silent rally in DC?

Did you hear about it, Mayday for Marriage, this big event that had maybe 150,000 gathered on the Washington DC Mall last Friday October 15th? I didn’t pick it up on the mainstream media nor on the blogosphere. I’d imagine the organizers put forth quite an effort to put the word out and invite the speakers, but wonder why so little buzz was generated? Was the unintended result to talk amongst themselves (as conservative evangelical Christians), rather than putting more energy towards press junkets and word of mouse?

interfaith family

The other big change in our family life while we were in Philly is: we’ve become an interfaith family. She bought an iMac G5 (17″ version), while our minimalist desktop PC gasps its last breaths, coughing up the blue screen of death with regularity.

While there, I worked from remote, I hung out with LT for several hours (great graphic designer + dynamic spirituality) and Lee Huang (dynamic urban-minded guy) I got my fill of a Philly Cheesteak, but did not do Philly cream cheese, wandered around the Franklin Institute (aka science museum) with Jeremiah on Friday afternoon, had trouble sleeping that night b/c of loud neighbors on a verge of domestic violence, and drove back down to metro DC on Saturday morning oh-dark-thirty.

old fashioned ice cream parlor

Came across a hot find last night, while wandering Old Town Philadelphia in search of some eats, after a few days up there with wifey and son (lots of blogworthy things, but used my online moments to work from remote).. with my StrengthsFinder theme of “input” constantly active, I noticed a distinguished dessert place, and we walked over there after dinner at Marmont (where I discretely described the waitstaff as being slim), it was delicious and delectable experience — The Franklin Fountain is an old fashioned ice cream parlor, with keen attention to ambiance and details, for handmade sundaes and ice cream creations that are a work of art, wide range of ice creams and bottled sodas.. and it has only been open for 3 weeks! By 2 brothers who even dressed the part, it was just plain great! Next time you’re near by, stop by 116 Market Street, Philadelphia, cf. the website www.franklinfountain.com .. they should be featured on Food Network next.

space for emotions

I’ve started listening (picked up where I last left off) to the audio book version of Emotional Intelligence.. and via a rather circuitous route, I think I’ve developed notable emotional capacity in more areas than I thought I had, over the course of my adult years, and it’s probably due to the open posture I have to receiving feedback and to learning, that helps this along.. so some of it was very reassuring, and it tells me that I have more to offer this world than I thought I had.. I don’t particularly agree with the part where the author said that the human body was not designed to run at the pace of absorbing so much information, and going at the pace it goes at in today’s society.. (to be fair, for me to slow down is risky for me, b/c of my past experience in having time on my hand and seeing where my emotions take me negatively, a la a dark depressing spiral).. so to heed the expert’s observation, I made sure I stayed offline during worship service today, even though I brought in my laptop, and knew there was free WiFi for me to wire up and multitask.. but the good pastor still got in my blog fix, quoting a blogger’s entry from a while back as a part of his talk.