Our Nation's Capital, Day 4

While I was home in Austin, I checked the mail, and found a sympathy card from Robin, which was postmarked in Alexandria. I called Kim to let her know, so that she could catch up with her friend.

*Kim:
I thought silly me- I'm about 20 minutes away from a friend from college...I wished I would have clued in earlier! Even though it was really short notice Robin was able to visit so I headed over to her house to meet her new little baby, Ava and her very friendly cat! We had a great visit and I hope to see her again soon!

I stayed the previous night with Josh and Steph in Austin, and caught a couple of early flights, getting back to Baltimore in the early afternoon on Thursday, July 15th. Well, not early enough, evidently. The traffic was still unbelievable.

I got back to Kate's and worked for a while, catching up on several day's email, and working hard toward a big code deadline at work.

On my Mom's strong recommendation, I bought a couple of floor-level tickets for the long-running, innovative comedy/murder/mystery called Shear Madness, at the Kennedy Center just across the river from Arlington.

I had forgotten to change my watch ahead an hour and we nearly missed the play!

We were in such a rush, we decided to drive rather than taking a cab, and I thought I had made a really bad choice when I saw that parking in the Kennedy Center garage was $20. But I drove about 100 feet further and parked on the street for free ;-) Don't give in so easily!

The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is an amazing building, with numerous theaters, and incredible views of the Watergate complex, the river, and the city.

Watergate is just next door.

I remember visiting Washington as a kid, and one of my best memories was climbing on the Einstein Memorial. It's very cleverly hidden from view of the street, otherwise, we would have probably visited it on Monday, as it's very close to the Vietnam War Memorial.

As luck would have it, our good friend Josh McJilton happened to be working in Washington this week. We picked him up near his office and headed to Georgetown. We dipped into what looked to be a brilliant English pub -- The Guards -- with great throne-room looking chairs.

However, they didn't have Guinness on tap, the waitress was somewhat rude, and the bathroom was covered in vomit.

So we left the English and headed across the channel to a gorgeous French Bistro, and feasted on omelette's until 1am, which came all too quickly.

It has really been great meeting up with so many friends and family along this trip. I believe that we are truly getting the "reboot" we're seeking. Thanks for hanging out with us, Josh.

:-Dustin