Jul 28 – Jul 30, 2017

White House in the rain...

Hangin' with Abe again...

This seemed bigger.

... When you come out of the Dupont Circle metro station and the rats scurry away.

Okay...so I have a confession. I judge. Yep. Most people do....I'm just admitting to it. So Julie and I go to this Mexican food establishment at Dupont Circle. It's called Mission. So we walk in and the bar area is full of what looks like college students drinking their asses off. Julie and I ask for a 'quiet corner'. So they take us back in a back corner of the restaurant. We're sitting there for a few minutes and these scantily clad gals are cackling over in the corner. One has almost nothing on with her very large bust on the top. The other has a VERY short leather skirt on. I wasn't thinking the best of them based on their choice of the public display of their 'goods' and Julie admitted to them being loud and judging them on that. Yes, we were being judgy and happy we didn't bring our grandson in there with us. Next to us are two other gals having drinks. One of them has her head down. Obviously had too many. The other is pretty talkative. So we're sitting there asking the 'alert' gal if her friend is alright. She says she's fine. About then the not so alert one gets up and starts tacking down the hall apparently heading to the restroom. I tell her friend that I've been around alcohol quite a while and there's approximately an 85% chance her friend isn't coming back. She asks us what she should do. Before we start that conversation the two other scantily dressed gals come over and say "we're leaving and can't finish our pitchers of mimosa and margarita...do you two want them?" Well DUH! We graciously accept their offer and I give a little humor as their walking away saying "Wait....are you trying to roofie me? You're not going to roll me when I leave are you?" They laugh and confirm the negative. They were very nice and it was wrong for me to think what I was thinking based on their attire. So after the gals dropped the pitchers off we re-initiated the conversation with the gal next to us, concerned that her friend might not be totally functional. I told her it was probably time to go check on her friend in the 'restroom'. She found her in the restroom. As a 'pay it forward' we decided the two gals next to us had a lot to deal with and so we paid for the girls food that was annihilated so the other girl wouldn't have to pay for her non-functional friend. She agreed to get her friend home and inside and lock the door for her before she left. The staff at this place were totally awesome and accommodating. I would ABSOLUTELY recommend this place to anyone visiting the Dupont Circle area of Washington DC. A surreal...yet entertaining and fantastic experience.

First....be careful judging people. Those you hold in a negative way may surpass your expectations and prove you wrong (this is that don't judge a book by it's cover thing). Second....ease the suffering of others...you'd be surprised how much it does for your soul.

Smithsonian National Air & Space Museum. Felt like a kid in a candy store in this place. I'm sure Julie and Linnea were getting sick of me taking pictures but I couldn't help it. Got to see Raymon Staton's contribution to the Apollo missions as well. Love this place.

No...it's not a Death Star.

Some good stuff in this one. Not as good as the full WWI Museum in Kansas City but not bad.

Julie called this one a waffle maker mixed with a George Foreman grill. *sigh*

Hey Scott....got one of these? Smithsonian is putting together an unmanned vehicle display at the Air and Space Museum. They have a few already on display (see following pics) Pretty neat stuff. Can't wait till it's finished.

Julie went to this the last time she came with me to DC. She insisted I see it. It was very well put together and had a lot of data. Learned a few things along the way. Great museum if you get a chance to go. Very humbling.

The town of Shtetl is where the violence and attrocities started.

Toward the end of the tour they wanted to emphasize that genocidal attrocities continue today in some places including a particularly moving piece on Syria. "Caesar", at great personal risk, took photographs of the attrocities in his country and smuggled the photos out in usb thumb drives in the heels of his shoes. I plan on learning more about this when I get back but here's a link to some info on him and what he did with the photos in the US. https://www.hrw.org/news/2015/12/16/syria-stories-behind-photos-killed-detainees