The White House and Capitol Buildings

Do you know that verse in the Bible where it says that God has prepared good deeds for us to perform ahead of time? I felt like I was the recipient of those good deeds on Wednesday when the car died on me. Ron was in the condo napping with his phone turned off, and I was stranded in the parking lot of Big Giant. I walked over to Auto Advantage and they lugged their battery tester over to Big Giant and tested the battery – which was good, but low on charge. Then they lugged over a battery to charge it up but that didn’t do anything. The gentleman that was helping thought it was the starter – so now what!!? I asked if he knew of a place that did good work but was reasonable and he immediately dialed Woody at Don’s Sunoco. They towed the car over (dropping me off at the condo on the way) and told me it would be done by the morning for sure, pretty iffy for getting done that afternoon. I called Rep. Hoekstra’s office where they graciously changed our tour to Thursday. Probably no more than an hour later Don’s called and they had the car done! They drove over to the condo to drop off the car and we drove Woody back to Don’s. Everything worked out so nicely. We had decided to just be lazy so I read “The Help” (very good), Ron napped, and then we went to dinner at Brio’s in Tyson’s corner (one of the 11 largest malls in US). Very good food and service, and I totally enjoyed my Crème Brulee Trio and Ron enjoyed one of the biggest pieces of chocolate cake ever!

Thursday morning we headed out to Old Ebbitt Grill in downtown DC. Ebbitt’s has been there 100+ years, and we thoroughly enjoyed our breakfasts (Egg Strata and Frittata) and yes, then we fell for dessert at breakfast (pecan pie a la mode and Chocolate Brownie Cappucino which was HUGE). Ebbitt’s is a beautiful old building and I thank my sister and Daniela from Pete Hoekstra’s office for recommending it.

After breakfast we headed out to the White House. First we stopped at the Visitor’s Center, which was okay, but I think we both felt we could have skipped it. Then we joined the other tourists to view the South view (Rose Garden and where Air Force One lands). Of course, we are barred out. I bet when Washington lived there you could have walked right up and knocked on the door. It doesn’t seem right to me that the House we help pay for doesn’t allow you in. We walked around and viewed the front as well. There were a few protester’s, but mostly just us tourists. From the White House we metro’d to the Rayborn Building to pick up our Capitol tour tickets from Pete Hoekstra’s Office. While I was removing my belt (I was tired of removing this by the end of the day, but it kept setting off the alarm), I noticed a sign for DIBELS pointing to the left. Somehow I had not expected to run into that while in DC – no protesters that I could see though.

The capitol tour was interesting. Our guide was very knowledgeable and took us through the history of the paintings and statues. Our government sure likes to spend a lot of money on these buildings and statues. We’re talking big bucks with marble floors, bronze statues, chandeliers, etc. Given this economy and the trouble our country is in I have to wonder about the wisdom of it. The Library of Congress was in the millions of dollars and they built that during the depression. It seems like the dollars we spend on these buildings could be better invested in people. I love seeing them, and seeing the history of the country, but I wonder if these monuments are just to make us feel important and show our success to other people/countries. Maybe we need to be more humble and frugal, and use these dollars to build up people instead of monuments.

After touring the capitol we sat in the House Gallery for a while. They were voting while we were there. It was driving Ron crazy because it just looked so chaotic and disorganized down there. Everyone was chatting people up in between the votes, and when the chairman would say what they were voting for and how long they would vote people just kept talking. Ron thought it was disrespectful, and he was disappointed we didn’t get to see a debate. After the house we went over to the Senate side. Hmmm. . . no-one was there. Eventually a few of the Senator’s walked in. This was actually fun for me because there were some young people (high school, college freshman?) there. When the Senator’s walked in they got so excited. Look! Is that Joe Biden?! (It wasn’t) We did get to see Joe Lieberman, John McCain, John Kerry, Debbie Stabenaw, Carl Levin and others. The kids were a riot. Ron hated to leave because it seemed like things were going to start happening, but we were meeting our niece for dinner so we had to go.

We enjoyed delicious pizza at Matchbox Pizza (Capitol Hill location) – Chicken Pesto and Sausage with sun dried tomatoes, and molten cake for dessert. We do love our desserts! Then off to view the monuments at night which was very nice.

We’re on our way home right now (I’m typing this in the car). We’ve decided you have to spend like a month in DC to see everything. I didn’t even get into any art museums and I had hoped to see some original Whistler’s art. Didn’t get to view the Smithsonian Castle, Spy Museum. I guess we’ll have to come back some day!