Washington DC

Sitting in my car, I watched umbrellas shielding LSU students from the rain and the drip of Crape Myrtle draped sidewalks. With a few minutes until my wife got off from her job in Himes Hall, I was fascinated with how the water globbed up and refracted the colors from the student apparel. Sometimes boredom just takes over, so I experimented with settings on my digital SLR.

(Click the picture for larger view)

The cell phone rang and my attention now turned to my next assignment near Richmond, VA. Since I'd never been to DC, this seemed like a good opportunity to put things into perspective to how it’s all laid out. This was probably going to be a short one and were that I would have only one weekend to explore.

Rising early one Saturday morning, I drove into Washington DC and found my way to the mall using the Washington Monument as my focusing point. Originally, my plan was to park somewhere and take a tour bus but I had arrived too early and the buses wouldn’t be running for another 1½ so I found a spot between the obelisk and the White House. My walking tour included the WWII, Korean and Viet Nam war memorials as well as the Lincoln Monument.

It was a good thing that I decided to just walk to the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue. Security was tight and only preauthorized vehicles were allowed near there and I was quite sure I wasn’t on the list. Honestly, I was expecting a bigger deal about the White House, especially the view. As I arrived at the viewing point there were lots of people there taking pictures of each other with the White House in the background. It just seemed further away and much less glamorous. After seeing news correspondents using it as a background,I thought people would be much closer than we were. It was fenced with wrought iron fencing but had hog wire attached to it. Most disappointing was the fact that there were no protesters, no Cindy Sheehans or John Kerrys throwing medals over the fence. I took my obligatory pictures and moved on back to the car, cranked up and drove myself to the Congress and Jefferson Memorials. My feet were flat, knees hurting and just a little tired from all the walking so after driving around a while, I went back south to the little burg near Richmond I was staying.

Sorry I missed you, Mr . Bush, I understand you were on a flight to Iraq at the time. Maybe next time. I'll call first.