Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

How any woman could possibly vote for this smug smarmy piece of misogynistic crap is beyond understanding.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires.

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

At some point, the ability to learn is a factor of character, not IQ.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

Let there be snark.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

He really is that stupid.

The real work of an opposition party is to hold the people in power accountable.

Disappointing to see gov. newsom with his finger to the wind.

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

Dumb motherfuckers cannot understand a consequence that most 4 year olds have fully sorted out.

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

The republican speaker is a slippery little devil.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Entertaining Read: When the Neighbors Don’t Share Your Vision (and That Vision Involves ‘ Transformers’ Statues)

Entertaining Read: When the Neighbors Don’t Share Your Vision (and That Vision Involves ‘ Transformers’ Statues)

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A good time is always tasteless, as Jean Redpath once said during a Prairie Home Companion Show, back in the 80s. I don’t think this is a hoax — the statues are listed on Roadside America, and there are previous news reports about the controversy — but I’m not at all sure about Newton Howard. Anyone so precisely situated between a John Le Carre spy novel and The Thursday Murder Club seems too good for coarse Mundanity… Gift link, so y’all can be sure I’m not hallucinating:

The thing about putting a pair of 10-foot metal Transformers statues outside your townhouse in the most picturesque district of the nation’s capital is that the neighbors are going to have opinions.

And on Prospect Street in Georgetown, they were not pleased.

The statues — Bumblebee and Optimus Prime, two of the good guys from the long-running “Transformers” movie franchise — appeared in January 2021 outside the white-brick home of Newton Howard, a cognitive scientist and machine-learning expert with ties to the intelligence community.

He had ordered them from a factory in Taiwan to the tune of more than $25,000 each. Where large brick planters had once blended in with the local aesthetic, there was now something akin to outsider art by way of an anonymous welder and Hollywood’s reinterpretation of 1980s toys.

Plenty of people love the statues, which resemble invaders from the future, in a neighborhood that does its best to hang on to its cobblestone past. Students at nearby Georgetown University can’t get enough. Neither can tourists: The Transformers statues have their own entry on Google Maps as a place of interest, with 4.9 stars. “The best part of visiting Georgetown,” one reviewer declared…

Dr. Howard, a bald man with an unplaceable accent, wears dark round eyeglasses that come equipped with a camera and a microprocessor that allows him to translate languages on the spot, he said.

He paid $3.75 million for the townhouse and moved in during the pandemic. In 2021, he snapped up the one next door for $4.8 million. The homes lie close to his job at Georgetown University School of Medicine, where he is a research professor in the department of biochemistry and molecular and cellular biology. (He added to his real estate holdings in 2022, when he bought a $3.6 million home in Potomac, Md. It has 14 bathrooms and a bocce court.)…

Sally Quinn, the author and longtime Georgetown resident, said she was firmly in the anti-Transformers camp. “I think they’re really ugly,” she said. “Some people may like them. You know, everybody’s taste in art is different. But that’s not the point.”

The point, she continued, was historical preservation: “People come to Georgetown because it’s Georgetown. It’s a beautiful, quaint village.”

But the author Kitty Kelley, who said she has lived in the neighborhood for “two husbands,” or since 1977, sent Dr. Howard a handwritten card in support of his sidewalk flair…

In any dispute between Sally Quinn (They trashed the place, and it wasn’t *their* place) and Kitty Kelley, I am of course firmly on Team Kelley.

The interior of Dr. Howard’s home, which he said he decorated himself, resembled a lair. The glassy back of the townhouse overlooks the Potomac, where the buzz of jets headed into and out of Reagan National Airport adds to the techno-paradise vibe. Motorcycles were parked in the living areas as objets, and five more Transformer statues stood guard. There was also a giant model of Iron Man, a Marvel superhero dear to Dr. Howard.

“A lot of people used to call me the real Tony Stark,” he said, referring to Iron Man’s alter ego.

The memorabilia on display included his concealed carry permit, as well as framed photographs of him with Bill Clinton and Tim Tebow, the former N.F.L. quarterback who became known for kneeling in prayer on the field. Dr. Howard, who said he is a follower of Messianic Judaism, a religion sometimes referred to colloquially as Jews for Jesus, said that he and Mr. Tebow belong to the same fellowship group. (Mr. Tebow couldn’t be reached for comment.)…

Dr. Howard has gone through several transformations himself. He was born in the Sinai Peninsula when Israel controlled it. His family — Egyptian Jews who ended up living in France, he said — moved to the United States when he was 11.

He said he joined the Army at 18, then worked as a linguist in Michigan “across various agencies,” specializing in Arabic, Farsi and Dari. He changed his name around that time because, he said, “it was offered by an agency.” He declined to provide more detail.

“There’s a lot of things during that phase of my career that should be kept secret,” he said.

Dr. Howard — whose doctorates include concentrations in mathematics and neuroscience, and who holds an appointment at the University of Oxford alongside the one at Georgetown — is a curious mix of limelight-seeking and discreet. After college, he said, he worked in military intelligence. He later did work for InQTel, which is functionally the C.I.A.’s venture capital fund.

What precisely he did to get rich is unclear. He said his wealth resulted from selling various businesses, some of which he could not talk about. The walls of his townhouse are filled with commemorative plaques of his patents, many of which have defense industry applications, including “Wireless Network for Routing a Signal Without Using a Tower” and “System and Method for Automated Detection of Situational Awareness.”

He said he suffered a traumatic brain injury in 2000 while delivering medical supplies, though he declined to offer more detail. After his recovery, he decided to focus on applying the principles of machine learning to the human brain, and turned to neuroscience. “I figured instead of sitting and getting my brain worked on, I would work on it myself by studying it,” he said…

And now he is making the brains of some of his neighbors explode. To study, no doubt!

Reader Interactions

115Comments

  4. 4.

    Boris Rasputin (the evil twin)

    Hell, I thought “Optimus Prime” was a credit card. I am so out of popular culture.

  5. 5.

    Anne Laurie

    @oatler: As long as he doesn’t get involved with Musk…

    Oh, c’mon — you don’t wanna see Dr. Howard persuade Musk to try his very special, only for the most elite brain implant?

    The one that will make Musk’s ex-wives come back to him, his kids respect him, and his old man finally say he loves him?  And also turn Elon into a truly kewl Transformer-style cyborg?…

    Cuz I think Dr. Howard is the man who could do that.  And it might not add much to the body of global information, but it would be hella entertaining!

  6. 6.

    Tony Jay

    I’m not sure about Dr Howard on a number of levels, but I am sure that he’s at least on the shortlist for when I have to once again assemble a team of Extraordinarily Adventurous Gentlepeople to save the world(s) from unknowable peril.

    Don’t thank us, we’re in it for the thrill.

  7. 7.

    Tony Jay

    @Anne Laurie:

    That already exists. It’s called a coma-inducing mallet to the head and you don’t need a doctorate to apply it, just an opportunity and a getaway route.

  8. 8.

    There go two miscreants

    He seems rather peculiar, and I couldn’t care less about Marvel movies (although my son did have transformer toys growing up — almost as bad to step on as Legos), but anyone who pisses off Sally Quinn gets my seal of approval!

  10. 10.

    Raoul Paste

    That “trashed the place“ line will be the only thing that Sally Quinn is remembered for.

    It’s amazing that people like Dr Howard exist.  His relative Moe, on the other hand…..

  11. 11.

    Jager

    Can somebody get this information on Dr.  Howard to MTG, with a hint that he may have been on the team that developed the Jewish Space Lasers.  She’d be busy for the rest of her term.

  12. 12.

    dmsilev

    Pissing off Sally Quinn is a social good in and of itself, so he’s got that in his favor.

  15. 15.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Anne Laurie:

    Oh, c’mon — you don’t wanna see Dr. Howard persuade Musk to try his very special, only for the most elite brain implant?

    And after Musk gets the implants, hackers start sending non-stop music to Musk’s brain, starting with “Baby Shark” and progressing until they finally reach the music for The Disney Ride That Must Never Be Named. I’m sure the CIA would interested in the results. Because reasons.

  16. 16.

    Chacal Charles Calthrop

    sounds like your basic attention-seeking narcissist …

    I once read about a study that in the course of testing to see whether traumatic brain injury caused personality disorders discovered that having a personality disorder first made you more likely to get a traumatic brain injury, since impulsive behavior is one of the symptoms of a personality disorder and a large cause of traumatic brain injuries.

  17. 17.

    Omnes Omnibus

    Messianic Judaism and Tim Tebow? Sounds like a crazy who just happened to piss off Sally Quinn.

  19. 19.

    different-church-lady

    with ties to the intelligence community.

    Nope. Not falling for it.

  21. 21.

    Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg

    So he’s a batshit crazy lousy neighbor who doesn’t understand the aesthetic of the area he moved to, and doesn’t care.

    We need much higher confiscatory tax rates.

  25. 25.

    Sister Golden Bear

    A kindred spirit to Dr. Howard owns the famous/infamous Flintstone House south of San Franciso, visible from the 280.

    Personally I think it’s charmingly wackily, especially the outdoor yard sculptures. But the good uptight people of Hillsborough hate it.

  29. 29.

    Omnes Omnibus

    Are Alison Rose and I really the only people who saw Messianic Judaism and recoiled?

  32. 32.

    Alison Rose

    @Omnes Omnibus: I think many people don’t understand how repugnant it is, they think it’s just another branch of Judaism.

    Having been the target of a months-long conversion campaign in high school by these people, I will knee-jerk detest anyone involved in it.

  33. 33.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Alison Rose: Me too, me too.

    I still remember the Moral Majority takeovers of school districts growing up — although they ran as normie conservatives, and only unleashed their batshittiery after getting elected. Same shit, different decade, except even more than extreme. Eventually many of them will get voted out, just like last time, but they’ll do a lot damage first.

  36. 36.

    Alison Rose

    @Baud: They were my classmates, two girls who were both members of the same religious organization and who knew I was Jewish. I had a class with them junior year, and they started trying to get me to come to their youth group, but I already knew what it was and said no. For at least 4-5 months, they would keep inviting me to things and wanting to talk to me about their religion and shit. I think it finally stopped when I told the teacher I didn’t want to work on a project with them.

  42. 42.

    Tony Jay

    @different-church-lady:

    Now don’t be hasty. At least have a little go at it. You might enjoy it.

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    It’s been a bit of a crazy decade or two. I think we’re all just pretty inured to the idea that most rich people are bizarre fuck-ups in one way or another. It’s just a surprise that this one isn’t an actual Nazi.

  45. 45.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Raoul Paste:

    That “trashed the place“ line will be the only thing that Sally Quinn is remembered for.

    and she was quoting David Broder, the patron saint of Both-Sidesism

  46. 46.

    smith

    @Alison Rose: Kind of reminds me of neighbors of mine, Baptists, who thought my kids were prime candidates for saving. They’d invite them to church picnics, youth gatherings, etc. My kids were up for more activities but weren’t buying the Jesus stuff. To return the favor, my kids taught theirs how to trip the gumball machines in the local drugstore to get free gum. Not that I approved of my kids’ budding careers in crime, but was satisfied that  we were even.

  50. 50.

    Frank Wilhoit

    Over thirty years ago, in a neighborhood of Columbus, Ohio that is much less affluent than Georgetown but nearly equally self-regarding, one resident decorated his front yard with an art installation that included every imaginable form of found sculpture.  The overall effect was somewhat amateurish, slightly interesting, but extremely conspicuous amid its surroundings.  His neighbors spent years trying to get rid of it, and him, by every means they could think of.  All failed.  Eventually the cops swatted him and clapped him into a mental hospital.  The full story must be much more interesting than this bare outline, but we will probably never get it.

  54. 54.

    Alison Rose

    @smith: Baptists can be really hardcore about conversion! I’ll tell ya, that’s one thing among many that I like about being Jewish. We don’t do that shit. In fact, we make it hard as hell to convert! You have to reeeeally prove you want it and for the right reasons and that it’s the right fit for you. The idea of going out and trying to proselytize and convert random strangers is bizarre.

  55. 55.

    Geminid

    The “Messianic Jews” have tried to impress others with their mimicking of ancient Hebrew customs, but thus far they have little to shofar their efforts.

  58. 58.

    Kayla Rudbek

    Is Quiltingfool around? I’m going through my clothes and I wanted to ask her about the t-shirt quilt makers out there (I have a fair amount of college t-shirts that are worn out underneath the arms but I like the logos still).

  60. 60.

    Scamp Dog

    @Omnes Omnibus: I noticed it, but I don’t have the visceral reaction that you and Allison Rose have, and I’m sure you both have it for good reasons. My instant reaction was “pissing off Sally Quinn? Cool!”

    Thinking a bit more about the situation, I’m glad for infighting between these types of people.

  61. 61.

    smith

    @Alison Rose: I agree. In fact, I find it downright offensive when a random Baptist, Jehovah’s Witness, Morman, or Christopathic freelancer shows up at my door to tell me that what I believe is ALL WRONG, and they are there to grace me with their superior understanding. I tend not to be particularly polite — not going to respect their beliefs when they so patently don’t respect mine.

  62. 62.

    zhena gogolia

    @Alison Rose: Have you met the Lubavitchers?

    Actually, to be fair, they are targeting people they think are already Jewish. Like me.

  64. 64.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @smith: Tell that you are willing to listen to them but first they need to listen to your testimony about your Dark Lord Satan.

  66. 66.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Omnes Omnibus: my explanation, she’s seen her daddy’s balance sheet, and Papa Kushner’s

    She tells a story—which may also feel familiar at this point—about walking down Fifth Avenue with her father around the time of his divorce from her mother, when Ivanka was 9 or 10 years old. They saw a homeless man sitting outside Trump Tower. “I remember my father pointing to him and saying ‘You know, that guy has 8 billion dollars more than me,’ because he was in such extreme debt at that point,” she recalls. “It makes me all the more proud of my parents, that they got through that.”

    I, too, would be proud of my father for having been born to an actual successful real estate mogul who gave him a billion dollars

  67. 67.

    trollhattan

    Tech bros with money, man. At least I now know where Optimus Prime comes from. Thought it was a camping stove.

    If I don’t want a giant Transformer, or more than one, on my block am I a NIMBY?

  73. 73.

    Brachiator

    Plenty of people love the statues, which resemble invaders from the future, in a neighborhood that does its best to hang on to its cobblestone past.

    This story is stupid and pointless. But everybody has their thing. At breakfast I ran into a guy who is attending the Monsterpalooza event this weekend in Pasadena. He was a very pleasant older guy who was saying hello and wishing a good morning to everyone who passed his table.

    Monsterpalooza returns to the Pasadena Convention Center June 3-5 to celebrate the art of monsters and movie magic. Featuring over 450 exhibitors of the countries best artists and creatives, see makeup demos brought to life before your very eyes, meet celebrities from your favorite films, enter the Monsterpalooza Museum with incredible monstrous displays, and sit in on panels diving deep into the behind the scenes moments of iconic movies and much more.

    He was a little bummed that Bruce Campbell, from the Evil Dead films, had cancelled his appearance. But he was still going to have a good time.

    I wonder if Transformers count as monsters?

  74. 74.

    Gvg

    I don’t actually like tacky art displays but I know what happens when people try to make other people follow their taste.

    I don’t believe this guys story. He is fishy as heck. Don’t give him any money perhaps because you think it’s funny he is pissing off the right people.

    My parents lived in a nice neighborhood without a HOA and had a problem neighbor with a hoarding habit. The guy it turned out had bought several houses, filled them with junk, didn’t live in them or maintain them, didn’t mow and eventually there were roof problems. It did cause property values to drop near him. There were rats seen going in and out of the house. He was violating codes and was reported and did get tickets which he mostly ignored and I guess the county didn’t have much recourse…they didn’t want to take the properties. Kept having court hearings and demanding he do clean up or mowing and billing which he didn’t pay. Family didn’t want to declare him incompetent. He was though. Not sure it ever got solves. You can’t force someone to be sane and institutionalizing someone is an extreme step. Not even a HOA can really deal with that.

    Irritating or different taste is more ordinary. But people ought to be taught you just can’t ever control what other peoples taste is and there are going to be what you think of as eyesores.

  76. 76.

    eversor

    @Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg:

    Not really.  Everyone here understands that area.  I grew up in this general area and live next to Georgetown and know more than a few people, some close childhood friends, that live in Georgetown proper.

    It’s always been full of plenty of kitsch and tasteless crap.  It’s also always been hostile to people who don’t come from the right backgrounds, went to the right schools, and have the right jobs.  A lawyer who grew up in Georgetown or Potomac MD living there and have trashy art in the front yard and windows with loud ass cars is fine.  An engineer from out of the country doing it is not.  It’s not about what you are doing there, it’s you didn’t grow up in the right places or have the right job and you don’t belong here.

    It’s a place where Pride and BLM flags are everywhere and all the locals will pat themselves on the back about how woke they are.  But don’t you dare play that music for your garden party and if you mention raising their taxes your a persona non grata.

    It’s a liberal as all hell place that’s upper class educations and jobs make it more hostile to non upper class whites than any of the GOP gated style communities but cloaks it’s self in symbolism that let’s it justify it’s elitism.

    The SO is a dark skinned filipina who’s family is all in the US.  She likes singing in choirs and was searching for a local Catholic Church.  While I dislike it, I’m not going to stop it.  The two closest to us are in Georgetown and in Clarendon VA.   For those not from here Arlington VA right outside of DC has lofts and condos that will sticker shock people even used to Georgetown Townhome prices.  It’s not cheap.   While the Georgetown Church had BLM and Pride flags it was made clear that she and her niece were not welcome there and it was all white people.   The ranting about homosexuality and abortion church in Clarendon VA openly welcomed them and was mostly young people, Latinos, and Asians.

    Even if he is just doing this to piss them off good on him.  Besides Dupont Circle is more expensive now, has better food, and ain’t nobody going to give you shit about shit there.   If I had the cash to fling 3.5 million at housing I’d get one of those nice new Arlington condo/lofts or buy in Dupont

    EDIT-  I should also notice that here in Arlington we have affordable housing complexes for the poor and mentally ill.  Lot’s of them.  That we voted to allow and help fund.  Georgetown refuses to do that.   So despite condos here costing more than in good old GT, we don’t chase the poor out.  People here like them.  And do not complain about the music, drinking, and outdoor cooking late at night on the weekend.  Some show up with meat and hang out.   As a result we don’t have tent camps and piles of human feces building up under bridges by the canal like Georgetown does.

  77. 77.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Omnes Omnibus: I just like repeating that story. I think that bankruptcy was around the same time, per Mary Trump, that he got depressed and started thinking he was going to die, and told his brother he had set aside $10M for Marla if anything happened, and Robert said, “What a cheap bastard!” (or some such) and that’s when Mary started to suspect she was getting the short end of the stick

  78. 78.

    Sid_Viscous

    Tell me it’s not funny that among the folks who’s all sour about Dr Howard is the accomplished polymath/brainiac Luke Russert. It’s quite laughable that these two can be quoted in the same story.

  80. 80.

    karen marie

    What I find far more offensive than the statues is the state of disrepair and lax maintenance of the brick bases.  With the kind of money Howard tosses around, you’d think he could afford a handyman to maintain the property.

  81. 81.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Sid_Viscous: Tell me it’s not funny that among the folks who’s all sour about Dr Howard is the accomplished polymath/brainiac Luke Russert

    oh god, speaking of the lucky sperm club. those syrupy, fawning  MSNBC segments a couple of weeks ago when he was pitching his book– which is somehow a best-seller– were embarrassing for everyone involved. I gather Monsignor Punkinhead really was a mensch behind the scenes and in his personal life, but Luke radiates smug like no one else this side of the Bush family

    Tim Russet protected Olberman when KO went anti-Bush, I wonder what Russert would’ve thought if he knew that was the beginning of MSNBC become the “liberal” cable channel

  82. 82.

    Alison Rose

    @Omnes Omnibus: Well, I have my personal doubts about the sincerity of her conversion, since she only did it so she could marry her Real Doll Jared after his parents balked at him getting hitched to a shiksa. Apparently she studied with someone at a Modern Orthodox organization and did the conversion process, but like…it typically takes about a year, sometimes longer, and it seems she did it in a few months, so…who knows. But if she managed to grease some palms, that doesn’t mean the religion as a whole is lax about it. As I said, in general, it is a difficult process to even begin. You usually have to ask three times on separate occasions before you can even start the work. She might be an exception, but that doesn’t say anything about the majority of situations.

  84. 84.

    Maxim

    @Brachiator: That’s cool. One of my cousins is an artist who’s done some monster work for one of the studios, but I don’t know if he’s part of that or not.

    @Alison Rose: Another one of my cousins converted years ago. It was not a speedy process.

  85. 85.

    Ohio Mom

    Is there any part of Newton Howard’s life story that adds up?

    In particular, I keep wondering, “But where did he get all that money?” A question that the article sidesteps. How silly of me, to think that what a reporter is supposed to do is dig for information that the average person has no access to, and to, well, report it.

    On another note, the only Messianic adherent I ever met was someone I worked with, long ago. She was a Christian who belonged to a Christian congregation that celebrated Jewish holidays like Jesus did. I am sure that whatever they did was completely anachronistic and would be a complete puzzle to Jesus if he ever showed up.

  86. 86.

    mrmoshpotato

    He had ordered them from a factory in Taiwan to the tune of more than $25,000 each.

    Holy moly!

  88. 88.

    different-church-lady

    @mrmoshpotato: This makes me incredibly stabby: I’ve tried my whole life to be sane and hard-working and now I can’t even afford a normal-sized Transformer.

  89. 89.

    evodevo

    @Sister Golden Bear: We had a talibangelical teabagger run for mayor in Scott Co. KY, and won (2006 or so)…she had been on the city council for a couple years, so people should have had a clue…anyway, her reign was a pre-Trumpian shitshow, and the guy who ran against her in the next election had the slogan “vote for a return to sanity”…he won in a landslide LOL

  94. 94.

    Alison Rose

    @Ohio Mom:

    a Christian congregation that celebrated Jewish holidays like Jesus did

    This makes me want to break stuff. It is so antisemitic and inappropriate for them to do this, not to mention the fact that most modern observations of Jewish holidays would be barely similar at all to how Jesus might have marked the same occasions. So they’re ignorant while also being proudly bigoted. BLEH.

  96. 96.

    smith

    @Ohio Mom:Is there any part of Newton Howard’s life story that adds up?

    My initial reaction was that Newton Howard was the product of a bored journalist trying out ideas for the comic/surreal novel he plans to write  someday.

  104. 104.

    kalakal

    I don’t believe a word ‘Howard’ says but the stories amusing. Shades of Heinrich Schliemann.

    Old Heinrich was a somewhat shady character, a brilliant linguist and a self taught archaeologist who worked out where he thought Troy was from taking Homer as the literal truth, went to X marks the spot, and dug up a ruined city that is generally considered to be the very place itself. He proceeded to merrily dig his way around the sites of classical Greece, became suspiciously rich, and bought himself a mansion in the most upmarket spot of Athens.  He then shocked the neighbours by putting copies of classical Greek statues all around the rooftop balustrades. The neighbours reacted to the statues like Floridians to Michaelangelo’s David at this outrageous display of dangly and bulbous bits. He had a great time, the proles loved it and he would regularly troll the neighbours by dressing up the statues in ridiculous outfits and then, cheered on by huge crowds do a striptease performance with the statues. These days the place is a museum and the statues widely admired.

    Schliemann

  105. 105.

    Brachiator

    @kalakal:

    Old Heinrich was a somewhat shady character, a brilliant linguist and a self taught archaeologist who worked out where he thought Troy was from taking Homer as the literal truth, went to X marks the spot, and dug up a ruined city that is generally considered to be the very place itself.

    I thought that subsequent discoveries have found layers revealing multiple cities over the span of time.

    He had a great time, the proles loved it and he would regularly troll the neighbours by dressing up the statues in ridiculous outfits and then, cheered on by huge crowds do a striptease performance with the statues. These days the place is a museum and the statues widely admired.

    I don’t think that Transformers statues would stand the test of time, but I applaud the idea of trolling the neighbors.

  106. 106.

    kalakal

    @Brachiator:

    I thought that subsequent discoveries have found layers revealing multiple cities over the span of time.

    That is the case. Lots of them.

    IIRC Schliemann actually dug through the Troy of the legends, something like he exacted Troy Vb and the one of the right age is VIIa.

    There’s a good book on Schliemann, he was quite the character

    Treasure and Deceit

  107. 107.

    Dopey-o

    Jew for Jesus – wouldn’t that be the Apostles? Who are these johnny-come-latelies?

  109. 109.

    Quiltingfool

    @Kayla Rudbek: I have made several t-shirt quilts.  I try to avoid the “12 inch shirt blocks all stuck together” style of T-shirt quilts.  Boring.  My t-shirt quilts involved a LOT OF MATH, but they are a bit more lively, I think.

    Here are two quilts I’ve done (no photos for others) https://pin.it/3Aw6wh0

    (customer’s daughter was very involved in church as you can tell!)  I didn’t do big squares as the daughter was very slim and had tiny shirts, plus, boring)

    This quilt was done in squares (after I told you I didn’t do that), but these were big t shirts with big designs.  And, not a lot of shirts.  I did put in some pieced blocks for a bit of variety.
    https://pin.it/44e1kUP

  110. 110.

    anastasio beaverhausen

    Can I offer this more upbeat neighbor, also from our Nation’s Capital? instagram.com/barbie_pond_ave_q

    “Lowering property values in Logan Circle since 2014”  A friend started this on a lark nearly a decade ago and it has morphed into a must see tourist stop in the neighborhood.  Proudly progressive, and definitely gay, Barbie and shirtless Ken constantly poke fun of the conservative powers that be.  And generally just have a good time.  Enjoy!

  112. 112.

    JaySinWA

    @Omnes Omnibus: No, you were not the only ones

    ETA I sat through a presentation at the church I grew up in from these clowns. It was apparent that they were either not the brightest bulbs, or were less than honest. Probably both. The pastor was non-committal about the group. I wonder who arranged the presentation.

  113. 113.

    Pete Downunder

    The discussion about Baptists reminds me of the late, great Molly Ivins who said something to the effect that the problem with Southern Baptists is that they didn’t hold them under water long enough.

  114. 114.

    trnc

    In any dispute between Sally Quinn (They trashed the place, and it wasn’t *their* place) and Kitty Kelley, I am of course firmly on Team Kelley.

    A few other people live around there, so I’m not willing to render their opinions worthless just because one dipshit I don’t like is pissed off. I would have though the historic district would have some restrictions that prohibit this, so I’m a little surprised it’s allowed.

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