My First Real Vacation: Capitol Hill (Day 2)

So, even though I’m on Eastern time this weekend, I still managed to wake up before 8AM. Of course, that could have to do with the fact that I crashed about 10PM last night. I hopped on the Metro blue line, transferred to the red line at Metro Center, and started my day at Union Station. I’d been there before, several years ago, but it’s still a beautiful building.

Outside Union Station

I didn’t have a lot of picture-taking opportunities at Union Station, mainly because there were so many people there. The weather today also started out poor and got worse…more about that later.

So after Union Station I wandered on down to the Supreme Court building. The last time I was in DC I wanted to get inside but there was a ridiculous line. However, that’s one benefit of early-morning tourism: no lines. I got right in, and I’m glad I went. I didn’t go on the actual tour, but you can see most of it in a more self-guided fashion. I appreciate architecture, and I can definitively say that the Supreme Court building is my favorite building in all of DC. Did you know that there are two identical, self-supporting, marble spiral staircases? They’re awesome.

The West Entrance

Anyway, then it was on to the exciting adventure of the day. Last week, I had requested a meeting with Senator Al Franken’s staff regarding for-profit education (it should go without saying that I both work for and attend for-profit schools and my opinion is markedly different than the Senator’s). I trekked over to the Hart building and got to meet with Jake, one of the Senator’s aides. Unfortunately, all he really did was try to placate me. But he did accept the Anthem pennant that I had brought with me…the Senator has a ton of college pennants hung up in his DC office, but no career college ones. Until now, anyway.

After that…interesting meeting, I hit up the Capitol. Since Congress is in session, no one can go inside, so I just walked around the outside of the building and managed to get some nice shots of it. Then it was on to the US Botanic Garden, then the National Museum of the American Indian. As of today, there is officially one Smithsonian museum that I haven’t been to (the National Portrait Gallery), but I hope to get there tomorrow, assuming there isn’t a government shutdown that closes down the museums. It’s funny because it’s true…

 

The US Capitol

When I left the NMAI, it was raining. Hard. And it had also gotten cold out. Now, being a ***TRUE MINNESOTAN*** I hadn’t worn a jacket when leaving the hotel at 8AM when it was 50 degrees and overcast. Lucky for me, there are vendors everywhere, and I picked up a pretty sweet zip-up hoodie for $20. Yay souvenir that’s actually practical!

However, rain meant that I really didn’t want to be outside. I hadn’t originally planned on going to the Air & Space Museum, since it’s always packed and I’ve been there several times, but I needed to get out of the rain and it was the closest option. I actually ended up going to see the “Journey to the Stars” planetarium thing and got to hear Whoopi Goldberg tell me about how the sun works. I didn’t learn anything, but planetariums are always fun.

After that, it was STILL raining and after 4PM. Since I had spent a good 8 hours being a tourist already, I decided to head back to the hotel. A quick jaunt through the rain to L’Enfant Plaza got me back to Rosslyn station, which is only three blocks from my hotel. After a quick dinner in the hotel restaurant, here I am.

The plan for tomorrow is to go to the National Portrait Gallery and possibly the Spy Museum (I’ve heard good things. You know who you are). The forecast says 55 and scattered showers, which hopefully means an improvement over today. Only time will tell.

 

Look! A squirrel!

 

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