Washington D.C.

I went to Washington D.C. this weekend. Heather's friend, Sherrie, lives right on the edge of Virginia and works in D.C. She's a big lawyer and is really smart. It was her birthday so she invited Heather and myself to join in the birthday festivities. We drove down Saturday afternoon and got there a little after 1 or so. Dropped our stuff off at the apartment and got on the Metro, which is the subway in D.C. It's a lot fancier than the subway in Philly or NY. We took it right to the stop at the Smithsonian. We didn't have much time, so we could only do so much. So there was not enough time for museums or anything like that. Maybe next time I can do all that. First stop was the Washington Monument. Very cool close up. Just neat to be around.

I took a picture of the monument from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial with the reflective pond. Everytime I show this picture to someone they say, "Oh Forrest Gump!"

What I wanted to see the most was the Lincoln Memorial. Don't ask me why. It was what I wanted to see and when we got there, it was just so moving. I didn't think it would impact me the way it would.

Just seeing the statue close up just left me in awe and silence. I just stood there and I read every word and just realizing what was happening at that time.

On the right side wall was his speech he gave at the inauguration of his 2nd term. It was 3 columns and I read the whole thing. Pretty amazing.

I wanted to get closer and take another picture.

This was kind of hard to see in the picture but this is the left wall with the Gettysburg Address on it. Reading it made me think, where are the leaders like this in these days? Has our politicians sunk so low? How easy is it to forget all that these founding fathers went through and stood for, when the president is surrounded by it right in D.C.?

We went to the wall with the names of all that were lost in the Vietnam War. I felt out of respect, I shouldn't take any pictures. But it was crazy to see how many names were on there. You don't realize it until you see it first hand.

There is a new World War II Memorial in between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. It was so big and just so great. There were two sides that said Atlantic and Pacific. Around the edges were columns that represented every state with wreaths on them.

In the middle was a huge fountain. You can see the state pillars in the background.

There was a wall filled with these gold stars and a fountain around it. There was a ranger there talking about it but there were too many people around him that we couldn't hear what he was saying. I'm assuming it is a representation for people that were lost in WWII. Like one star stands for 50 or 100 people that died.

There were quotes all around the Memorial and this one stuck out to me the most. How scary must that be to have been at Pearl Harbor.

This is the entrance to the Memorial. You can see Lincoln Memorial way in the background. These things were not that close to each other so we did a lot of walking. But it was worth it.

We were walking back to the Metro b/c we had to get back to the apartment to get ready for the night. Sherrie came to pick us up. We were waiting for her at the Washington Monument and we look off to the side. Lo and behold, there's the frickin White House. We had no idea it was right there. I zoomed in as much as I could. There was a giant Menorah (sp?) and a Christmas tree outside.

We went back at night after the party and walked around some more. None of the pictures came out b/c they were too dark. We got a closer look of the White House, which was a lot smaller than I expected. Seeing the Monument and Lincoln Memorial all lit up was really cool. There was a ton more stuff I wanted to see but it was late (almost midnight) and it was freezing outside. So we went back to the apartment. We were so exhausted today from all the walking that we didn't do anything today. We just came back home. I want to go back b/c there's so much more I want to see now. The Capitol building, Jefferson Memorial, the Museum of American History, etc. I never had any interest in history in school, but being there and seeing it all makes it that much more real. It's funny that you don't really have an interest in learning until you're old and out of school. Haha In school, I wanted nothing to do with it. Now all of a sudden I care.

And just for fun, this was my buddy this weekend, Simon. He's Sherrie's cat and he was really cool. We hung out. He was sitting in my bag when I was trying to get ready this morning. When I went for my camera, that's when he jumped out. He knew what I was doing. Haha