On the road again - DC edition

I'm back on the research road - flying high above this quite large nation on my way to our Nation's capital. I'll spend a number of days on the ground there, pursuing a plethora of new angles. I arrive on a day I hope will not feature the Postal Service defaulting on the first of their sizable financial commitments. But that souffle may already be cooked, given that Congress hasn't acted on much of anything other than anti-abortion legislation as of late (unsuccessfully, it should be added). And what of the Ag Bill still hanging in limbo as the Nation struggles with a terrible drought? Not much happening there, either. What to do, you might ask, if there's so little goshdarn legislating being done in the required home of such activity? My schedule will be tight, but I am planning to mix it up with some frenzied museum time. Yes, I do indeed know how to party. For those keeping score at home, I have a wish list that includes the following:

• Fort McHenry in Baltimore is a place I know little about other than the basics - think War of 1812, the origins of "The Star Spangled Banner", and probably a fair amount of other stuff. It requires a trek. For those paying attention, however, I do dig being this sort of trekkie.
• Continuing along those Bicentennial themes, the National Portrait Gallery has a War of 1812 exhibit in place. I'd read a review a few months back that intrigued me. Prior to that, I only recall Stephen Colbert's hilarious pursuit of inclusion in the museum's holdings. Put this one at the top of my museum geek wish list for this visit.
• To finish the short list the nerd-poriums I'm hoping to bag, a secret plan to visit the Spy Museum has always stuck in the back of my neck like a poison-tipped dart. In a good way. So add that little divulged secret to the ledger.

I do have other plans. I'll keep y'all updated, if you'll be so good as to check back. But we're heading into Memphis - wow, now that's a sunrise worth tweeting about. As in what a bird should be doing - there's another word lost forever to modernity.

Not even a MILF or a scissors-wielding Mitt tops the snap on this lid.

Just sticking my head through the blogversational door for a few brief comments before heading back down to the salt mines. I'm surely not alone in seeing loads of stories worth earnestly discussing. Even with the current distracting titillation offered by stories on prep school bullying and being way too attached to certain parents. Amidst all that you've probably missed that the U.S. Postal Service threw a bone to rural America by deciding to keep a ton of small offices open a few hours a day for at least a few years. The deal likely will come to stink. But at least huge swaths of America can still make the trip into town to pick up and/or mail their manifestos. In even easier to miss news, the Labor Department has backed away from the overstated tempest in a teapot some feared might prevent farm families from hiring their own bairns. Or is it utes? Depends on the holler from which you hail, I reckon. As of now, this just means lots less job searching for farm kids throughout small town America. I can feel the collective disappointment for a subset of America's youth who lament never getting their shot at bagging your groceries. Takes one to know one, if you catch my drift. Finally, a totally missed case with an engrossing narrative effectively came to an end in Iowa yesterday when a last jailed defendant was paroled from prison. To mark that fact, not a single news story was filed, even though the parolee made the front page of the "Washington Post" two months ago. I'd link you somewhere worth going, but this case turned into Gertrude Stein's Oakland, if you know what I mean. Rest assured, I won't keep you hanging forever on that note.

In non-newsy news for a totally different reason (since I've not yet mentioned it), I'm about waist-deep into planning my next roadtrip. And it's a humdinger. This time I'm looking at two weeks and change spent traveling through densely-populated - and way in the middle of nothing - parts of Canada and the northeastern urban corridor of these United States. Mix in a little rural New York State and you've got me on the road from just after Memorial Day through mid-June. By then I plan to have some new tools up and running for everyone to keep tabs on the work in progress. Maybe more definite show to go with the rarely clear tell. However it's construed, check back. Please. And, thank y'all for doing so.

Moving on from bronzed pigs to mad cows

My week of playing tour guide turned out to be a complete delight. Don't tell anyone, but Seattle's most visited sights are still "walk right on" empty when April hasn't yet morphed into the proper touristy months. So all the way from the top of the Space Needle through the depths of the old MOHAI and the soon-to-be filled space wing of The Museum of Flight (those last two are personal faves) - we seemingly had the run of the City. Amidst all that free and/or easy access, I tried to keep my eye on more than a few stories of direct interest to my larger narrative. Such as another case of "mad cow disease" turning up at a truly Orwellian-sounding rendering plant in California. Or how 'bout the U.S. Senate punting on a fix for the Postal Service, leaving the House to possibly play the baddie and shutter vast swaths of this Constitutionally-mandated system? Yup - those both indeed happened. My personal near-term connection to "mad cow" research (its origins and importance) comes from a series of conversations I had at Washington State University while on the road the week before last. Which seems like months ago. Plus the whole U.S. snail mail conundrum fascinates me - how can we rescue and re-purpose a system so essential for an ever shrinking and yet evolving minority? I can think of no other debate on the nation's plate right now that better captures an "urban vs. rural" political dichotomy.

If you share some small measure of the interest in these or other salient issues, check back. I'll surely still be here, from time to time. Not standing near Rachel the Pig @ Pike Place Market - that was last week.

What comes to mind when traffic keeps me from "A Separation"

The older and more decidedly rooted in my urbanity I become, the more sensitive I become to the growing separation between urban and rural America. Not exactly sexy Friday night stuff. But I missed my art house movie, so this is what's on my mind at the moment. If we're discussing institutions that remain to hopefully bridge that physical and metaphorical separation, none that I can think of have the singular and almost spiritual importance packaged up in the grand metaphor of the U.S. Postal Service. There's very little news in the statement that these are tough times for that institution. But this week's release of truly terrible numbers from the last quarter of 2011 adds fuel to the engine driving toward a major retooling of what we all get for the price of a stamp. In a nutshell, a $3.3B loss during what should be the biggest time of year for the people still using the mail means drastic changes are ahead. From here, the debate over what to retain seems in need of a modern King Solomon. But for me it provides a fascinating test for how rural history will continue to intersect with commerce all over the map. Soon the debate will arise in Congress for all those Constitutional originalists who also supposedly wear the green eyeshades of deficit and/or debt hawks. Article One, baby - it's in there. Beyond that, though, anecdotes do matter. What about all those mail order businesses in small town America - should they send their specialty wares out by email? And what about newspapers? Imagine a daily paper being delayed by a few days - at the earliest, if the stripped down system remains. I keep looking for a Solomonic way of reasoning for this "split the baby and deliver it on time" conundrum. I'm just riffing here, but what about if we partnered a for-profit business with the idea of keeping all those thousands of small town meeting places occupied? If you keep the buildings, they will come. So get cracking (and packing), America. I'd hate to think of a Starbucks on Main Street in every small town across the Land, but that may be what sort of outside the drop box thinking that's called for in these new times. All I know for sure is that if the Postal Service is shuttered, I'll be clamoring to open a franchise for some new sort of Pony Express. Just imagine the crowds of romantics - and hipsters - looking to reclaim this analog manner of communicating. It could be the cat's pajamas.

Fondly posting about the Postal Service

I seldom see such an unromantic notion as that of abolishing the U.S. Postal Service for the sake of budgetary politics. This meme has been going on for ten days since the NYTimes appropriately gave it some Front Page dap. I'm still amazed that so few people have risen to defend this transcendent service. With renewed focus on the act of doing so, I visited our local Post Office this morning to pick up an Express Mail package. I waltzed through the door right at 9am, after dropping Maya at school. There was one car in the parking lot, no one in line, and the woman behind the counter greeted me like an old friend even though I've never seen her before. I'm sure that most of us have far fewer occasions than those around the holidaze when such a trip is required. But the thought of losing the overall cloud of things that make up the Postal Service painfully pinches the sentimental core of my brain. Combine all the retro-yet-still-utilitarian coolness in the world - vinyl records, Polaroid cameras, manual typewriters, knitting, growing your own vegetables, beer making, basically anything you'd ever find at a flea or farmers market - multiply it by 10 and you're less than halfway to the appreciation and loss factor I think we as a Nation would feel if we actually stuck a fork in the souffle that is the mail. Speaking as someone with his own stationary who still revels in the chance to use it, the loss of snail mail would be a crushing blow. I imagine most Americans can find distinct, personal reasons to keep the trucks rolling. I fondly remember the huge but still permissibly-sized old Hudson's Bay Company boxes we used to mail all manner of things all over the country. And those 35 boxes of books weighing in at over half of ton we mailed from San Francisco to Seattle when we moved? Thanks y'all - it was actually cheaper than having it go on a truck with the rest of our stuff. Which is surely part of the problem. Still...I fondly remember and relive the courting of my wife via snail mail letters. Yes, I said "courting" - that's how I roll. Come rain, sleet or gloom of night - let it be so for the foreseeable future.

Until the next page turns...may a barista you've not seen in a few months today have your coffee up on the counter before you even ask for it.