Hunt Cover C 5/2/08 2:43 PM Page 1

Hunt cover C 5/2/08 2:43 PM Page 1

Want to win a week in paradise?

Want tohave some good,crazy fun?

Joinus today,May18,at noon downtown for an adventure you’ll never forget.

For details,turn toPage 16.

TWPM

MAY 18, 2008

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5_18 contents 5/2/08 3:58 PM Page 1

May18,2008

CONTENTS

(1) Read the instructions on Page 16. (2) Join us before noon downtown.
(3) Solve the Post Hunt Puzzles before anyone else.
(4) Spend an expense-paid vacation for four in this little corner of paradise.

STORY ON PAGE 16

10

FIRST THINGS FIRST

22468

Editor’s Note Cul de Sac Second Glance DateLab Then & Again
10 Making It 11 Editor’s Query 12 First Person Singular 14 Dilbert

34

DEPARTMENTS

44 Dining

Thai Ki and Ping

16

by Charlie Chiang’s

BY TOM SIETSEMA

After winning the Hunt, you’ll need five nights

C O V E R S T O R Y

46 The Puzzle

‘It’s Not What It Looks Like’

BY MERL REAGLE

at a Florida resort.

16

GO!

47 Significant Others

Home Invasion

BY DAVE BARRY, GENE WEINGARTEN AND TOM SHRODER

Join the first-ever Post Hunt, and

BY JEANNE MARIE LASKAS

spend an adventure-filled afternoon that you’ll

48 Below the Beltway

Teddy Stole

need years of therapy to forget.

NEXT WEEK

My Panties

IN THE MAGAZINE:

BY GENE WEINGARTEN

F E A T U R E

When a man’s job is eliminated, literally over lunch

34

hour, he becomes an

The Wild Man at the Center of the World

explorer in the freakish world

BY DAVID TAYLOR

of the unexpectedly unem-

12

Washington’s Meridian Hill Park was once a prime spot for the international meridian. An eccentric poet made it the prime spot to build his cabin.

ployed — and discovers what all of us may have to look forward to, after lunch.

On the Cover: IIllustration by Otis Sweat Illustrations: Otis and Barbara Sweat

Send letters to: 20071, The Washington Post Magazine, 1150 15th St. NW, Washington, D.C. 20071. Send e-mail to: [email protected]. The Magazine is available online at washingtonpost.com/magazine.

EDITORIAL EDITOR: Tom Shroder; DEPUTY EDITOR: Sydney Trent; ARTICLES EDITORS: Sandy M. Fernandez, Lynda Robinson, David Rowell; SENIOR EDITOR: Bill O’Brian; SYSTEMS &

SPECIAL PROJECTS EDITOR: Michael Bolden; STAFF WRITERS: Laura Blumenfeld, Liza Mundy, Lonnae O’Neal Parker, Tom Sietsema, Gene Weingarten; COPY EDITORS: Elizabeth Chang,

Michelle Gaps; ART DIRECTOR: J Porter; PHOTO EDITOR: Evan Jane Kriss; ASSISTANT PHOTO EDITOR: Jennifer Beeson; CONTRIBUTING WRITERS: Christina Ianzito, Paula Span, Wells Tower; EDITORIAL PRODUCTION MANAGER: Leslie A. Garcia; ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT: Daniele Seiss; ADVERTISING GENERAL MANAGER: Jenny Abramson; ADVERTISING PRODUCTION MANAGER:

Julie Gunderson; BUSINESS MANAGER: Douglas S. Dykstra; ADVERTISING SALES REPRESENTATIVES: Diane DuBois, Anne Tackabery; ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT: Linda Baquet; ADVERTISING PRODUCTION:

Leigh Updike Braun, Jackie Ellis, Kiara Kerwin, Tara Shlimowitz; ADVERTISING GRAPHIC DESIGN: Willie Joyner, Joseph Wadsworth; PHONES EDITORIAL 202/334-7585; MAIN ADVERTISING 202/334-5228, 5224, 5226; NEW YORK SALES 212/445-5050; ADMINISTRATION 202/334-6160; MAGAZINE MARKET 202/334-7031. Copyright 2008 The Washington Post, 1150 15th St. NW, Washington, D.C. 20071.

FIRSTTHINGSFIRST

Editor’s Note:

By Tom Shroder

UNT PUZZLE SOLVING 101. Class

is in session. is loaded with clues, real and decoy. The Map also shows coordinates for pinpointing Hunt locations. In the

year of the golf tee Puzzle, the map coordinates consisted of a

You there in the back row. I heard that. And I’ve

H

heard it before. You took a look at the practice Puzzles number and a letter. on Page 26, and you said, “I’d never figure that out.”
Wrong. Time and again, I’ve seen people who were positive they’d get nowhere come up aces, supplying the key insights that put their team over the top in solving a Puzzle. The secret: Just take it one step at a time.
Bingo! 4-T is a map coordinate. Clearly, the next step is to go to that location. It becomes clear that was the right decision when you arrive to find a huge leader board for a fictional golf tournament, filled with the names of fictional golfers with their scores.
Consider the golf tee Puzzle on Page 28. Hunt staffers handed out tees. That’s all you had to go on. So, step one: Ex- amine the tee. Plain, white … with the word “fore” printed on its stem. That’s obviously important. And since the solutions to all Hunt Puzzles are a number, fore is interesting because it sounds like “four.”
All those numbers! Now you know you’re getting close. Very often in the Hunt, when you get a list of options, each with a number, the trick is to figure out which of the options is the right one. In this case, find the right golfer, and the number beside his name will be the solution.
You find no further hints on the leader board, so you still have nothing more than fore tee (or 4-T) to guide you. Is there a way to apply that to the names in front of you? Are there
So, now you look at the numbers on a list of possible Hunt clues, and you see that four is not there, which means that four can’t be the answer. But you knew that — a Hunt Puzzle would four names that begin with a T? Maybe you could add all those

never be solved that simply.

scores together.

So, think again. The “fore” isn’t in isolation, it’s on a tee! Put

But no. There’s only one: Elliott Tarantino. Which, when

it together, and you get fore tee. Another number! Alas, 40 isn’t you look at it for a minute, does appear to have … a lot of T’s.

a possible solution either.

One, two, three … four T’s to be exact.

What else could “fore tee” mean? This is where you need to consider another prime Hunt asset: the Hunt Map in the Magazine. The Hunt Map is an actual map of the Hunt area, and it
That click is the sound of the solution falling into place.

Tom Shroder can be reached at [email protected].

Cul de Sac is online at washingtonpost.com/magazine.

2

The Washington Post Magazine

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MAY 18, 2008

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4/9/08 3:44 PM Page 1

Second Glance

ETCHED IN STONE

By Randy Mays

The Carnegie Library building at Mount Vernon Square.

Find the 12

differences between the original photograph, top, and the altered photograph, bottom.

Puzzle answers

are online now at washingtonpost.com/magazine

and will be in the Magazine’s print issue next week. For answers to last week’s Second Glance, see Page 14.

Degree of difﬁculty: [moderate, advanced, extreme]

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MAY 18, 2008

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Date Lab

A MAN, A WOMAN, TWO MOTORCYCLES — ACCIDENTS HAPPEN

7:30 P.M., VERMILION, ALEXANDRIA

Salil: Marisa got to the restaurant ﬁrst and was at the bar when I arrived. She seemed attractive enough, but I didn’t feel

any instant Oh, wow! Sh e ’s gorgeous. She was light-skinned with

freckles. I tend to go for girls who have darker skin.
Marisa: I’m into the tall, athletic guy next door. He was
5-foot-6, if I was lucky. But that doesn’t mean anything. I hate when people say, “He wasn’t my type at all!” Very few people get that positive connection right away.
Salil: As soon as we sat down, she asked me, “Why do you think they set us up?” and my response was, “I have no idea.” Then she asked me if I ride motorcycles. When I told her I did, she said, “That must be it.” I had to hold back a laugh. I wanted to say, “Oh, I guess it wasn’t my hot body.”
Marisa: I wasn’t sure why we’d been set up. He comes from a classically Indian family, and his ﬁrst marriage was arranged. I’m an ex-military, motorcycle-riding female. That’s almost as feminist as you can get, so my initial reaction was, Why the heck

did they put us together? Are they trying to see how bad the date will be?’

Salil: It bothers me that she assumed my family is classically
Indian. I agreed to an arranged marriage [several years ago] after I found out that my ex-ﬁancee married someone a few months after we broke up. It was a huge mistake. My sister is married to a white guy named Steve Jones, and I don’t think of my parents as being conservative at all. They had a conservative moment [arranging my marriage] that had serious repercussions for us all, but Marisa didn’t know that. I would never presume that she was conservative just because she’s an Army brat.
Marisa: Well, I hate to say it, but I don’t know many Americans who have arranged marriages. But I’m open-minded enough, and I’ve been around the world and have friends in many different cultures, and ﬁrst impressions are almost always wrong. And he was a nice guy; he was articulate, and he seemed very interesting.
Salil: When it came time to order, I asked her if she wanted to share an appetizer. I’m a big communal eater. I tend to offer my food around the table. But people have different takes on that kind of thing. She wasn’t really interested. So, I ordered an appetizer for myself. I was hungry!
Marisa: Actually, I had looked at the menu online, and I really wasn’t interested in any of the appetizers. I don’t eat red meat, so the chicken dish was one of the few things I was going to be able to eat. Later, he asked if I wanted a bite of his food, and I said sure, and I gave him one of mine.

MARISA GERTH, 39 SALIL MANIKTAHLA, 35

Veterinarian

IT Consultant

Brag a little

I’m honest, friendly, well traveled and kinda cute.
I’m as different a person as you’ll ever meet.

Happiest moments

Hiking in the woods on a beautiful day with my dogs or floating underwater on a dive trip (I love the water).
With friends, outdoors, doing something new with a drink in my hand and an idea percolating around that I just know I can make work.

Ways you’re D.C.

I love the variety and culture of the area.
I am neither this nor that, and all of the above, yet somehow never indifferent, with some pretty strong opinions and a very tight and deep network. Oh, and I had dinner with Hillary a few weeks ago and met Terry McAuliffe.

Your type

Athletic, outdoorsy and tall (as in 5-foot-9 or more)
Thin, dark hair, skin and eyes. Very smart and witty. Lively conversationalist, extroverted, successful and somehow, bizarrely, attracted to me. In other words, “unlikely as hell.”

Interests you’d like to share

Animals, outdoors and travel. Tolerates motorcycles. (I haven’t met an unmarried male who doesn’t ride who’ll show any interest in a female who does.)
A love of adventure. She should be kind of an adrenaline junkie and do things that most rational people would never attempt. I’d also hope she hates cliches as much as I do.

Dream date

Jack from “Lost”: smart, athletic, attractive, well out of my league. But you did say dream big.
A sexy librarian. Complete with chunky glasses and Van Halen playing in the background.

something that causes stress. He did tell me that he does parkour, which seemed very interesting.

Salil: We started talking about politics, which I know is a

Salil: Her reaction was sort of indifferent. Overall, she didn’t

dangerous topic for a ﬁrst date. She kind of went off on Dubya, ask a lot of questions. I felt like I was driving the conversation. so I was happy. I’m not very subtle when it comes to my political opinions. I invited her to a nonpartisan event I was having the next night to watch the [primary] election returns, but she wasn’t interested. She said she had work stuff.
There was stuff we had in common — we both like to travel— but we had to hunt for it. She’s very straightforward. There isn’t any embellishment or hyperbole when she’s telling a story. I’m the exact opposite of that. It was entertaining to see if we could
Marisa: I had an art class that night. [Politics] isn’t something ﬁnd something to talk about. But I’m an easily entertained
I pay much attention to. My work takes up a lot of my emotional energy, so when I’m not working, I’d rather not focus on person.
Marisa: He was better at holding the conversation than I was.

6

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MAY 18, 2008

When there was a lull, he’d pop a question. I talk to my clients, but it’s all very science- and medical-oriented. It’s very different when you have to converse with people on a social level. I work with animals, and obviously they can’t talk to you.
Salil: The waitress came by and asked if we wanted dessert, and she said yes. I think she had already picked out what she wanted. But I got the feeling that if she wasn’t prone to sharing dinner she deﬁnitely wasn’t going to be sharing her chocolate cake, so I got the bread pudding. And we did have a bite of each other’s. After dinner, I walked with her to her car. I asked if she’d like to get together again—I’m always looking for people to go riding — and she said yes. She was kind of rummaging around in her car, and I couldn’t tell if she was looking for something, so I asked if she had a card on her, and she gave me one. I gave her a hug; she hugged me back, and that was it.

M

E

M

O

R

I

A

L

D

A

Y

E

V

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T

!

Marisa: I’d give [the date] a 3.5 [out of 5]. He’s someone I’d easily invite to a group get-together. He’s very personable, but you either have a connection or you don’t, and there wasn’t a connection.
Salil: She’s a rough-and-tumble kind of girl. There aren’t many girls [who ride motorcycles]. If there had been more chemistry, that would have been pretty hot. But overall I was a little bit let down. There wasn’t even a good story in all of this. It was very safe, middle-of-the road. I’d give it a 3.

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UPDATE: Though he was peeved at Marisa’s assessment of his family, Salil hasn’t totally ruled out another rendezvous — in a group setting. “I was thinking about calling her to go riding with my friends,” he says. Marisa would be up for it. “It’s not going to faze me at all if he never calls me again,” she says, “but if he does, I’d be more than happy to go out riding.”

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The Washington Post Magazine 7

2007

Then & Again

THE SANDS OF TIME

Circa 1930s

Ocean City’s boardwalk and beach, looking south from the rooftop of the historic Atlantic Hotel. The boardwalk is now nearly three miles long. The city hosts 8 million visitors annually, and has 10,000 hotel rooms and 193 restaurants.
The Ocean City, Md., boardwalk and beach, looking north. In 1933, a storm cut an inlet in the sand barrier, creating access between the bay and ocean, which brought sportfishing to the sleepy resort and spurred its growth.

HAVE AN OLD PHOTO YOU’D LIKE TO SEE IN THEN & AGAIN? Send an e-mail to: [email protected].

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