Reluctantly I Headed to D.C. (And Had a Pretty Good Time!)

Last week I had to take a trip to Washington DC for work. I LOVE traveling, but traveling for work isn't nearly as fun. I wasn't really looking forward to the trip - on top of having a cold, I was going to be engaging in 'team building' with 40 strangers. Ick!

At the El Paso airport, I discovered that TSA is doing extra-special 2nd base checks... The TSA lady ran her hands down my sternum and around my ribcage, multiple times. I boarded my tiny puddle-jumper to Denver to enjoy having the whole row to myself. So I took advantage of the No Seat Belt sign and gorgeous day and took lots of photos (with my cell phone so the pics are crappy).

We flew along the Permian Reed, with El Capitan and Guadalupe Peak out my window. I waved down to my boyfriend as we passed Carlsbad. Northern New Mexico is pretty cool to see from the sky. Its all desert plains and huge mountainous patches of black rock left, remnants of 10,000 year old lava flows. (geology nerds rock!) 

To the west, the Sandias and Jimez mountains were capped with snow. My first snow of the season!

Wow! Southeastern Colorado is boring! I was hoping to see Great Sand Dunes National Park but no, just flat, brown, agricultural fields.

The front range of the Rocky Mountains is pretty amazing to see. Just imagine those poor pioneers, after thousands of boring flat miles of Kansas and Missouri, to be hit with this site. Little did they know the landscape would be rocky and mountainous all the was to the Pacific. Awesome!

Even the Denver airport has some snow-capped peaks.:-)

Inside the airport I encountered some local wildlife.... a flock of sparrows flying around the terminal eating crumbs off the empty seats. Once on the completely packed plane, I discovered more wildlife.... our pilot had a very strong, very cliche New Jersey accent. Just what I need, the Jersey Shore cast piloting my jet across the country.

At Dulles I was surprised to find some super-helpful airport workers (take notice, Houston Intercontinental bitches!). I thought they were extinct! A very nice eastern African traffic director noticed I was lost and pointed me in the right direction, even stopped traffic so that I could get across. Then a west African shuttle driver helped me find which bus I needed to get to my hotel. It was 11pm and I'd been traveling for 12 hours. My brain was fried.

The next two hours consisted on a random midnight tour of Georgetown, where all I could think about was The Exorcist, and cleaning all of my 'fancy office clothes' in the hotel sink. My shampoo exploded and the freezer bag I had packed it in was open.

This is only the 1st day and I'm already exhausted. Seriously not looking forward to this trip.

The rest of the week was a blur of meeting rooms, new faces, and Team Dimension profiles. However, we got a lot of sight-seeing done too!

The White House!

Washington Monument, cracked and broken
so nobody can go inside

The Navy Memorial Museum - where they were
practicing for a Pearl Harbor memorial event

Very cool statue at the Navy Memorial
Museum reminded me of my grandfather

Ford's Theater - the box where Lincoln
was assassinated

From the top of the Old Post Office tower -
Looking up Pennsylvania Ave towards
Capitol Hill

Christmas Tree Concert at the White House

Oh yeah, we also got free tickets to the White House Christmas Tree Celebration - it was freezing, I'm not into crowds, and I STILL had a cold - but I went nonetheless. When the Deputy Director of the National Park Service gives you free tickets to a White House event, you go.

It was a star-studded concert, with Neil Patrick Harris
hosting, and the Obamas reading
The Night Before Christmas to us all

It was an awesome evening!

Things I learned from my trip to DC?

1. City life is fun but ultimately not for me. All that walking and concrete and traffic and noise? Ugh!

If you have enough money, you can
afford your own tiny spot of
nature, on a roof

2. When standing with 8000 strangers in front of the White House, no amount of bandwidth will allow you to access Facebook to brag or text photos of Phillip Phillips to your best friend (who LOVES him). So I'll post a quick video here :-)

Yes... that's me screaming throughout the video.
(try my YouTube page if you can't get the video to play here)

3. Getting kicked out of your meeting space because the President of the United States (or POTUS) needs to talk to 150 leaders of Native American tribes is pretty cool.

4. Introducing non-city people to Tapas is both interesting and amusing

5. Room service and a bubble bath make for a damned good evening

6. The Secret Service have traffic stops down pat! They can get VP Biden from his house in Georgetown to the White House with only minimal disruption to us commuters. ps - they will wave at you if you wave at them (not the snipers, never wave at snipers)

7. Even a reluctant work trip can have some pretty awesome adventures attached.

Flying over snow-capped Rockies is gorgeous!