Washington, DC – Day #5

April 14, 2012
Day number 5 in our nation’s capital was an interesting day.  After the conference was done for the day, we were invited out to the faculty reception at the “W” Hotel.  My first thought, “Wow, President Bush was more popular in this town than I thought, to have a hotel named after him.”  However, no – that was not the case.  It is called the “W”, but not after him (just in case you were confused).  I was told that I HAD to go to the hotel, because you can see the roof of the White House from the balcony of the W.  “Sometimes you can even see the snipers,” I was told.

Yes, I got up to the roof of the W – and sure enough, you can see the roof of the White House. Sorry, no snipers today.  You can even hang your camera over the balcony and take pictures of the roof of the White House (remember this, this will be important later).  So – after taking pix of the White House roof, and other pictures of the DC skyline, I saw a door sign that said, “talent only”.  I can only guess that this was a cute way of saying, “employees only.”  I wanted to snap a picture and show to one of my colleagues - as he would find this humorous (long story, not worth re-telling).  I dig out my camera, and right as I’m about to raise it, a waitress says, “sir, you cannot take pictures of anything inside this hotel.”  Thinking she’s joking, I say, “you’re kidding” and wait for her to crack a smile – which does not come.  Instead, she repeats, “you cannot take a picture of anything in this hotel.”  Uh – but it’s a door sign (keeping in mind that I just took a picture of the White House roof!).  “No pictures are allowed,” she says – still not cracking a smile I might add.  Now curiosity has gotten the better of me, and I ask, “why not?”  Her answer?  “Because you can’t” – end of story.  I put my camera away and proceed to the elevators.  I have a sneaking suspicion that I will have to swing by the W on Monday and, as a matter of curiosity, find out the scoop.  I will keep you posted.

A semi-funny thing that happened; all week I have been skirting around the White House.  I could see it from the Washington Monument and when I was down by Ford’s Theater, I was only 6 blocks from it.  Unfortunately, since I’ve been taking the Metro everywhere, I’ve been traveling underground and so have had no real bearings as far as what’s where in relation to where I’m staying.  So – on my way to the W, thinking that I was going to have to stop by the White House before I left DC – I came upon a large park – but looked a little different, just due to all of the security and barricades.  While I pondered the reason for such a hub-bub, the reason soon became apparent.  I was approaching the White House.  This whole time I’ve been thinking that I would get to the White House when I had time – only to find out that I’m only staying about 8 blocks from it.  It was a major hit my forehead and say, “doh!” moment.

After returning from the White House and the W – I found something to eat.  Should you ever come to DC, avoid a restaurant called, “The House of Kabob.”  The food wasn’t bad (I had a gyro) – but the buffet was scary looking – including the house dressing type stuff that had that, “I haven’t been stirred in 4 hours skin on it.”  If he would’ve taken my gyro sauce from that pan I think I would’ve just tossed it in the trash and moved on.  My gyro was not made from any contents in the curdled milk pan, and I have – thus far – avoided food poisoning.  I’ll let you know how it goes.

Anyway – off to bed.

Thanks for reading.  Be well.

JBD