Jen heard on the grapevine that the Forest Diner was closing at the end of this week, so we drove out on Sunday evening to have one last bite before the doors close. Talking to our server, the story is that the whole property will be converted to a strip mall, and the adjacent ice cream stand has bought the dining car. Hopefully they’ll leave it alone and keep it intact.
I was getting used to driving past the collection of tents and banners in McKeldin Park every morning, and happy to see the fruits of civil protest at work. However, with temperatures in the 20’s overnight, I’ve been wondering how these dedicated folks were going to make it through the winter. I guess the city decided it for them, and from the sparse reports I’ve heard it was peaceful.
We’ve got a generator humming noisily in the backyard, connected via a 100-foot cord to our refrigerator. We had to throw out a couple hundred dollars’ worth of frozen food yesterday, even after we’d iced it down, which made me sick to my stomach. BG&E still claims we’ll be online sometime Friday evening, but I don’t believe anything they say right now. It seems like Baltimore County is the only place left in Maryland having problems getting power back.
We’ve got alternate housing plans for the Outer Banks next week; a house has been reserved in our name between Duck and Corolla north of the bridge, which means we just need to get down there in time to avoid Hurricane Katia. Special thanks go to Mr. Scout and his lovely wife, who did the legwork to save Christmas.
I was plugged into my headphones at work when I felt the first rumble, and at first I thought it was just another big truck driving by on Redwood Street. The rumble went on for too long and was too severe to be a truck, and just as I was pulling my headphones off, my coworkers were asking what was happening. We all started saying Earthquake at about the same time, and that was right as the first wave passed. Then, the second, more powerful one hit, and I felt the floor start moving in ripples underneath my feet. Another coworker came tearing down from upstairs, yelling, “Get out of the building!” and we all jumped from our desks like we’d been shot out of a cannon. Feet down pounding the stairs, outside to the street, where other people emptied out of their buildings and stood around gaping at the sky like us. Sirens wailed across the city. People stared into their cellphones and texted frantically. I’d left my phone, wallet, and keys on the desk upstairs, so I stood around feeling stupid until we decided the coast was clear, then went back upstairs to an “all circuits are busy” message and the magic of the Internet to confirm my girls were OK.
Not surprising, considering how bad the food sucked. It’s a shame, because ten years ago it was still really good; the new owner rode it into the ground.
