Tired Thursday (16th Sept)

Altough it is now Tuesday 28th, I wrote this next lot on the evening of Sunday 19th September evening, sitting in Baltimore Airport.  Here are my musings from that day on what had occurred from Wednesday to Sunday...

I'm waiting for the flight to Detroit to stay with my Mum’s cousin Stephen and his wife and daughter, Galina and Isobella.  The thing is, I’ve been so busy having lots of fun, I’ve not had time to keep my blog updated everyday, which is not that surprising really.  So what I’m going to do from now on is just give the highlights and some pictures, as otherwise I’d be spending all my holiday writing my blog and not really doing any holidaying.  I hope this is ok with everybody.

I think I wrote about most of Wednesday, but here’s what happened after we landed and after Joe had eaten his first in-flight meal.  

Stuff I did and saw

• Talked politics with the air hostess as we took off.
• First ariel impressions of the grand old U.S of A as we flew in to Washington DC - It is very green in this area - lots of trees and forests.  There are lots of little clumps of houses, but each quite remote from the other.  There were lots of patterns in the street planning.  Not only the grid system, but also the interesting fan effect of the suburban cul de sacs and drives.  The white wood panel houses and the red wooden barns, just like my Fisher Price farm and “Edward Scissorhands”.
• When we landed it was 30'c and 4.30pm local time, but my body thought it was 9.30pm.  It should have been dark, but it was glaring sunshine.  I think it was all exacerbated by the 4 hours sleep I had the night before - I was starting to feel a bit spacey.  We queued to go through immigration for quite some time, but actually got through with no problems, probably much to my Dad’s disappointment, as he had taken great care to prepare us for the interrogation he and my mum and brother got when they arrived in Detroit 3 years ago.
• Dalj and Magali offered to give us a lift to our hotel in their hire car.  Said hire car ended up being a big white beast of a Chevrolet.  He just could not resist the offer to ‘go large”.  So we arrived in refined and leafy DC, in gangster style, complete with blacked-out windows.  
• We gave the shuttle bus driver a tip.  As we were waiting for Dalj to bling up, he came over to me and told me that I was a wonderful woman and because of me he was now going to have a break.  I think it’s because our giving him a tip guilted the other passengers into tipping him too.  He was a nice chap and told us he’d moved to the US a few years ago and that he thought he was a wonderful place.  
• Dalj also hired a SatNav so as not to get lost in a strange town, but the kind man in the car hire place set it up wrong which meant we got a bit lost, but this meant we got to drive around some amazing rural bits of the country.  The houses were H.U.G.E.  Mansions.  But on housing estates.  We got back on track, but in a round-about way, which took us into DC through Alexandria, which was founded in 1749, so we had a treat, passing by amazing old buildings, the likes I had not seen before or even knew existed.  We got into the grid system, the yellow traffic lights hanging over the crossroads and the big freeways dissecting the old streets.  Thing is, the streets and buildings were old, but looked so new.  Not stained by coal smoke like the red-brick Victorian buildings in England that I am so used to seeing.  
• Then we drove through Georgetown, the original bit of DC.  Also old, with the most beautiful houses.  Kind of like I’d seen on TV and films, but better.  DC was also very green, loads of trees.  By this time it was dark.  We drove past the university and down Q Street - original old building with cute shops.  I was starting to feel bit delirious as it was now about 1am in my body (8pm local) and I hadn’t eaten for ages.  But we arrived at our hotel in Dupont Circle at last, dropped off our bags and then walked out to find some food.  Dupont Circle is a classy bit of town, and quite soon I could tell I was in Washington, with the young politicos out to eat and drink, chatting about their days work in the capital of the world.  “My member said this”, “well, my member reckons this”.  The uniform - women in very conservative but casual dresses, the men in chinos, shirts and ties.  All pretty young looking.  We ate some yummy Mexican food then floated home in a daze and fell into bed.

Our ride into Washington

Thursday

Perky perky perky at 6am.  Blooming heck.  We were up, showered, phoned home and out  of the hotel by 8am.  I suppose this is what the jet lag does to you.  

Stuff of note

• We had an amaaaaaaazing American breakfast in Kramer and Afterwords.  Kramer’s is a very American book shop and it had a cafe out the back.  We had blueberry pancakes, with streaky bacon, scrambled egg, maple syrup and a slice of melon and pineapple (to make it healthy).  It was delicious.  The waitresses were very friendly and chatty.

Kramer & Afterwords, where we had our first American Pancakes



Our first American Pancakes.

• We saw: the Whitehouse (it’s quite small), the Washington Monument (it’s very tall), the WW2 memorial (a calvalcade went past at this point), the Vietnam Memorial (pretty intense) and the Korean War Memorial (very eerie), the Lincoln Memorial (it’s at one end of the Mall), the Capitol buildling (it’s at the other end of the Mall) and all the amazing buildings in between.  It is like an outdoor museum of epic proportions.  A National Park in the middle of a city.  We walked from one end of the Mall to the other, stopping off to get some shade and rest.  It was about 2 miles, and it was the middle of the day and it was 30.c and we were jet lagged.  I think we did well.
• As we walked across the green in front of the Whitehouse, a policeman came and chased us off on his bike.
• I walked over a subway vent and the air blew my skirt up, just like it was supposed to.
• We walked from one end of the Mall to the other, stopping off to get some shade and rest.  It was about 2 miles, and it was the middle of the day and it was 30.c and we were jet lagged.  I think we did well. 
• Joe bought his first hotdog from a street vendor. 
• I felt weird - spaced out.
• We ate delicious noodles in Chinatown.
• I discovered rag cut books.  Very nice.
• Book covers have a very different style.
• Free refills of coffee and sodas do exist.
• I haven’t seen any fat people yet.
• The food is not that cheap.
• The meals are not huge.  Maybe it’s just DC.
• We spent the evening in an area called Adams Morgan - an old area with lots of independent eateries and bars.  I saw a proper record shop (like the one in High Fidelity film).  We had our first american burger in “the Diner” a 24 hour joint.
• I slept well.
• TV is pretty dull.  The adverts are amusing and plentiful.

More photos to follow when internet connection allows