Dining Out for Life Tomorrow

Tomorrow is Dining Out for Life.

As the Food and Friends website states:

What Is Dining Out for Life? On Thursday, April 26th, more than 150 restaurants throughout the Washington, DC metropolitan area will donate 25%-110% of their proceeds to Food & Friends.

Simply by dining out, you'll ensure that thousands of children and adults facing HIV/AIDS, cancer and other life-challenging illnesses, receive the daily, nutritious meals so vital to their care.

So if you have a chance tomorrow, Thursday, April 26 see if you can participate in Dining Out for Life.

I plan to be at Posto on 14th Street.

I'll be having dinner with 9 other volunteers from Food and Friends.

You can go to the link above and find other restaurants that are participating in this great event.

Or if you can't go out you can help out by going to Whole Foods Market and get something from their Salad and Hot Bars. That will help out too.

HP New Media Gallery at the Newseum

I got to see a sneak preview of the gallery last night before it opened. It was so very cool. 


You come into the exhibit and the first thing you see is a screen that will take your picture. You then answer the question of the day. The picture is posted on a column in the middle of the exhibit.


Next are two large touch screen with various topics to pick from. You then learn about each of those topics. There might be Youtube video about them or tweets. The topics range from the serious to the not so serious. 


Then there is the make your own front page. There are a list of topics: National, World Politics, Business,Technology, Entertainment, Sports, Offbeat and Photos. You touch each of the categories and six stories are displayed. You can select from this list to "add" to your front page. You can also hit the refresh button to bring up additional stories. Once you've selected six stories you create the front page.


Here's a little more about the gallery:

WASHINGTON — The Newseum, in partnership with technology giant Hewlett-Packard, will open its 15th gallery on April 27, 2012.

The 2,500-square-foot HP New Media Gallery will be the first major gallery opening at the Newseum since 2008.

“The HP New Media gallery will give Newseum visitors a chance to step into a three-dimensional social network,” said Paul Sparrow, senior vice president of broadcasting at the Newseum.

Eight HP tablets in the “Check-In” station allow guests to snap a picture of themselves and post it to the gallery, email to a friend and/or publish on the Newseum’s website.
 
In “Choose the News,” visitors can flip through the latest news stories and build a customized tablet-based news page. The news pages are published to a large video wall powered by the HP Photon Engine solution.
 
At the “Story Board,” two 11-foot-wide HP VantagePoint touch walls let visitors read and watch milestone moments in the history of new media. Each wall has six monitors that allow up to 12 people to interact simultaneously.
 
The “Game Zone” offers four motion-tracking systems to play the trivia quiz “Dunk the Anchor.”
 
Two touch-screen monitors, one featuring live Twitter feeds and the other displaying photographs and content from the “Check-In” stations, instantly connect visitors to social networking.

Here are a few pictures of the new gallery.

This is the page I did. I called it Linus News

Rest of the Peanuts Series

Well it got overcast later in the day and it did rain some too. I went to a preview of an exhibit that's going to open at the Newseum at the end of the week. I'll pictures and more details on this very cool exhibit tomorrow.

Rainy Days and Sundays

In light of the dismal weather we had on Sunday, cold rain, I found this from Peanuts. I'll post the rest of the series a little later in the day.

Dessert from the Cheescake Factory

My friend Mark and I went to the Cheesecake Factory for lunch today. Here's what we had for dessert. It was yummy!

Daryl Hall at the Warner Theater

Friday I get to see Daryl Hall at the Warner Theater. He recreated Daryl's House on the stage. His guests were Sharon Jones and Allen Stone. It was a fantastic time. Below is a clip from the show.

Me and My Kindle

Here I am with the Kindle I won in the 10,000 steps a day program at work. So far I've only downloaded free books. I've read a Christmas Carol in part because I've never read it.

Now that I have the Kindle I need to look into setting up a wireless network at home. The first thing I'm going to look into is getting another internet service provider. I'm leaning toward going with Verizon but I have a few more questions that I need answered before I make the switch. I'm hoping to do that in the next week or so.

Two Very Funny Cat Videos

Both of these videos are about the cat Henri and his angst at being a cat. The narration is in French but it is subtitle in English. They are both hysterical.

Other Pictures of the Shuttle

Here are a couple more pictures of the fly over that I got from other people. I'm hoping to have more tomorrow as we all pool our pictures.

The Shuttle Flies Over DC

From the Washington Post:

A spectacular aerial tour pulled Washingtonians out of their offices Tuesday morning as the space shuttle Discovery, riding piggy-back on a 747, flew low and slow over the Capitol, White House, the Mall and much of the Potomac River. The duo touched down at Dulles International Airport, just a few miles from Discovery’s retirement home, the Smithsonian’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly.

We went to the top of the building I worked in. Here are some of shots I got. It was just an incredible thing to see.

The first picture is a shot from the roof of the building I work in looking toward the Washington Monument. And then along comes the shuttle!

Cherry Blossom Festival on the River

Last Saturday was the Southwest Waterfront Fireworks Festival celebrating the 100th Anniversary. There was something for everyone including fireworks. Bands, food trucks, activities for kids and did I mention fireworks. It was a very fun time.


























































































As the sun began to set, the boats that were decorated turned on their lights. Here are a couple of pictures.



































These are a group of Japanese drum performers. They were really good. I'll post some video of them in the next day or so.

Cherry Blossom Festival Fireworks

The fireworks started right on time at 8:30. They were shot off from a barge in the river. They were spectacular.

More Cherry Blossom Festival Fireworks