Creative Non-Fiction

1830s Paris is home to a variety of sensational characters, among them the woman who writes under the pseudonym George Sand, dresses in men’s clothes, and openly scorns the institution of marriage. She attends a weekend gathering of some of France's greatest artistic and creative minds and encounters composer Frédéric Chopin, with whom she’s fallen in love solely from hearing his music – this will be their first meeting. If opposites attract, the robust and provocative Sand should easily seduce the frail and shy Chopin. However, her pursuit is complicated by other guests, including some of her former lovers and another woman who has also set her sights on Chopin. ■ Title — *Impromptu* ■ Director — James Lapine ■ Cast — Judy Davis, Hugh Grant, Mandy Patinkin ■ Rating — PG-13 ■ ©1991 \| 1h 47m \| Biography\, Comedy\, Drama\, Music\, Romance ■ Watch it free with ads on Tubi: https://tubitv.com/movies/486600/impromptu ■ Available free without ads to Hoopla subscribers: https://www.hoopladigital.com/title/11080238 ■ As with most of our online features, you can watch this one whenever you like. Members who watch at the scheduled time may enjoy exchanging comments with other members on this page. If you post a comment before the show, please avoid spoilers. Comments posted after the show may contain any content, but Oddball Cinema encourages members to always avoid spoilers unless there’s some particularly important details you need to mention. ■ Many of the movies on our online events from as far back as March 2020 are still available for viewing. However, titles sometimes move from one streaming service to another. If you find that the links on an old event no longer work, you can search for the current providers of any title here: https://justwatch.com

Looking for a quiet, focused space to write? Come be part of our writing group—a dedicated time just for writing alongside fellow writers in your community. No readings, no critiques, no peer-review—just you writing within a supportive atmosphere. 7pm-7:15pm: Find your seat, set up your writing station, quick intro's. 7:15pm-8:45 pm: An hour and a half of silent focused writing. 8:45pm-9pm: Quick debrief, pack and head home. Can't wait to see you! :)

Join us for modern island-inspired dishes at **Isla DC**! If it's good enough to attract the Obama's, I think we should give it a try too (they visited within weeks of its opening). **NOTE: This restaurant will NOT split the tab so please come prepared to cover your portion with Paypal, Venmo or Zelle. Thank you in advance for your understanding.** ***Washington Post:*** Beyond the shimmer, Isla is an ambitious Caribbean destination with a lot to say. Dinner at Isla does not end in the dining room. Chic customers filter back into the moodily lit entryway in twos and fours, where they put their to-go bags and fur coats to the side. They find their best light in a dramatic archway framed with mirrors. They strut a little strip of red carpet. As I duck inside, I always seem to land smack in the middle of Washington’s most fabulous photo shoot. Sorry! Isla opened in the shimmering Midtown Center in late October, and it already feels like a destination. A place to celebrate birthdays, to get engaged, to spend an inordinate amount of money on a company credit card, to see and be seen (and, maybe, to see the Obamas on date night). Past the entryway is the even grander dining room roaring with life, illuminated by a chandelier shaped like a beehive and dripping light off hundreds of delicate glass petals. Through and through, this is a power restaurant, the kind of place people go as much for form — the glam of it all — as function. (You know, the food.) A plate of lamb tartare was my first clue that Isla isn’t all window dressing. It arrives as a neat column, painted with a ticklingly spicy sweet potato and habanero cream and covered with a fine layer of chopped chives. Mixed almost imperceptibly in with the dark red cubes are bits of pickled shrimp, their slight chew giving way to waves of salinity. Instead of attempting to wrestle the gamy meat into submission, chef Lonie Murdock accentuates its undeniable intensity, breathing new life into a dish that tends to be more or less interchangeable from one glitzy restaurant to the next. Murdock is new to D.C., but Canadian expats and visitors might know her from Miss Likklemore's, the restaurant she and husband Darren Hinds opened in Toronto in 2022. There, Murdock says, she felt more beholden to tradition, honoring the substantial Caribbean population that calls Toronto home by serving faithful renditions of classics such as slow-cooked oxtails and the handheld chickpea wrap called doubles. At Isla, she wanted to step “outside of that comfort zone.” She brings her vision for a sprawling, globally inspired restaurant to Washington at an exciting moment for Caribbean cooking in the United States. In New York, chef Paul Carmichael opened Kabawa in early 2025, a sleek tasting counter where he exalts plantains with shaved salt cod and caviar, treating the sticky sweet fruit as a luxury ingredient. At Kann in Portland, Oregon, chef Gregory Gourdet rubs whole cauliflowers in jerk seasoning and brings them to life in his restaurant’s open hearth, his cooking a glorious collision of Haitian technique and Pacific Northwest produce. D.C. has played its part, too. Chef Kwame Onwuachi's Dogon is a destination restaurant built around coco bread and brown stew snapper. At St. James on 14th Street NW, paratha is served as a centerpiece dish, surrounded by an ornate spread of meat and vegetable curries. Where does Isla fit in? The restaurant’s most interesting dishes emerge when Murdock treats “Caribbean” less as a prescription than a loose framework. “For me, it was more important just to kind of highlight the beauty and the bounty of Caribbean ingredients, and not necessarily focus on a traditional dish hitting the plate,” she says. Take flaky patties. There are familiar fillings, like supple oxtail that melts into each bite of buttery pastry, but more thrilling are ones densely packed with crab cooked in a fragrant panang curry. Murdock, whose mother is Jamaican, is a quick study in the American palate: A particularly decadent patty features processed cheese and ground beef. Small plates and creative side dishes tend to outshine the bigger, spendier ones, but you can piece together a meat-and-starch dinner if that’s your thing. The showiest entrée on the menu (under a section called “feast & fire”) is a snapper whose meat has been separated from its bones and turned into fried nuggets. These morsels are then reunited with the fried skeleton, which wraps around the plate as if standing guard. For all the fun of the presentation, I found the fish disappointingly mild and craved a creamy sauce to dip into. For something substantial, I prefer the pork chop, lovingly charred and served in a deep, dark, puckering reduction made with pork bones and the Trinidadian green mango condiment kuchella. A pat of crab butter slowly melts into the chop and amplifies its meaty richness, and a few spears of grilled mango radiate like glimmers of sunlight. Whatever feast and fire you choose, pair it with a grilled plantain. “It is such a beautiful ingredient,” Murdock says. “I just didn’t want to see it hit the plate in any kind of way that I’d ever seen it before.” She roasts a sweet plantain until its skin is charred and the insides are beginning to soften, then slices it open and finishes it with butter infused with more bracing kuchella. The starchy fruit has all the heft of a baked potato, but so much more depth and curiosity. I like to double up with a side of mac pie. Murdock bridges the traditional Caribbean dish — a dense casserole — and ooey-gooey American mac and cheese. Her version is a brick of pasta almost caramelized around the edges, cheese lightly coating each noodle, all drenched in a devilishly rich Mornay. I’ve yet to leave Isla short of stuffed, but someday I’ll build a light dinner around bara, the springy Trinidadian flatbread used to make doubles. Here, the dish is deconstructed, the bread served on a glass pedestal, the fillings served separately for swiping and layering. I like a version featuring tender oxtails blanketed dramatically in a creamy butter bean foam, but my favorite of these dishes nods to tradition. A bowl of well-spiced chickpeas, surrounded by labneh and dotted with a sweet-sour tamarind achar, is comfort food dressed up with a bow tie. The leather booths are deep and cozy, and the cocktails, which favor rum and lean light and tropical, are lots of fun. A daiquiri stained blue with butterfly pea flowers is a refreshing start to the night, and Isla’s rendition of an espresso martini, coined the Style and Grace, balances jittery cold brew with sweet, milky peanut punch. Here, the classic cocktail becomes something rich and grown-up, almost devoid of its typical oversaturation. ***Check out the menu [here](https://isladc.com/menu/)*** We ask that ALL folks honor their RSVP. If you are unable to attend after sending in a YES, please update your status so that others may join. In the event our group incurs a fee for no-shows / late cancellations, your ability to RSVP for future events will be restricted. Thank you in advance for your understanding. **WAITLIST:** Meetup does not allow a waitlist for paid events. If this event fills and you are interested in adding your name to the waitlist, please send host a message through the app. In the future, we will vary the days of the week and the types of restaurants so that we can attract many different types of diners. Feel free to make suggestions for future meet locations. All diners will pay their own tab. before departing the event. If you are unable to join us in June we hope you'll stay interested and join us for a meal in the future. Looking forward to catching up with you for a fantastic dinner at Isla DC!

### **Join our next unhappy hour Breathwork Ceremony. In this Ceremony we use Conscious breathing to embrace and release our discomfort surrounding our emotional wounds, heart break, grief and stressful situations.** ### This 90 Minute ceremony includes breathwork and a sound bath to release the weight of our struggles by using our very own conscious breathing to transform our lives. **What is Breathwork?** Breathwork falls under an umbrella term with many different marketing names and techniques. For this session we will be focusing in one technique while laying down on our back. This is NOT your typical relaxing breathing and it DOES NOT INVOLVE ANY YOGA movement. Breathwork takes us deep into the subconscious mind to make necessary changes and improve our lives by releasing emotional baggage and healing emotional wounds. When we tap into deep states of consciousness emotional release may take the shape of crying, laughing, even screaming. Many people like to call it years of therapy in one single session. It is very common to experience moments of clarity, bliss and many Aha moments during this session. Each person will experience something different with every session. All you need is an open mind and your own breathing to achieve results with no prior experience. Please note breathwork cautions before booking. **What you may experience during this session:** -Deep healing of emotional wounds, grief and traumas -Ability to connect to your higher self, Ancestors and the divine -Release anxiety -Improve emotional balance -Increased feelings of joy, happiness, and inner peace -Ability to create self-love and improve relationships **What to bring:** -Your own water bottle -A pen and notebook -A Yoga mat (or use one at the studio) -A blanket ( or use one at the studio) -Eye mask (if you have one) -Comfortable clothes to breathe and lay down **About Jenny Perez Curandera:** Jenny is a full time Curandera and Shamanic Healer. Her core values are to LIVE IN HARMONY with great spirit, the elements, nature, animals and people. DO NO HARM TO OTHER PEOPLE, PLANTS OR ANIMALS. In the traditional Curanderismo that Jenny practices the foundation is LOVE AND RESPECT to the spirit world, towards animals,plants, people,free will and the elders who guard the curanderismo tradition (Los Abulitos de la tradicion). Private bookings are available for ancestral healings,energy clearing , energy balancing and tarot readings. If you would like to book a private energy session or tarot reading before/after ceremony send an email to [healing@curanderasheart.com](mailto:healing@curanderasheart.com) or text (703)531-7046 ( Visit our site for more information on our upcoming ancestral healing ceremonies, trauma release ceremonies, cacao ceremonies, full moon ceremonies, women circles, breathwork sessions and energy clearing ceremonies to bring balance to mind, body and spirit) Stay connected via IG @curanderasheart Curanderas Heart is located in the Westover Village in Arlington VA . 5852 Washington Blvd STE 5 Arlington VA at a walkable neighborhood with food options and street parking. Space is limited allowing all of our events to have an intimate vibe. Due to limited space pre registration and arriving on time is very important. **Energy Exchange: $60** **Time: Tuesday 6pm-7:30pm (Space is limited make sure to register early and read breathwork cautions. Please arrive early to set up your spot we will start on time)** DON'T KNOCK ON THE DOOR OR DISTURB THE SESSION. ONCE THE DOOR IS CLOSED IT MEANS SESSION IS ALREADY IN PROCESS AND IT WILL NOT OPEN UNTIL THE SESSION IS OVER. **Info: [Healing@curanderasheart.com](mailto:Healing@curanderasheart.com) call or text (703)531-7046** ### **CAUTION: BREATHWORK IS NOT ADVISED FOR persons with severe mental illness or seizure disorders or for persons using major medications. Pregnant women are advised against practicing Breathwork without first consulting and getting approval from their primary care physician. Breathwork can result in intense physical and emotional release. Therefore it is not advised for persons with a history of cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, or significant recent physical injuries or surgery.** ### **\*\*\*\*Cancellation Policy: There are no refunds for missed or canceled reservations\*\*\*\*** ### **What you may experience during this session: Improve emotional balance, Increased feelings of joy, happiness, and inner peace. Ability to create self-love and improve relationships**

**++++++++++++++++++++** **The Ride: Summary** **(Must Read)** **++++++++++++++++++++** * RIDE NAME: The Koffee Klatch Ride - Constellation (Crystal City) * START LOC: Bluemont South Parking, 325 N Manchester, Arlington, VA * START GPS: [https://goo.gl/maps/2sMA3jhGSgdS4fJj9](https://goo.gl/maps/2sMA3jhGSgdS4fJj9) * START PARKING: Bluemont South Parking lot * ARRIVAL: 10:00 am * SPEECH: 10:10am ***\*\*you must be present for the speech or no ride for you!\*\**** * ROLLING: 10:15am * LEVEL: Medium * PACE: 11-13 mph (a "social" pace) * DISTANCE: 16.5 miles * TERRAIN: Trail / Street / Cyclepath * RIDEWITHGPS ROUTE: **CBG_KOFFEEK_CONS_2026** * [https://ridewithgps.com/routes/55529797](https://ridewithgps.com/routes/55529797) **++++++++++++++++++++++** **The Ride: Detail** **++++++++++++++++++++** **Notes:** * **Constellation** is at the site of the former **Freshman** and may be more of a sit-down coffee shop/cafe. * This ride is organized "lean" and may not have a sweep. * Pump your tires on the morning of the ride, please. * It is strongly suggested that you become a NoVA CBG RidewithGPS club member and download the route posted for each "Klatch". * Loading the route onto your Garmin (or other Nav device) is also acceptable. * **NoVA CBG has a turn by turn RideWithGPS club account that's free. [https://www.meetup.com/novacbg/events/271742916/](https://www.meetup.com/novacbg/events/271742916/)** **The stop will be at:** [Constellation](https://www.constellation-va.com/) (former Freshman site) 2011 Crystal Dr Arlington, VA 22202 They are located on Crystal Drive in Crystal City after mile 9.2. The ride is a 16.5 mile medium level ridden at a social pace (11-13 mph). We will ride the Loop clockwise starting from the Bluemont South Parking on Manchester. We will ride up the Bluemont Junction Trail to the Custis and continue around to the Long Bridge connector trail from the MVT past the Pentagon and the Long Bridge Aquatic Center on the way to Constellation. After coffee we will cross back at the Water Park to the MVT and regular Arlington Loop. **+++++++++++++++++++++** **The Ride After The Ride:** **+++++++++++++++++++++** This week's coffee shop is the Ride WITHIN The Ride! **+++++++++++++++++++++** **Ride Level Chart** **+++++++++++++++++++++** NoVA CBG tries to accommodate all levels of cyclists by offering different types/levels of rides. We just ask that you come to the ride that suits your current riding ability the best. * Introductory Level: If you haven't ridden a bike in a number of years (or are uncertain of your abilities on a bicycle). * Beginner Level: You can ride for 10+ miles at a pace of 10+ to 12+ mph with potentially minor hills involved. * Medium Level: You can ride for 20+ miles at a pace of 13+ to 15+ mph with potentially moderate hills involved. * Advanced Level: You can ride for 20++ miles at a pace of 15+ mph with potentially major hills involved. Both Medium and Advanced Levels might require handling various challenges such as reading cue sheets, using a Garmin or navigation app, night riding, out of town travel, or any other odd cycling situations. **+++++++++++++++++++++** **The Fine Print:** **+++++++++++++++++++++** An RSVP of 'YES' is your digital signature and means you have read and understood MEETUP.com's: * "Terms of Service : Section 6. Release" found at https://www.meetup.com/terms/ * NOVA-CBG's "Assumption of Risk Agreement" found @ https://www.meetup.com/novacbg/pages/1942951/NOVA-CBG_Waiver/ * NoVA CBG's "COVID Policy" found @ http://bit.ly/2021_NoVACBG_COVID19_POLICY Helmets are required to participate in all NOVA-CBG rides. All riders ride at their own risk and with the understanding that cycling is an inherently dangerous activity. When coming to the meetup you do so voluntarily and are ready and able to participate in the ride as described under the conditions of the day. Be on time for the "pre-ride" preparation. If you do not attend the pre-ride preparation you will not be allowed to participate on the ride. There are NO exceptions to the above.

**❤️ DMV PROFESSIONALS SINGLES MIXER (AGES 42–55)** **Real People. Real Conversations. Real Connections.** **Tickets :** https://www.eventbrite.com/e/professionals-single-event-mingles-mixer-real-people-connection-42-55-tickets-1991952765343?aff=meetup Looking to meet accomplished, interesting, and relationship-minded singles in the DMV? Join us for an evening designed specifically for professionals ages 42–55 who are ready to step away from the apps and connect face-to-face. Whether you're newly single, divorced, an empty nester, focused on your career, or simply looking for a more authentic way to meet people, this event offers a welcoming space to build meaningful connections. No endless swiping. No ghosting. No awkward first messages. Just genuine conversations with local singles who value real connection. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 📍 Location : Finnegan’s Wake Irish Pub 100 Gibbs Street · Rockville, MD 🚇 Metro Access Conveniently located near major Metro lines with nearby parking available. Venue details will be provided upon registration. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🎟️ RESERVE EARLY & SAVE ❤️ Early Bird Admission — $15 Limited quantity available. ❤️ General Admission — $20 Available after Early Bird tickets sell out. ❤️ Last Chance / Door Admission — $25 Only available if space remains. ⚠️ Attendance is intentionally limited to create a comfortable and balanced experience. Most Spark Vibe events sell out before the event date. Reserve your spot early and save. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ✨ WHY ATTEND? Meeting new people shouldn't feel like work. At Spark Vibe, we believe the best connections happen naturally through conversation, shared experiences, and genuine chemistry. This event is designed for professionals who value authenticity, meaningful relationships, and meeting people with similar life experiences and goals. Many attendees are looking for: ❤️ A meaningful relationship 🤝 New friendships and connections 💍 Long-term partnership 🌟 A fun, engaging social experience Whether you're seeking companionship, romance, or simply looking to expand your social circle, you'll be surrounded by people who are open to connecting. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🌟 WHAT TO EXPECT 🍸 Relaxed Social Mixer Enjoy a welcoming atmosphere where meeting new people feels comfortable and easy. 💬 Guided Conversations Optional conversation starters and icebreakers help spark meaningful discussions. ⚡ Meet Multiple Singles Connect with local professionals from across DC, Maryland, and Northern Virginia. 🎤 Friendly Event Host Our host will welcome guests, facilitate introductions, and ensure everyone feels included. ✨ Genuine Connections Skip the screens and experience what dating feels like in real life. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ❤️ PERFECT FOR SINGLES WHO ARE ✅ Tired of dating apps ✅ Looking for meaningful connections ✅ Interested in meeting local professionals ✅ Newly single or re-entering the dating world ✅ Open to friendship, dating, or a serious relationship ✅ Ready to meet people face-to-face ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🌟 WHY PEOPLE LOVE OUR EVENTS Many attendees tell us they meet more quality people in one evening than they have in months online. The conversations are genuine. The atmosphere is welcoming. And everyone is there for the same reason: to connect. Some attendees leave with a date. Others leave with new friends. Everyone leaves having shared memorable conversations. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ✨ ABOUT THE AGE RANGE This event is designed primarily for singles ages 42–55. The age range is intended as a guideline rather than a strict requirement. If you feel you'd connect well with this group, you're welcome to join us. Our goal is always to create a balanced and enjoyable environment where meaningful connections can happen naturally. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⏰ IMPORTANT INFORMATION • Please arrive 10–15 minutes early. • Check-in closes 15 minutes after the event start time. • Most attendees come solo. • Dress code: Smart casual or business casual. • Tickets are limited and often sell out in advance. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ❤️ STOP SWIPING. START CONNECTING. The best relationships don't begin with an algorithm. They begin with a conversation. Reserve your spot today. Spark Vibe Where Strangers Become Stories.

[Profs and Pints DC](https://www.profsandpints.com/washingtondc) presents: **“Owl Wisdom,”** an introduction to the biology, habits, and conservation of various owl species in our region and beyond, with Steve Sheffield, professor of biology at Bowie State University, curator of mammals and birds for the Natural History Society of Maryland, and president of the Maryland Ornithological Society. [Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Available at [https://events.ticketleap.com/tickets/profsandpints/dc-owl-wisdom](https://events.ticketleap.com/tickets/profsandpints/dc-owl-wisdom) .] Who wants to learn about owls? If you are fascinated by these hunters of the night, you’ll love spending an evening with Steve Sheffield, a biologist who extensively studies owls and works to conserve them. He’ll start by covering the different types of owls in our region and elsewhere, and the ways in which their bodies and their sizes represent physical adaptations to their environment. He’ll especially focus on the owl species of the United States and Canada, describing their biology, ranges, preferred habitat and prey, behavior, and vocalizations. You’ll learn how and why field biologists study owls and how owl researchers from around the world assemble periodically to discuss their work. We’ll consider owls' value to ecosystems and, especially, humans and human-dominated landscapes where they serve as especially efficient killers of rodents and other crop-harming pests. Dr. Sheffield will talk about the many years he has spent researching owls, with much of his work focused on their exposure to environmental contaminants and how they’re affected. Being top predators, owls serve as sensitive bioindicators of contamination throughout the food chain. Much like canaries in coal mines, they function as an early warning system alerting us to potentially dangerous levels of toxicity. We don’t just study them for their own good, but ours as well. (Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID. Listed time is for doors. The talk starts 30 minutes later.) Image: Burrowing owls in Florida (Photo by travelingwayoflife / Creative Commons).

Title: What Is Progress? Knowledge Aggregation, Living Textbooks, and the Automation of Scientific Discovery Date: June 20 2026 Noon - 14:00 EDT Summary: Our collective knowledge infrastructure — the textbooks, professional training resources, and literature syntheses that define what professionals across disciplines believe to be true — is quietly accruing a structural liability. Compounded confirmation bias, stacked citation-by-citation into the foundations of formal knowledge, means that breakthroughs can take decades to reach the classrooms, clinical workflows, and decision-making frameworks where they matter most. Meanwhile, the deepest friction is rarely acknowledged: before any field can build meaningful consensus on "why" or "how" a phenomenon occurs, it must first establish honest, consolidated agreement on "what" has actually been observed. That prior step is routinely skipped, assumed, or fragmented across siloed literatures that never cross-pollinate. This talk introduces a framework called "Knowledge Aggregation" — with two distinct but complementary ambitions. The first is descriptive transparency: algorithmically mapping what has been said, measured, and documented across a problem space, without imposing causal interpretation or narrative. The second traces the boundary between empirical observation and explanatory claim, building systems that can separate the "what" from the "why/how" — because consensus on mechanism cannot be meaningfully constructed until consensus on phenomenon is first established. Both ambitions are now within reach. By composing tools already at our disposal — large language models, classical NLP pipelines, public data repositories, and engineering-grade automation frameworks — it becomes possible to model knowledge itself, rather than merely imitate individual experts. One concrete expression of this is automating the writing of living textbooks: compressing the lag from bleeding-edge discovery, through replicated evidence, all the way to professional training resources. But the deeper aspiration reaches further — toward automating the discovery of scientific insights that have never previously been conceived, by systematically surfacing hypothesis combinations that no single siloed researcher would have had the cross-disciplinary vantage point to even ask. Drawing on ongoing systems biology and computational research — with ME/CFS research demoed as a use case for what siloed, fragmented knowledge infrastructure costs in practice — this talk maps the conceptual architecture, the real-world friction, and the data science toolkit for building it. Speaker: As a systems biologist at heart, Sam specializes his biomedical research on interactions and connections in biology - rather than just one domain of expertise. He wears many hats and collects skill sets across disciplines, with degree studies and industry experience acquired across Chemical Engineering (BSc), Bioinformatics (MSc), Systems and Synthetic Biology (M2), Biomedical Sciences (MSc), and beyond. Even more important to him than niches or fields of work, comes down to the synergistic approaches that allow us to move beyond reductionism. The notion that a question can only allow for one answer, is inherently reductionist. By resisting many norms in science and engineering which can get overly reductive, his current role as Principal Investigator of Research for DMV Petri Dish (501(c)(3) non-profit local to the DMV region) embraces computational frameworks that aide scale-up and automation - not only around the processes which already exist with established workflows, but also taking a keen interest in attempting and accomplishing ambitions which have never been perceived to be possible previously. Sam carries a passion for the synergy of computational biology - fused with wet lab validation. This way, one can build a beautiful knowledge base in the theoretical sense, and then test to see if said computational prediction might actually be able to stand in the real world with wet lab validation. Translational modeling starts to become possible once biological experiment design can be iteratively looped alongside computational model design, optimization, and analysis - empowering the design of a better wet lab experiment, followed by a better computational model, back and forth until science is done!

JOIN US FOR AN EVENING OF CELEBRATION, COMMUNITY & CREATIVITY Following our Audience Award-winning 48 Hour Film Project, Phil is hosting the DC Creative Collective cast, crew, supporters, and friends to enjoy breathtaking Washington, DC skyline views. ⸻ **DIRECTIONS** The entrance to the building is on Mass Ave (the building attached to the Hampton Inn). The front desk attendant will buzz you in. Tell them you're here to meet Phillip on the roof and they'll fob you up to the 14th floor. Walk in the direction of apt 1411 and enter the stairwell across from apt 1411. Take the staircase directly to rooftop. **FOOD** Beverages and light snacks available, but please bring additional food and drinks to share. This event is bring your own everything. A Safeway grocery and 2 liquor stores are within 2 blocks of the building. **EVENT HIGHLIGHTS** 🎥 Exclusive Director’s Cut Screening Experience the enhanced version of The Seasoning King. 🥂 Rooftop Networking Reception Connect with fellow filmmakers, actors, writers, and creatives. 🏆 48 Hour Film Project Celebration Recognizing the cast, crew, and supporters who made the project possible. ✍️ THE WRITER’S BOX Have an idea for our next film? Drop your: • Story Concepts • Character Ideas • Loglines • Themes • Genres • Creative Challenges Selected ideas may inspire the next DC Creative Collective production.

Did you know..... The National Gallery conducts free guided tours. All we need to do is show-up! Join us Thursday, April 2, for the 11:00 am tour titled "The Collection, Up Close" The tour will start in the West Building, Main Floor - Rotunda, and will last one hour. Afterward, we'll walk to the nearby L"Enfant Plaza food court for coffee, a bite of lunch and to socialize. Need more info.? Send me a message. Hope you can make it! ....Ross A.

The title of this movie is the name of a fictional phone app designed to help blind people. Like the real app on which it’s modeled ([Be My Eyes](https://www.bemyeyes.com/)), the software allows a blind person to contact a sighted volunteer, point the phone at something, and hear a description of what’s on the screen. It’s useful for grocery shopping, walking through unfamiliar territory, reading menus, and hundreds of other daily activities. In this story, the protagonist is a blind teenager who’s fiercely independent. She gets a cat-sitting gig at an isolated mansion, and she uses the app to familiarize herself with the layout and posh amenities. It seems like a cushy assignment until intruders arrive, and then the app changes from convenience to lifeline. ■ Title — *See for Me* ■ Director — Randall Okita ■ Cast — Skyler Davenport, Jessica Parker Kennedy, Laura Vandervoort ■ Unrated, suitable for teens and adults ■ ©2021 \| 1h 32m \| Crime\, Drama\, Horror\, Mystery\, Thriller ■ Distributed by Image Entertainment

Welcome to Drunken Philosophy, a casual, curious, social discussion club. Come grab a drink and a seat at The Oracle. **Optional topic for this meetup: Where is everybody?** In 1950 the physicist Enrico Fermi was talking about aliens over lunch and asked a question that still has not gone away: if the universe is so vast and so old, and even a fraction of those billions of stars have planets, where is everyone? By the numbers the galaxy should be crowded with civilizations. Instead we look up and hear silence. That gap between "they should be everywhere" and "we see no one" is the Fermi Paradox. One of the most unsettling answers is the idea of a **Great Filter**: somewhere on the road from dead chemistry to a galaxy-spanning civilization, there is at least one step that is almost impossible to get past. Maybe the filter is behind us. Maybe life starting at all, or simple cells becoming complex, or intelligence ever evolving, is the freak accident, and we already cleared the hard part. Or maybe the filter is ahead of us, and advanced civilizations reliably wipe themselves out before they spread. Here is the part that messes with people. If we ever found life somewhere else, even pond scum on Mars, most people would call it the greatest discovery in history. But it might be the worst possible news. It would mean life is common, the early steps are easy, and the hard step is still in front of us. So the eerie silence overhead might actually be the best sign we could ask for. **Questions to wrestle with:** * Is it better to be alone? Would you rather we find alien life and learn we are not special, or find nothing and quietly improve our odds of surviving? * Where do you bet the filter sits, behind us or ahead of us, and why? * If it is ahead of us, what is it? Nuclear war, climate collapse, AI, something we cannot even picture yet? And can we do anything about a filter we cannot see coming? * Does any of this change how you live, or how humanity should be spending its time and money right now? As always the prompt is optional. Come for the conversation, stay for the drinks, and bring your own questions.

Let’s meet and wander the galleries! General admission on Sundays is free.

Welcome, readers! Our June read is ***Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible*** ***Voyage*** **by Alfred Lansing.** A work of nonfiction, and one of the most astonishing survival stories in history, we follow Sir Ernest Shackleton and his crew after their ship is crushed by Antarctic ice. Stranded in one of the harshest environments on Earth, the men endure months of isolation, freezing temperatures, and near starvation—yet refuse to give up hope. Lansing brings their ordeal to life through vivid detail and firsthand accounts, capturing both the brutality of nature and the resilience of the human spirit. At its core, the story is a powerful testament to leadership, perseverance, and the unbreakable will to survive against impossible odds. Looking forward to discussing with everyone! We will meet at Zaftig Brewing Co in their event room in the back. We are welcome to bring in our own food, but **all** **drinks must be purchased at the bar.** Happy reading! 📖

The topic for June is "Roadtrip" Speak Easy: true stories, told live. The idea is simple: an audience, an open microphone, and great stories. Hilarious, gripping, poignant- it's up to you. Audiences are invited to come to listen or come to tell as folks from all corners of Columbus offer their stories live on stage! Held at Wild Goose Creative's warm, intimate space, this night of tales occurs on the 3rd Thursday of every month. Doors open at 6:30 pm, show starts at 7:00 pm. Please arrive early if you want to tell, as we generally only have room for a limited number of tellers, and the sign-up sheet has a tendency to fill up fast. Formed around the idea that people need stories--they're what hold and draw us together--SpeakEasy celebrates the strangeness and commonness of being human. And in a world of smartphones, Facebook, Twitter, and more . . . it gives people a real, breathing, in-person way to connect. The night is geared for true stories of all kinds, taking the best tales told around kitchen tables, in darkened pubs, on the street corner, and at late-night parties and giving them an audience. Speak Easy is also a great outlet for performers, writers, and artists looking to share their favorite stories and perfect their skills. We strongly encourage tellers to please tell the story rather than read it so we keep within the spirit of good storytelling and stay engaged with the audience. All are welcome. Hang around after the show for a drink and build community!