• It’s outdoors.
• It’s local, from Wheaton’s wonderful Brookside Gardens.
• It shows storm damage. We had three storm-induced power cuts this summer: 54 hours, 24 hours, 4 hours.

I regard summer as over, since MoCo schools have restarted. Maddie started first grade yesterday.

Moco outdoor pools have gone into post-season mode, which means that they aren’t open on weekdays. We could really use them this week, with temperatures heading up towards 100, but I guess that many of the outdoor pool staff have gone back to high school, and that it was impossible to know very far ahead that this week would be hotter than most of the earlier part of August.

Post-season ends, and the outdoor pools close until next year (June?) after Labor Day. For someone who grew up outside this country, the status of Labor Day as a hard end of summer is even more amazing than spelling Labor without a u. It seems particularly silly when it comes to closing swimming pools in this climate.

That said, we had a good summer, and we’re having a good time as summer turns to autumn (all right then, fall).

• Application (N-400) sent: 5/26/10
• Receipt date: 5/28
• Priority date: 5/28
• Fingerprint appointment: 7/12
• Naturalization interview: 8/26/10

So from sending the N-400 to the interview was exactly 3 calendar months. That’s rather faster than I expected. The interview was also rather faster than I expected, starting on time and taking rather less than the 2 hours the interview notice advised me to plan for.

I note that taking US citizenship does not strip me of my UK citizenship.

On the 4th of July, we went to Grand Caverns, a cool destination in more ways than one: it was interesting, and about 40 degrees below the heat of the great outdoors. Then it was back to Charlottesville for the fireworks, which were a lot of fun to watch from a blanket on a high school field.

First we went to a start of season party at the Parkland Pool, on Arcola in Wheaton. We found out about the party via a flyer at the nearby Little Gym of Silver Spring, where the kids enjoyed some classes during the spring. Although we enjoyed the party and liked the pool, Parkland is more of a club, and more of a $ commitment, than we are looking for.

Second, in terms of pools visited, was the Wheaton/Glenmont Pool. It fits our family well, as do many things run by Montgomery County.

As well as a toddler pool and a big pool, Wheaton has a kid pool, which ranges gradually in depth from almost nothing to about a meter. There’s also an adventure pool, for which none of us are quite ready. We decided that $275 for a family season pass would provide savings, as well as fun and coolness.

The third pool we visited is at the YMCA in Silver Spring. I’m starting this post as Maddie (6) is having a lesson in the indoor pool. We went for lessons there largely because of the timing: four mornings a week for the two weeks between Maddie’s school and summer school.

Today brought an incentive to make further use of the Y, in the form of a coupon. Today’s Groupon is $20 for a One-Month Family Membership, Two Personal-Training Sessions or Two Private Tennis Lessons, and $25 Toward Programs at the YMCA of Metropolitan Washington (which includes the Silver Spring location).

Although it’s ~45 minutes from Wheaton, I might well take the whole family, including 3yo, to Homestead. The strawberries were great. The supporting cast of staff, tractors, pygmy goats, etc., added to the fun. So did the weather, with clouds replacing the hot sun of the previous few days without dumping the threatened rain on us.

The photo is from the local Gazette. It shows lemongrass chicken from the Saigonese Restaurant. The Saigonese stall was the first one I visited; we intend to have more of their food.

We enjoyed our first-ever pupasas. I forget which stall they were from, and more than one place in Wheaton does them.

We (mainly the kids) had noodles from Hollywood East Cafe. Hollywood East recently got a glowing writeup in the Washington City Paper, which recommends Wheaton over DC for dim sum.

There is, however, at least one vital ingredient missing from Wheaton’s restaurant scene. There is no Indian restaurant. From my review-surfing, it seems as though the nearest good non-veggie Indian restaurant is quite a way away. I hope you can tell me I’m wrong…

Hurricane Agnes.. in his grandparents’ Silver Spring home: He and younger brother Steve went to bed in the basement, only to awake to the “magic” of a suddenly flooded floor. Chabon writes that it was Max’s bedroom in “Where the Wild Things Are” come to real, rippling life.

My favorite Chabon novel is The Yiddish Policemen’s Union, by the way.

I’ve been meaning to sign up for Groupon for a while, despite my cutting down on the number of web services I sign up for. I knew that DC was one of the locations.

It’s actually better, and more local, than that. Three months ago, Groupon introduced hyperlocality, starting in the DC area. What does that mean?

It means that our own Montgomery County, MD, gets its own Groupon every day. There are currently two other DC-area Groupon regions: Northern VA, and DC itself.

Exhibits open at 10:00, and we turned into the grounds, toward the parking lots, about 10 minutes after that. We were waved past full parking lots, then directed to turn round and leave again, all lots being full. Luckily, we found parking on the street nearby. There was a 2-hour limit, which would not be long enough, but I decided to risk the parking ticket (the most prominent alternative being heading straight home). The kids (6 and 3) were pretty patient during all this.

After we took in the Asia Trail and a few other exhibits, it was time for an early lunch. Given the crowds, that meant another wait in line, and sitting on a wall when all the tables were occupied. But the kids enjoyed their lunch: here they are working on the apple sauce course.

We saw less than half of the zoo – not because of the crowds, but because the zoo is so huge. I was mocked for being scared of the snapping turtle in the reptile house. A good time was had by all. And we didn’t get a parking ticket after all.

Not that I’ll be able to vote for Murray, or for anyone else, being a victim of taxation without representation. But a resident alien can dream.

There’s lots of online coverage of Murray’s run for office: NPR, Changing Way, etc.