At the farmer's market

Later. Sightings I forgot to note earlier.

• An interesting sign, in the adjacent flea market, from a vendor wishing the mothers there a Happy Fathers’ Day since they were “mothers and fathers both.”
• There were computers for sale, all towers from six to ten years old. Pentium 3s (at best) with Windows 98 installed. The phrase “digital divide” ran through my head, and I wondered what kind of Linux might make the most of these machines yet accommodate new and perhaps skiddish users.

I went to the D.C.’s Capital City Market this morning. Some things are more important than blogging.

The market, near the corner of Florida Avenue and New York Avenues NE and next to Gallaudet University, isn’t your chi-chi, sustainable, local organic market. It is mostly wholesale, loud, smelly with garbage all over the place and I love it. The newish New York Avenue Metro station puts the Union Market within easier reach because — believe you me — you don’t want to drive (not that I have a car) and the bus service could be a lot better.

A few observations:

• The market is important for small merchants who only sell a few onions or potatoes and other vegetables: the only vegetables available in some neighborhoods.
• That said, a lot of people go their for their groceries: vegetables, fruit and meat mainly.
• On the subway, the only newspaper left behind was in Spanish. I can get the gist of a Spanish-language newspaper, but it gave me pause to realize I was able to read Brazilian butt lift in a plastic surgeon’s ad.
• The market is at risk by — what else? — redevelopment for condos.
• I got beets, parsley, cabbage, mint, watercress, cucumbers and celery worth about $20 for less than $8.
• I found a stall that sells hoop cheese (got a pound, $5), chow chow (got a half pint, $2) and poke salat (none today, thanks).
• Two 450 gram boxes of loose black tea at the halal market, $3 each plus some mixed vegetable curry spice for 89 cents.
• Two pounds of wonton skins for $3. (Perhaps for making little pierogi?)

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