Trip to DC

Lindsey and I are on vacation.  Before any of you ask, yes we plan our vacations together, that is one of the perks of our job.  We decided to head to Washington D.C. to see some friends and family, sorry if we missed anyone during this short trip.

Saturday we got to Lindsey’s friend’s townhouse in Alexandria.  We hung out there for a bit and got to hear some stories about her giving birth and Lindsey got to hold the baby.  Sorry, I did not hold the baby, that is probably the least appealing thing to me ever.

And no, Lindsey did not look that uncomfortable the whole time she was holding the baby.  The kid would not stop crying the whole time she held him.

Her friend told us that she is using a cloth diaper system and that did intrigue me.  She said it was not nearly as expensive as disposable, but the idea of having to wash a poop-filled diaper is absolutely disgusting.  I do not feel like there would be enough of these diapers to make even a small load, so they would have to add some other clothes.  Maybe I would like to see if the math breakdown does make it more worthwhile to use cloth diapers.  Nope, I will not do this research because while I am interested, I am not that interested.

Once we were done there, we went to Burke, where Lindsey’s aunt and uncle live.  They took us out to dinner at a place called Esposito’s.  It was a pretty good Italian restaurant.  That night we went out in Alexandria with Lindsey’s cousin.  We hit up a bar called Spider Kelly’s, which I hoped would be like Spider Jerusalem…it was not.

The place was fun, they had pool tables and shuffle boards, but it was pretty crowded and very loud.  Needless to say, we just chilled at a table, had a few drinks and did some bullshittin’.  My idea of a fun time.  Yes, I am old and lame now.  We also noticed that the majority of the crowd was like early 20s.  They were kind of annoying.

The next day, we woke up and went into the city to do a few tourist things.  We started out by heading to the Natural History Museum.  I was quite excited to see the evolution of man stuff.  I do not think Lindsey enjoyed it all that much, but whatever, she tortured me later.

We also got to see the dinosaur stuff and as you can see, Lindsey almost got eaten by a T-Rex!  It was pretty scary.  Okay, not really.  We skipped a good bit of the ocean stuff since we saw so much stuff at the different aquariums last summer.  I did enjoy watching Lindsey get freaked out by the different mounted bats they had.

After the museum, we took a walk to try and find some lunch and coffee.  We went to the Ronald Reagan building and they had a decent food court downstairs.  I finally got to try California Tortilla, which I was always curious about from Sean’s ramblings (I crack myself up).  I get that these federal buildings have security, but does everyone have to be so mean about which door you must exit?  Why the hell do they have 1200 doors, if you can only exit one of them?  And no, I do not want anyone to answer this question, I realize why.

We walked to the Washington Monument, which must be having some work done to it.  I wonder if my dad’s union is involved with the scaffolding?  That would be a fun job.

Lindsey really wanted to see the cherry blossoms, but as everyone told us, they were pretty much on the decline.  That did not stop us from walking all over the place and having me suffer with allergies.  Look how terrible and miserable I look.  I imagine my nose must look 323 times larger than it already is.

I did take a picture that I thought was pretty awesome.  Please tell me what you think of this one:

I am not a photographer.  I have never taken a class or anything, but every once in awhile, I will take a picture with my phone and be amazed at how well it turned out.  This was like a two-second point and click shot.  No thought put into it, but a random picture.  I think it looks cool.

Near the Tidal Basin, there were a bunch of flowers planted.  Different colors and whatnot.  Most of them were tulips (or maybe all of them were).  There was a number by each plot, but we could not figure out what they were for.

It was annoying there though because everyone with a phone or camera thought they were the next coming of Georgia O’Keeffe (I realize she was not a photographer, but what the hell do I know about art?).  I kept trying to take a picture of Lindsey, and this lady would not move out of the way.  She clearly saw us, but just did not give a shit.  I hope her pictures turn out crappy and she gets an F in her shitty art class.

We walked back up to Air & Space Museum and spent the rest of the day there.  I was amazed by how large the drones are.  I do not know why, but I assumed they must be pretty small.  Anyways, there is so much cool stuff at that museum and you really need a full ten hour day to really see and read everything.  We skimmed through a good chunk of it.

I did spend a good deal of time in the planet section and got to give some interesting facts to Lindsey that were not written on the cards.  What can I say, I enjoy learning about the planets.  I had Lindsey pose with the famous Voyager record.  Unfortunately, the photo did not turn out so well.

After the museum, we went back to her families house for dinner, watched some television, and then we both crashed.  We woke up the next day, had some breakfast.  Her aunt and uncle then took us to a place called Occoquan.  We hit up some of the shops and then had lunch at a place called Madrigans, it was pretty good.  Unfortunately, since we were outside, I thought I would never stop sneezing.

We left there and made our way back west to visit my Aunt Lori in Winchester.  Okay, not really Winchester, she lives in Round Hill.  We arrived there and there was no one there.  I had to pee so bad that I could not wait and we turned around to leave to find a place with a restroom.  Luckily, Aunt Lori and Addison passed us and I did a quick U-turn and just made it in time.

We hung out there for awhile, watching the news about the Boston Marathon tragedy and catching up on family stuff.  Also, we had to wait for Addison to finish a biology paper.  Once that was done, we went to dinner at this place called Magnolias at the Mill.  The place was awesome.  Lindsey and I both had the pork chop special and it was delicious.  I can see why my family loves eating there.

I forgot to take a pic, so I stole this one from facebook…

After dinner, they gave us a tour of their little town (it is amusing that many people think my Aunt Lori lives in the big city, well they could not be further from the truth).  Addison goes to a school that is only three years old.  This fascinated me.  Allow me to explain why.

I have always been intrigued by rivalries and since this school was built because the area was growing rapidly and they could not house the students.  Addison told me how once they split, the two schools became huge rivals.  The kids at the old school, hated the kids who left.  I think that is so bizarre.  I would have thought that it would take years to develop a rivalry, but instead those kids that left for the new school were somehow considered traitors.  Interesting.

We went back to the house, did a bit more talking, and then late into the night, we said our goodbyes and made our way back to Pennsylvania.  Can someone explain why Lindsey’s GPS decides to take us from Bedford up to Altoona and then to our place?  We always ignore this and go to Johnstown instead.  It is definitely shorter, mileage and time-wise.

Here are the rest of the pictures from the trip:

I have no clue why this makes me giggle, but it does.  I took two pics of her and then realized she was making that face and figured it would be a great GIF.  I was right.

Stay tuned the rest of the week for more vacation recaps.