THE WEISS CHRONICLES

Sunday, October 31, 2010

Havre de Grace Visit

Ann and I were in Havre de Grace to visit our friend Sue Myers.

For the second time we bought stuff at the gift shop of the Maritime Museum.

The Museum had a new exhibit since the previous time we were there. It included some petraglyphs from the lower Susquehanna River which were created about 1000 to 1500 years ago. So these were the second petraglyphs we had seen this year (we saw some at Dinosaur National Park that were also from this time period).

posted by Martin Weiss # 11:00 PM

Friday, October 29, 2010

Walking through the botanical garden in Atlanta

Ann and I went there on Oct 28, 2010.

They had just opened up the canopy walk (see first image). In this you are on an elevate

d walkway about halfway between the tree tops and the ground. The botanical garden says this was inspired by the dancing of Ginger Rodgers and Fred Astaire. However, I didn't get it. Also, the garden brags about the lightness of the structure, but personally, I thought it could have been made much lighter. It is about 600 feet long and said to be the longest such walk in North America. Personally, I found it a bit boring. There are tree branches below you and tree branches above you. Once you get that, so what.

The had a cell phone guided tour so you called a number and punched a number to get a narrative of what you were seeing. This is certainly far less expensive than the practice of distributing headsets (or course if it were an all inside exhibit the cell phone thing might be distracting and noisy).

I found some of the art in the garden very enjoyable, however. The mask is a ceramic and organic combination. The art near the waterfall is ceramic on concrete. The final piece is blown glass (it has a fountain underneath it and you can see water gurgling within the glass sculpture if you go close to it. There were a lot of more fanciful things (I think these may have been temporary sculpture) for example an octopus made of bubble wrap and dogs drinking beer. I really liked those. One of them was a papermache of the Beetles.

Also, I thought it was stunning to see the skyline of the central business district in the background.

They have a world class orchid collection there, however, you have to be really a fan of orchids to appreciate it and I am not.

We used cabs to get to and from the garden since we didn't rent a car this visit.

posted by Martin Weiss # 11:07 AM

Thursday, October 28, 2010

Interesting Visit to Atlanta

Ann and I were in Atlanta, GA from Oct 26-28.

Here are three interesting events.

1. On my previous visit here (Sept 14-16, 2010), I left a pair of sunglasses in my room. They returned it to my mother in law for her to keep until we returned. Of course by then I had purchased new sunglasses so we had extras.

2. My wife left her cell phone somewhere. Someone found it and brought it to the concierge who called me and we retrieved it.

3. While I was in the swimming pool (they let guests swim once they sign a disclaimer), there was a tornado warning. I had to get out of the pool and go to an interior room. After that was over there was another alarm while I was in the pool again. This time the 'all clear' was announced within a minute or two of the alarm.

posted by Martin Weiss # 11:58 PM

Saturday, October 23, 2010

M& A in Israel

Ann and I were in Israel Oct 12 to Oct 20.

I have a detailed blog of this elsewhere.

We stayed in Herziliya and made trips to Tiberias and Rosh Hanikra and spent a lot of time with Beth.

posted by Martin Weiss # 5:05 PM

Wednesday, October 06, 2010

George Discovers a Good Deal

G has been taking his dry cleaning to a place called "Cleaner Max" on Rockville Pike.

They only charge $3.75 or so for a two piece suit.

Not only that, they fix buttons and stuff for free.