Things began to heat up (figuratively, as the weather took a distinct turn for the extremely chill) once I got to D.C. Why, there were meetings, monuments, and Pho Eurasian.
As the extern, I sat in on two meetings and then did work during the final meeting of the trip. I’ve discovered that meetings are highly tiring encounters. You have to sit, prim and proper and largely silent. < = Things I almost never do. I am a habitual chair-sloucher/slumper/folded-legger, and a talking fidgeter extraordinaire. In any regard, I performed quite admirably. I managed to devote my attention to the goings on and produce coherent and vaguely intelligent responses when called upon.
I was not, thankfully, the stumbling mutterer from class who always gives the wrong answer when called upon. I should also note that I got to D.C. courtesty of my extern sponsor (she paid for the Amtrak).
The table spread (turnovers eaten)
I ate some delighful spinach and cheese turnovers at Just World Books author, Laila El-Haddad’s house. And admired her seriously cute baby. I mourned for JWB’s new D.C. representative, bestowed of the name Steven Fake.
I happily wolfed down vermicelli at PhoEurasian – because pho and I are close friends.
I had the opportunity to wander D.C. in search of monuments on Saturday. The air was crisply freezing and I briefly feared that the homeless man bundled in a mountain of blankets and trash bags had expired. (I even wondered what to do if he had – he hadn’t). I stumbled down 22nd Street, asking many passersby, “which way to the Lincoln Memorial?”
Is that…a vision from Egypt or that Tom Cruise Movie Oblivion?
What I saw first was not the Lincoln Memorial but, rather, a mirage of an obelisk.
It was as though I’d inadvertantly entered a hallucination from Hildalgo or something. Much like a mirage, the Washington Memorial was in the annoying habit of disappearing behind buildings. Each time I wondered if, in my cold-induced madness, I had imagined it.
Not cute.
Naturally I hadn’t and there it would appear again. Somehow, I managed to reach it and take this less than glamorous photo:
I also reached the Lincoln Memorial but, by that time, my camera had died and refused to participate in any photo ops.
So that was D.C.
