I know I'm not keeping up with these updates weekly like I'm supposed to, but I like to wait until I've actually done something worth talking about and most weeks I just work and hang around the house with Shawn. I'm sure no one wants to hear the boring details of my daily life, right? Anyway, now I have some stories, and more importantly I have some pictures, from the last week or so!
Since I've been here in Alexandria I've made several very good friends at work. The people I work with are great, and if I were going to decide to stay at this assignment just based on the people I work with then I would stay here for sure! There are some really great travelers here too! Megan and Jennifer have become very good friends. This coming week is Jennifer's last week then she's off to Cincinnati, OH for her next assignment. Megan is here for another week or two after I leave and she's not quite sure where she's going to go next. I'm hoping that it is somewhere close to us though because Shawn and I have really had a good time with her. One night last week Megan had a friend in town and I went with them to a place in Crystal City called the SkyDome. It is a restaurant/bar in a dome on the top floor of the DoubleTree Hotel. The restaurant is circular and the center of the room is a dance floor while the outer ring revolves at a pretty slow rate. The outer wall of the dome is all windows and there is an amazing view of The Pentagon (which is right across the street from it) and D.C. At night the restaurant becomes a nightclub and that is when we were there. It was a gorgeous view, but other than that it wasn't anything special. The drinks were expensive, the food was shitty, and the people there were not exactly our crowd. There was some excellent people-watching though and we had a good laugh at the expense of others there! Haha. I wish I had some pictures of this place, but I forgot my camera that night! When Shawn got off work that night we picked him up and headed to a Country Western bar in Alexandria. That was an experience! There was a live band in the front room with lots of people in boots & cowboy hats dancing. Then the back room had another bar, dance floor and karoke. There were people doing more line dances than I knew existed! I got up and sang a country song and the line dancers came out and danced for me. It was great! We are planning a get together tomorrow for Jennifer's farewell. We are having a group of people from work over at my place to hang out with Jennifer. Shawn has to work but we'll all still be here when he gets home so he'll get to meet a lot of the other people I work with too! Should be fun!
Only 2 weeks left!
This past week, Shawn and I both had Tuesday & Wednesday off work, which was wonderful! We decided that we had put off Arlington National Cemetery long enough waiting for a nice day so we were just gonna go...well it turned out to be the most beautiful day this year so far! We spent about 2.5 hours there. I was amazed at how large it is! There were so many different areas with rows and rows of gravestones, plus there were so many memorials that I didn't realize were there. Right when you start there is a large memorial to Women. We were just going to walk though, so we didn't get to see everything, but we stopped at the Kennedy Grave Site, which had the Eternal Flame in the area with JFK's and Jackie O's graves. Near that is a nice area with a water tribute and Robert Kennedy's grave. This area was at the base of a hill with the Arlington House at the top. The Arlington House was the home of Robert E. Lee prior to the Civil War. There are tours of the house and a small museum about Robert E. Lee as well. The Slave quarters are still present behind the house to demonstrate the living environments the slaves lived in compared to the wealthy land owners. It was interesting to see the contrast. We walked over to the Memorial Amphitheater which is the site of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and the Changing of the Guard. Shawn got a video of that ceremony. Near there is a tribute to the victims of the Challenger and Columbia Shuttles as well as Iran Rescue Mission Memorial. The afternoon at Arlington Cemetery was even nicer because the Cherry Trees there were blossoming and there were such beautiful flowers in bloom everywhere! We went into Arlington afterward for a quick stop at the Iwo Jima Marine Memorial. I had no idea how large that memorial is! That statue is HUGE! Then we were on our way into D.C. along the Memorial Bridge to check out the National Cherry Blossom Festival. The festival is 2 weeks long with daily events. The weekends have more events but also MANY more people...so we were happy to go on a Tuesday and just enjoy the blossoms. We took a ton of pictures which are below in the slideshow. There were areas along the walk where the branches were hanging down into the water of the Tidal Basin and it was like walking through a canopy of Cherry Blossoms. I can't remember the last time I saw something so beautiful, plus the fragrance is wonderful as well! Megan met up with us around dinner time and we went to eat at The Capital City Brewing Company. This is a local microbrewery and the food and beer were both great! By the end of that day we had walked enough for the whole week, but we weren't finished yet! Wednesday Shawn and I walked to the Metro and went into D.C. to check out the Spy Museum. This museum is fairly new and does have an entrance fee as well as an additional fee if you want to participate in Operation Spy, which is an hour long, hand-ons spy experience. Obviously we had to do that :) It was a really interesting museum and the gift shop was even cooler. We walked down by the White House after the museum and then we went to check out the garden at the Smithsonian Castle because Megan had told us the day before how beautiful the garden was. She was right! There are pictures in the slideshow! When we got back to Crystal City that evening we stopped for dinner at McCormick & Schmicks, which is a really great seafood restaurant. It was tasty...expensive but tasty. We also had the most delicious chocolate truffle dessert cake I've ever had! Wow! By this point I thought our legs were going to just stop working so we headed home for relax!
Tonight we're planning a West Wing TV Marathon and possibly some a SceneIt Tournament before the excitement tomorrow when my friends from work will be coming over. This coming week we are planning a trip for a few days to Philadelphia. We are going to check out some of the historical sites there as well as go to a Cubs game against the Phillies! I'm pretty excited about the trip and I know Shawn is too! Another reminder is that we will be heading back to Indiana on April 18. Our tentative plan for that week is to stop at Shawn's parents house first and stay there a day or two, then head back to Muncie because I need to pack and move all my stuff out of the house in Muncie and into storage. We will spend some time with my family and friends as well then stop back at Shawn's parents before heading to Chicago that next weekend. If you wanna see us, give one of us a call! I love you all and miss everyone!!
Since I've been here in Alexandria I've made several very good friends at work. The people I work with are great, and if I were going to decide to stay at this assignment just based on the people I work with then I would stay here for sure! There are some really great travelers here too! Megan and Jennifer have become very good friends. This coming week is Jennifer's last week then she's off to Cincinnati, OH for her next assignment. Megan is here for another week or two after I leave and she's not quite sure where she's going to go next. I'm hoping that it is somewhere close to us though because Shawn and I have really had a good time with her. One night last week Megan had a friend in town and I went with them to a place in Crystal City called the SkyDome. It is a restaurant/bar in a dome on the top floor of the DoubleTree Hotel. The restaurant is circular and the center of the room is a dance floor while the outer ring revolves at a pretty slow rate. The outer wall of the dome is all windows and there is an amazing view of The Pentagon (which is right across the street from it) and D.C. At night the restaurant becomes a nightclub and that is when we were there. It was a gorgeous view, but other than that it wasn't anything special. The drinks were expensive, the food was shitty, and the people there were not exactly our crowd. There was some excellent people-watching though and we had a good laugh at the expense of others there! Haha. I wish I had some pictures of this place, but I forgot my camera that night! When Shawn got off work that night we picked him up and headed to a Country Western bar in Alexandria. That was an experience! There was a live band in the front room with lots of people in boots & cowboy hats dancing. Then the back room had another bar, dance floor and karoke. There were people doing more line dances than I knew existed! I got up and sang a country song and the line dancers came out and danced for me. It was great! We are planning a get together tomorrow for Jennifer's farewell. We are having a group of people from work over at my place to hang out with Jennifer. Shawn has to work but we'll all still be here when he gets home so he'll get to meet a lot of the other people I work with too! Should be fun!
Only 2 weeks left!
This past week, Shawn and I both had Tuesday & Wednesday off work, which was wonderful! We decided that we had put off Arlington National Cemetery long enough waiting for a nice day so we were just gonna go...well it turned out to be the most beautiful day this year so far! We spent about 2.5 hours there. I was amazed at how large it is! There were so many different areas with rows and rows of gravestones, plus there were so many memorials that I didn't realize were there. Right when you start there is a large memorial to Women. We were just going to walk though, so we didn't get to see everything, but we stopped at the Kennedy Grave Site, which had the Eternal Flame in the area with JFK's and Jackie O's graves. Near that is a nice area with a water tribute and Robert Kennedy's grave. This area was at the base of a hill with the Arlington House at the top. The Arlington House was the home of Robert E. Lee prior to the Civil War. There are tours of the house and a small museum about Robert E. Lee as well. The Slave quarters are still present behind the house to demonstrate the living environments the slaves lived in compared to the wealthy land owners. It was interesting to see the contrast. We walked over to the Memorial Amphitheater which is the site of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and the Changing of the Guard. Shawn got a video of that ceremony. Near there is a tribute to the victims of the Challenger and Columbia Shuttles as well as Iran Rescue Mission Memorial. The afternoon at Arlington Cemetery was even nicer because the Cherry Trees there were blossoming and there were such beautiful flowers in bloom everywhere! We went into Arlington afterward for a quick stop at the Iwo Jima Marine Memorial. I had no idea how large that memorial is! That statue is HUGE! Then we were on our way into D.C. along the Memorial Bridge to check out the National Cherry Blossom Festival. The festival is 2 weeks long with daily events. The weekends have more events but also MANY more people...so we were happy to go on a Tuesday and just enjoy the blossoms. We took a ton of pictures which are below in the slideshow. There were areas along the walk where the branches were hanging down into the water of the Tidal Basin and it was like walking through a canopy of Cherry Blossoms. I can't remember the last time I saw something so beautiful, plus the fragrance is wonderful as well! Megan met up with us around dinner time and we went to eat at The Capital City Brewing Company. This is a local microbrewery and the food and beer were both great! By the end of that day we had walked enough for the whole week, but we weren't finished yet! Wednesday Shawn and I walked to the Metro and went into D.C. to check out the Spy Museum. This museum is fairly new and does have an entrance fee as well as an additional fee if you want to participate in Operation Spy, which is an hour long, hand-ons spy experience. Obviously we had to do that :) It was a really interesting museum and the gift shop was even cooler. We walked down by the White House after the museum and then we went to check out the garden at the Smithsonian Castle because Megan had told us the day before how beautiful the garden was. She was right! There are pictures in the slideshow! When we got back to Crystal City that evening we stopped for dinner at McCormick & Schmicks, which is a really great seafood restaurant. It was tasty...expensive but tasty. We also had the most delicious chocolate truffle dessert cake I've ever had! Wow! By this point I thought our legs were going to just stop working so we headed home for relax!
Tonight we're planning a West Wing TV Marathon and possibly some a SceneIt Tournament before the excitement tomorrow when my friends from work will be coming over. This coming week we are planning a trip for a few days to Philadelphia. We are going to check out some of the historical sites there as well as go to a Cubs game against the Phillies! I'm pretty excited about the trip and I know Shawn is too! Another reminder is that we will be heading back to Indiana on April 18. Our tentative plan for that week is to stop at Shawn's parents house first and stay there a day or two, then head back to Muncie because I need to pack and move all my stuff out of the house in Muncie and into storage. We will spend some time with my family and friends as well then stop back at Shawn's parents before heading to Chicago that next weekend. If you wanna see us, give one of us a call! I love you all and miss everyone!!
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