Anyway, I have been away on my trip to Washington, DC. I took my little girl to DC for the weekend and it was fun. It is oppressively hot there, even more than in Chicago! But, I had no migraines so that was good. There were huge storms on the East Coast this weekend so traveling was horrible. But once we got there, it was fun. We’re planning to go back for cherry blossom time.
Friday July 15– Day at O’Hare
4:12 comes along. No plane. Flight delayed to 5:30. We board the plane at 6. Plane gets on the runway and the pilot tells us that there are two things wrong. First, there is a 30 min delay for all east coast flights. Second, there’s a mechanical problem with the plane. We ended up having to go back to the gate and stood around for an hour waiting for a new one. We FINALLY got on board and took off around 7:30 CST. We arrived in DC at 10:19 pm EST. We missed our 7:30 monument night tour and were really tired 🙁 You wouldn’t like gazebogirl when she’s tired and grouchy. My muscles ached in my shoulders and toes!
The lady at the Marriott Crystal Gateway was great though. They got us some room service (we were STARVING) before the kitchen closed & they held our reservation for us. Great hotel — highly recommended!
SLEEP……………………………………..
Saturday, July 16 — Day in DC
Thanks to the late arrival we slept until 10 and were unable to make it to the zoo 🙁 But, we still got to the Smithsonian and spent the day there. We saw everything! Vicki fed the pidgeons (those little guys are friendly!) . We saw Kermit the Frog, the ruby slippers, the Hope diamond (I was unimpressed), Fonzie’s jacket, Oscar the Grouch, and Mr Rogers’ sweater. We also saw the Berlin Wall — It amazes me that Vicki didn’t know what the Berlin Wall or Soviet Union were. The cafeteria was full!
We left the Smithsonian around 4 and not five steps away from the American History museum, it POURED! We managed to get to the Metro station a block away and saw the Reagan Trade Center. But, we were drenched. The laminated map we used as a cover was torn to shreds by the time we got there. My video camera got all wet but it did power on & was ok! So, we went back to the hotel and got ready to go to Union Station to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. (I love Movietickets.com)
C&CF was pretty cool. It was more true to the book, except for the end. The message though was that family is most important and that evil little children will eventually get what they deserve. The best change though was the Oompa Loompas. The ones in the original movie had that creepy clown look while the new ones were more cool looking. Their songs were better too.
Went back to the hotel and worked on my Accounting homework. It was due at midnight on Sunday. Stayed up until 3am.
Sunday, July 17 — Crystal City & Going Home
Sunday morning, we got up and went to the Crystal City shops below our hotel. Unfortunately, they were closed! So, we decided to get some pizza and met some people at a PartyLite convention from Wisconsin. We checked out of the hotel, went to the airport, read, ate, slept, shopped until our 5:38 flight. Which became 5:50 which became 6:30.
We got in around 9:00 and could not find our car! How embarrassing! We got the car around 9:30 and were home by 10.
SLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!