How about: Vögeln ruhm um dir Uhr.
Ben, I finished making my fully-referenced playlist. How does one make it available to the public? I am dumb. Email me.
This comment thread is never going to get busy, so it seems the place to ask about DCon2 or whatever it's called this year. Does driving down from Milton (near Toronto) seem sensible? Map things seem to tell me it's 500+ miles and will take 9 hours. I'm thinking this is a lot cheaper (especially for 2) than flying, which is a couple of hundred quid each. Also, any recommendations on places to stay or at least area to go for?
C and I had been hoping to fit in a couple of days away without the kids whilst we're over there (staying with my aunt and my parents are there over Christmas/NY too), so whilst he seems keen on this I'm going to try to present him with confirmation of why it would be a good idea and not cost us a fortune.
Following on asilon's threadjack. This is my third thread spam, but here goes: if anyone sees JL around here, please ask him to e-mail me. It's semi urgent. I sent him an e-mail at his yahoo account.
JL answers that email regularly.
My one concern, asilon, is that the weather might not cooperate. It's not typically snowy here in the District at that time, but your mileage will in fact vary; I'd look into weather along the way to determine whether that drive is 9 hours or 12 hours. My other concern, asilon, is that the party might not live up to 9 hours of hype—but leave that one to me.
Trolling Ben:Current listening, groups only:
Mount Rushmore,Keef Hartley,Van Morrison,Madura,Stevie Wonder,Truth(ex-Them),John Stewart,Decameron,Chris & Carla,Stonefield Tramp,Emmulou Harris,Loudest Whisper,Golden Earring,Stevie Wonder,Walter Horton,Hank Penny,Cold Blood,Blue Murder,Laura Nyro,FairportConvention,PhoebeSnow,Martin Carthy,Procol Harum,Magna Carta,HaymarketSquare,Bruce Haack,Big Brother & Holding Co,Little Walter,David Axelrod
I used to stream my listening on Shoutcast years ago.
4:I presume a Shoutcast stream would still work, all you need is Winamp and a URL to listen
Ben, I'm sure you've said this before, but is there a way to go listen to old shows? I've never caught one because I'm such a dazzingly busy whirlwhind of a gal, but I'd like to hear 'em later on, say when I'm grading all these fucking precalculus exams tonight hypothetically.
"AMONG FUCKING OTHERS" would be a good name for a band.
7 - ah, weather. Hadn't really thought of that. Will investigate further.
As for My other concern, asilon, is that the party might not live up to 9 hours of hype - I'm a grown up, I'm happy to accept responsibility for my own enjoyment. (Unless you're all as cunty as dsquared claims.) I guess we'd stay over a couple of nights, make it worth our while anyway. I understand there are other things to see and do in DC?
I understand there are other things to see and do in DC?
Not really, no. Sorry.
Many of the residents of DC are fond of launching poorly planned wars. Unfortunately they don't let just any random tourist enjoy that kind of fun.
I'm only diminishing expectations so that yours will be exceeded. Not a single one of us is a cunt!
Although some of us have them.
As I understand it, DC is alone among American cities in having world-class museums with free admission.
"World class" is up for debate, but most are free, yes.
Evelyn Glennie, Ben? Enticing!
With Fred Frith!
Heebie: selected old shows are available from this page.
"World class" is up for debate
Let's see all you fomer Debate Team nerds sort this out for us!
Resolved: Washington D.C. has world class museums.
World class
The Rembrandts in the national gallery are nice. Also photographs of American Indians in the NPG.
The National Gallery has paintings by most all of your artists with cocktail-party names, even if they aren't generally the best paintings. It's below most of the major European museums, but in the U.S. it's up there. I mean, the Met and maybe MOMA clearly exceed it, but I'd say it's at least equal to the MFA in Boston, and the main museums in Chicago, Cleveland and Pittsburgh.
Of course, I don't really know what I'm talking about -- this assessment is based entirely on wandering around in a daze looking at the pretty pictures in whatever city I happen to be in. Often while jet-lagged.
On thinking about it, not sure if you could say the National Gallery is better than Chicago, Cleveland, Boston. But it's comparable.
Also, the Phillips has a lot of charm, and the Corcoran is nice too.
The Holocaust museum is a little depressing.
Air! and! Space! Museum!
That is, if your s.o. is eleven.
Or, if they're me. Oooo, space capsules...
25 should have read "eleven like I am."
The National Gallery has bitching easels---with tarps!---available for amateur use in most rooms! I have never seen this before.
Also, the National Gallery has more Van Dykes than I ever knew to miss. While he's not (yet!) a special favorite, the collection is impressive. There are a lot of Rembrants too, including four or five real jaw-droppers.
25 should have read "which is pretty old for a republican to date."
"DC is alone among American cities in having world-class museums with free admission."
I am offended on behalf of my own museum, which is free. World-class is debatable as well, but so's everything. And the art museum and history museum in Raleigh are free too. They are less classy than the science museum, but what can you do without dinosaurs?
Ben, I was going to take this opportunity to ask you a stupid question, but I can't even come up with the right link. That's how stupid I am. There's a cool song on a DELL commercial and it's killing me not to know what it is. I'll see if I can find it and annoy you further.
Alison, for what it's worth, I drive 600 miles in 8-9 hours every holiday season (from NC to Alabama). We don't generally have snow or ice down here to contend with, but it's a very doable ride, even for one person alone (with CDs). With two people to switch off driving, it'd be a good road trip, I think.
Yeah, I don't mind the driving if it's just the two of us (though I have just been looking at train tickets to avoid a 350 mile journey to Scotland, alone with the kids, in February - have done it a few times and have had enough). Just wondering whether it was a realistic estimate I suppose. But even though neither C nor I are 11, I'm starting to get excited about the Air & Space Museum - if I don't come now I'm going to be disappointed.
9 hours sounds a little quick for 500+ miles; obviously it depends on the roads, weather, etc., but I don't think you should count on averaging a speed any faster than 50 mph.
FWIW, it used to take me 6 hours minimum (sometimes significantly longer due to weather or construction) to drive to DC from Teoville, which I would estimate is about 5 hours from Toronto. Driving directly would be a bit shorter, of course.
If you have decent interstate to drive on, you can easily average 60mph, even 65. It's the only reasonable way to do thousand mile days, which I've done often.
The main thing is, you don't stop much (which is much easier for some people with another driver to trade off with).
It's hard to do that on northeastern interstates, though.
36: fair enough, I've mostly done this west & central.
Yeah. I'm the wrong person to ask about driving, so I'm not going to opine directly about how long Toronto to DC would take, but longer than the distance on the map suggests. The last half of the drive is all in at least the outskirts of one urban area or another, and the roads aren't big straight wideopen interstates.
Toronto to Teoville, 5 hours? Toronto to Buffalo is less than 2 hours, unless Customs takes an interest in you.
Yeah, it's easy to average 60 mph or more in the west. In the northeast, though, the roads are smaller, the speed limits are lower, and the traffic is worse. Plus the weather is more of a gamble.
Driving from Oxford to Scotland, I would probably expect to average 80mph. More, maybe.
But the urbanized stretches, much less [the Birmingham/Manchester bit]. So what LB says in 38 seems reasonable.
I have shit-all knowledge about the US freeway system, though.
Buffalo to Teoville is about 2 hours. So maybe four total. I've never actually been to Toronto.
The last half of the drive is all in at least the outskirts of one urban area or another, and the roads aren't big straight wideopen interstates.
This is important. Traffic often slows to a crawl when you get into the sprawly suburban areas, and they start a long way from the actual cities.
I believe one would PROBABLY get ticketed if one tried to AVERAGE 80mph anywhere in the US outside Montana.
I don't know why an average of 60-65mph is unfeasible in the Northeast, though. Unless one expects to get stuck in rush hours around urban centers. I'm used to making trips like this that start around 6:30 PM, so I don't need to budget for rush hours.
It's feasible to average 60 or 65, given the proper conditions, but it's not a good idea to plan for it.
Also, this is going to be in December. Weather is an issue.
The National Gallery has a great collection, but it lacks progressive direction—its contemporary holdings are slight to nonexistent. I'm working on a piece right now about the scary conflicts of interest within the board and how they stymie their own growth. Beyond its photography holdings (which are the best in the world, I think), the Corcoran is a joke. I love, love, love the Phillips. I do like the Hirshhorn a great deal, too, though I'm nervous about recent administration moves there. The city lacks a proper Kunsthalle for showing contemporary art that's not tested. I think DC's probably on par with DC or SF for seeing art, just below LA and NYC; but the world is a very large place with cities like Berlin and Rome and London in it.
DC's probably on par with DC
Comforting to know.
The great advantage to living in Chicago is the proximity to midwest collections, which aren't slight. If it weren't so god-awfully cold there, I'd like to write about that scene.
49: One of those DCs s/b Chicago.
There are, of course, museums in DC that are not art museums.
re: 44
The speed limit in the UK is 70mph on motorways but it'd be rare to be ticketed unless you were going a lot over 80. On lots of the broader motorways with less heavy traffic the vast majority of cars would be doing well over 80.
I generally just sit at the speed of the prevailing traffic (ignoring the nutters doing well over 100 in the outside lane and the people doing 50 towing caravans). On longish journeys that usually means sitting at 75 - 85 for hours on end, punctuated by urban areas with more dense traffic.
My 350 mile trip is here to Melrose (Borders) and that takes me over 6 hours of driving time, so an average of less than 60 mph. Must be about the same distance as Oxford-Edinburgh, but I guess you can do more of that (pretty much all of it, depending on which way you go) on motorways. Not convinced by an average of 80 though!
This is what Google Maps is suggesting.
53: That sounds a lot like the western US, where the speed limit is generally 75 (now 80 in west Texas). Speed limits in the eastern US are generally around 65, though they vary by state, and there is a lot of traffic in urbanized areas, so average speeds tend to be a lot lower.
44 is wrong. I've averaged 80 many places outside of Montana without getting a ticket.
I believe one would PROBABLY get ticketed if one tried to AVERAGE 80mph anywhere in the US outside Montana.
In AZ the interstate speed limit is 75.
55: That's the route I would have suggested as well. You'll probably be able to go pretty fast through the New York and Pennsylvania portions, but it'll slow down a lot when you hit Maryland.
If it makes any difference, Chicago's a lot less cold the last few years: I haven't put out chairs for three or for years now. No guarantees, of course.
What do you mean, put out chairs?
OK, will add the photography at the Corcoran to my lure for C.
And thanks for all the driving advice so far - always grateful for more.
34:
9 hours sounds a little quick for 500+ miles
Seconded, or thirded -- LB's 38, The last half of the drive is all in at least the outskirts of one urban area or another,
is right. I've regularly driven from DC area to Massachusetts/New Hampshire/Vermont, and that's 8-9 hours; there are slowdowns every 45 minutes or hour between Connecticut and DC, *unless* you drive at night. (Doing so can shave a good 2 hours off the trip, and is worth considering.)
Driving at night through urban centers is a really effective technique, if you don't mind driving at night. Really early works, too.
As for things to do in DC, poking around the Smithsonian website isn't a bad idea. Some of the more obscure museums are actually a lot of fun, and they're all free.
64 written before seeing the reference to the route through Pennsylvania.
Driving 80 mph in Montana is permitted as long as you have an open bottle of beer in your hand.
between Connecticut and DC,
Yeah you have to time it right. I used to drive a couple of times a week between New Haven and Princeton and had the whole early-morning/late-night contraflow thing down to a fine art.
Although looking at the Google maps route, that's actually not as bad as I was thinking -- I hadn't visualised it clearly enough to remember how far west most of the trip would be. I'd say you don't get stuck in the urban sprawl on that route, like Teo says, until Maryland.
(Actually, what I think I was doing was planning the route as Toronto-NY, then NY-DC. Which would be an insane way to go.)
I love, love, love the Phillips.
The Phillips is amazing. I wasn't aware that the Corcoran had such a fantastic photographic collection. Is it on display? I must've missed it when I was there last.
So who's been keeping score? Or, more to the point, who's winning the debate?
And thanks for all the driving advice so far - always grateful for more.
In America, we drive on the right.
55, that should be pretty fast. The highway around Pittsburgh (I-76) is a turnpike (toll road with very few exits) so it isn't used much by commuters. The entirety of I-270 near the end could be pretty slow, though.
It seems like a more direct route to Philadelphia would be to go through the southern tier of NY and then down 476...but DC is farther west than Philadelphia, which I always forget.
Mom and I had the most fun at the Hirshhorn, I think. At least, it was the one place I felt we both had a really great time.
Mom has great but narrow taste. When she finally finds something she likes, she claps like a little girl. It's cute.
In America, we drive on the right
I've heard it anecdotally that a vast number of accidents during the war unfolded like this: Americans, often aircrew—high rank meant money, and they had access to fuel—would roll out of a bar at some early hour, pile in the car, forget themselves and head into the fog on the right side of the road, colliding with a lorry sooner or later. Apparently thousands of multiple fatality crashes just like that.
DC is farther west than Philadelphia
Yeah, significantly so. When I would drive down there from Teoville I went through Scranton, but that's actually pretty far out of the way. There's a more direct route, but it involves taking a lot of little country roads in Pennsylvania and may not be any faster.
People do the chair thing in Boston, too.
asilon, see also this thread for D.C.-visitin' ideas.
I could retrace Chopper's footsteps! I can't really imagine filling the time will be a problem. What about in the evenings though, in case I'm stuck at some boring function and need to escape?
What about in the evenings though, in case I'm stuck at some boring function and need to escape?
Plenty of helicopters, plenty of rope.
Now I am. This is oddly not-odd, so far.
Well, I did say I'd be playing Lyle Lovett.
81: Here in the District? We'll head to the Tavern, naturally.
I'm not one to brag, y'all, but that was just an awesome transition made all the more awesome for its sheer unlikeliness.
I'm getting a network error, ben. I suspect it's on my end. But I'll listen later.
Also, I admit that sometimes downloaders really are missing out. Box of Birch similarly.
I as well am network errors Stanley getting.
Stanley-getting network errors am as well I.
A good reason to allow a lot of extra time when driving to DC from anywhere.