy new bridge over the creek and second is a shot of the bridge.


And then, it was off to the United game. But, we'll save that for another day.