DC and what not

Alright, alright. I know you're all dying to hear how my life is going. To start things off right, I want to share this picture I made Jeff surreptitiously take with his phone the other day (if you can't tell, that Obama bill says ZERO $).

Secondly, my research is funny. Yes, you read that right, funny. Perhaps my sense of humor has become distorted since spending days alone in a basement, looking through papers and photos by myself while wearing dainty white gloves. But, perhaps not. This is my favorite find of late:

I am researching a playwrite named Henry Francis Downing. Mr. Downing was an African American diplomat to Liberia in the late 1800s. He tried trading, business, writing, everything. Pretty much failed at it all. Hence, I am trying to recover his plays and anything else on him because he was forgotten by the world (but not by me). Don't get my wrong, although he was a terrible writer, I somehow am fascinated by his story. I found two letters the other day, from Downing to Spingarn, a guy who helped found the research center where I am currently working.

Letter 1. Downing announcing that he would like to dedicate his new novel, “The American Calvary-Man” to Arthur Spingarn. Why? For Spingarn's efforts on the behalf of American Negroes. Downing asks whether Arthur will accept the book dedication, pretty please with a cherry on top. The letter is dated August 20,1916, from London, England.

Letter 2. Next letter, dated November of the same year. Downing writes to "Doctor Spingarn" saying that he accidentally sent a book dedication request to the Doctor’s brother, Arthur, which was an accident. He thought that Arthur was the Doctor. Whoops. Downing asks whether Doctor will accept the dedication because he is sooo wonderful and smart and cool. And besides, Arthur never wrote back anyway, so no hard feelings right?

The poor guy never got anything right.

Otherwise DC is hot, in more ways than one, ya know?