ndmckinney|net

I love that flickr is so friendly.

NPR is reporting that Charlotte Louise Berry Winters has died at the age of 109. She was the last known surviving female veteran of WWI. According to the report, there are now only 5 veterans of WWI alive in the United States.

It’s amazing to thing how little an impact the Great War has had on the long-term history of our nation. At one point it was a big deal (think Armistice Day); but now, in the words of Kurt Vonnegut, “Armistice Day was sacred. Veteran’s Day is not.”

There is a memorial to the D.C. residents who served in WWI on the national mall. It sits beneath the shadow of the Lincoln Memorial. Most visitors to the mall never even notice that it is there; it can only be accessed by a dirt path from the Lincoln Memorial (next to the entrance to the Korean War memorial) leading towards Independence Ave. Once an object of great slpendor, it is now in danger of collapse due to neglect.

I went out today and took a number of photographs. I’ll be releasing them over the next few days (instead of one day of blogging).

Towards the end of my tour of the District (and about ten minutes before a massive downpour) I walked down along the waterfront in Georgetown. It’s a quiet, albeit somewhat touristy section, of Georgetown.

Certainly, there are a few noticeable landmarks along the waterfront. The Watergate Hotel, pictured on the left, is located here. Most renown for helping to take down a president, the Watergate, like so many other properties in the District, is being converted into condominiums. The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, on the right, is located next door. The Kennedy Center is one of the cultural landmarks of the city, and the associated Kennedy Center Honors give tribute to the lifelong career of so many in American entertainment.

The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal is also located near to the Waterfront area in Georgetown. George Washington himself ordered the construction of the canal, since the Potomac river is not navigable past Great Falls, just west of the District. The canal began operation in 1836 to ship goods and services to Cumberland, Maryland, where they could continue their journey west. The canal was plagued with problems and ceased operations in 1924. Justice Douglas helped motivate a campaign for the restoration of the canal as a recreational area with an 8-day hike up the entire length of the canal.

Of course, not everything in the District is as it should be. Like many cities, the District has a problem with pollution. What is particularly disgusting about the District’s pollution problem is the sewer system. The sign in the photograph above says it all. I’ll make two comments about the photo: (1) the photo above was taken about ten minutes before a massive downpour; (2) the kayakers in the background are paddling upstream, away from the dock. Yuck.

Thus ends my brief tour of the Georgetown waterfront. Stay tuned for other aspects of the city.

Apparently, a group of chimpanzees in Sierra Leone are mad as hell at not going to take it anymore. Perhaps deciding that they were tired of being in captivity, the chimps revolted, killing one man and injuring two others.

All joking aside, the chimps are in dangers of being of being wiped out in West Africa. Unfortunately, the sanctuaries are perhaps the only places left in the world for them. More people need to take the lead of the chimps and become more proactive against the harm coming to our taxonomical cousins.

A game that’s fun for the occasional waste of time is Fishy. The rules of the game are simple enough: you’re a little fish that can only eat smaller fish. If you encounter a bigger fish, *GULP* you’re gone.

The one problem with the game is that there comes a point when there are no more bigger fish. Once this critical mass, it’s only a moment until…

It’s a guilty pleasure to do this to the environment…