Mall Rats

So once I inadvertently sped down New York Avenue to my hotel, the kids and I enjoyed a rollicking good time in our nation's capitol.

But the trip was not without its ups and downs. To wit:

The hotel pool was scheduled to remain open for one hour following our check in time. The kids were thrilled. But they were also the only guests daring to set foot on the pool deck at 8 pm, so the lifeguard, who had been socializing with friends, did not welcome the sudden need to actually work. Left the deck lights off, removed all the floats and inflatables, and insisted that I remain at poolside so I could do his job. At least until 8:35 when his friends left and he decided he'd like to go with them, and closed the pool. Note to self: Speak with the manager.

The upside to that was a very accommodating shuttle driver who, when he noticed that we were the only party on the 9 am shuttle the next morning, took us directly to our destination, not the official stop nearest our destination. And for that he earned a nice tip.

I learned that the mere sight of the actual flag that flew over Ft. McHenry and thus inspired Francis Scott Key to pen the poem that became the words to our National Anthem could inspire me to cry and keep on crying for the duration of my tour of that particular exhibit. The montage of different well-known renditions of the song did not help curtail the tears.

I learned that the Ruby Slippers were intended to be silver according to the original script, that Roosevelt scratched out parts of his original speech and added the word "infamy" himself to the famous Pearl Harbor speech, and that all First Ladies, no matter their ages, shapes or sizes, feel like princesses when they step out on Inauguration Night with the most powerful man in the world, in a fabulous dress people competed to design just for her shining debut. And that there are 100s of things that move me to tears in the National History Museum.

The Newseum with its absolutely gripping, fascinating, magnificent exhibits and its amazing presentation of how the press has brought newsworthy moments to life in our homes for centuries, and its reasonable price, and its pass that is good for two days, is easily the deal of DC. It left me breathless but not penniless. And by the way, a blogger now has a White House Press Pass. That is how important good information is. The coverage of Hurricane Katrina was devastating. The images and heroism from September 11th were vivid and heartbreaking. The headlines from around the world were amazing. Without the press, what would we know about any of these things?

The biggest rip-off of DC is hands down the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. Free to get in, but even the map is $2. Half of the museum was off limits because they had to get 25 guys and 17 pieces of equipment to move a propeller plane across the room. (This evidently could not be accomplished on hours not open to the public.) But I didn't care. It saved me the energy it takes to produce a yawn. Most of the exhibits were ho-hum visually and forced you to do a lot of reading. We took part in a flight simulation demonstration, at $8 a piece, as a trade off to seeing one of two 18 minute movies or the planetarium, all of which were $9.50 per person, when a full length feature film with George Clooney is only $9 at home, and a whole lot more promising from a visual perspective. We spent the most time in the exhibit designed to demonstrate flight principles like drag and force to young people. It was like a great big science fair project. Or Yawn-fest.

I missed Scott on a visceral level when we went to the Elephant and Castle for lunch.

After an exhausting day but a reasonable cab ride to the hotel, I found out that the lounge by the pool was inexplicably closed during the week. There was a handwritten note on the door apologizing for the inconvenience. (What?) While the kids were in the pool, I had to fend for myself without the ability to order dinner for us or a glass of wine for my nerve endings. With starvation fast approaching, I had to order takeout from an assortment of menus at the hotel desk. I was not about to traipse out the door again looking like a hag. So we settled for greasy, MSG-laden Chinese food delivered by a man with a three-year-old in a car seat in the delivery car. Note to self: Mention to the hotel manager that the lounge is one of the only two things that make this quirky little way-off-the-Mall hotel acceptable (the outdoor pool being the other) and so far, they were zero for two.

Maybe we'd sleep well?