Have you seen enough air and space things yet? No, no you have not! Which is why the parents and I actually found a parking spot right by the Air & Space Museum (!) and continued to explore the fascination that is air and space amazingness. I actually do really love the Air & Space Museum and could spend excessive amounts of time in there. I am truly my father's child. We were fascinated by missiles (although apparently not the ones my dad worked on back in his Army days)...
...and played space flight director...
...and marveled at what the Wright brothers managed to put in the air...
...and took a break for lunch by going over to National Museum of the American Indian, which (1) is conveniently located right next to the Air & Space Museum, (2) is WAY tastier than McDonald's, (3) gave us a chance to feed the parking meter, (4) provided a minor break from the airplanes because food ranks right up there with airplanes on Dad's awesomeness-meter...and then we went back and were generally fascinated by all manner of aircraft.
After the airplanes, we rested and chilled with Harry before having a lovely dinner with Dana at District Chophouse. The Texans and the New Yorker are equally fascinated by each other and the vast differences in natural habitats, I assure you.
More D.C. adventures...after we slept in a little bit the next day, which was truly lovely. If you know me at all, you know how I feel about weekend mornings accompanied by the addiction I just can't, and frankly don't want to, kick (ever!) coffee. It was remarkably rejuvenating. And then...on to the D.C. adventures. For a more chill museum experience after surviving what is one of America's most-visited museums (on a Saturday, eeekk!), Mom suggested the National Portrait Gallery and American Art Museum, which I love for that very reason - it is pretty chill. It's also remarkably close to my apartment - score one more. I mean, just look at the quiet peacefulness, whether it's folksy Americana...
...or a couple of Bushes hanging out, undergoing a close inspection by Dad...
...or a gallery so free of other people that we managed to get Dad to strike a pose.
Ahhhh, I can hear the silence now. Well, except for the talking garbage cans in the courtyard, which are quite possibly the most polite trash cans ever as they slowly proclaim "thank you" for every piece of trash that goes in. Mom made a movie of me throwing away our snack trash. Not gonna lie, my acting skills were kinda awesome there. It's what won me the part over Dad. We also spent some quality time in the gift shop and then found a pony for Dad.
We had a special dinner planned for that night per Mom's request for "a place where they dump seafood on the table and you get to whack it." I've got just the place, Mom. Last summer I met up with work buddy Stephanie along with her husband and a friend at Quarterdeck in Arlington, which I don't know if I would have discovered otherwise. Total dive, and an excellent place to get a bunch of steamed crabs and attack them with a mallet. Well...if you like that kind of thing. I think Dad had a comment along the lines of "anything that only gives up 10% of its body weight in edible mumble mumble whack whack at crab..." Let's just say that Dad really enjoyed the appetizers of crab balls and onion rings (can you say two kinds of deep fried deliciousness??), his side of baked potato, and our shared pitcher of Miller Lite, likely because they were all immediately consumable and required no excessive amount of work to get from hand to mouth. It does take some effort to get out the crabby deliciousness, but once you get the technique down and dip it in butter...oh yum. Please enjoy the photo spread from the evening (with a notable lack of photographic evidence from the portion of the evening where my fingers were covered with crab goo and were in no way suitable to touch the camera).
Prepare to attack...
Yeah, I made a smiley face out of grease...yipes....
WHAT are we supposed to do with those??
The final verdict
On the way home from the seafood dining adventures, we made a stop at the Marine Corps War Memorial, which depicts the raising of the flag at Iwo Jima. We managed to get some quiet time in between the buses of tourists arriving and leaving on a very military schedule, and I managed to take about a million shots demonstrating my need for a tripod in order to actually get really good night shots. For now I'll settle for this.
For our last day together in D.C. (boo), we had two very important items to tackle: tube meats and old pieces of paper. Sounds fascinating, doesn't it? Maybe I should rephrase that as...quintessential street food dining in the form of a street cart hot dog...
...a trip through the National Archives, which unfortunately now prohibits photography in any way, shape, or form in any of the exhibits, so I don't really have much to show you there...except us eating the aforementioned hot dogs right outside the National Archives...
...and a food stop at a D.C. dining institution, Ben's Chili Bowl, where we made short work of some loaded half-smokes, managed to make a dent in the massive amount of fries loading our table, and shared a tasty piece of pound cake. Yes, we were very, very full when we left.
I really didn't want them to leave, but after one last stop at home to say goodbye to their grandfurchild, it was time to drop off the parental units at their rental car so they could drive down to visit the other child in North Carolina. So glad you finally made it to D.C., Mom & Dad - hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.
Side note - why do I feel compelled to blog about things in chronological order? I'm guessing it has something to do with the same genetic makeup that compels me to be an accountant. At any rate, last weekend I drove approximately 1,000 miles and moved my sister from Durham, NC to Brooklyn, NY. Definitely a blog-worthy experience you'll hear alllllll about soon. And I leave for Dallas (SUPER YAY!!!!!) Thursday morning, so let's see if I can manage to squeeze it in for posting before then.
2 comments:
Did you force your parents to take those goofy face pictures or do they do that on their own? I just want to know if that was genetic too.
Goofy faces are basically encouraged by me...although sometimes I can catch them just happening. Rarely.
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