I'm back after a great weekend! I'm typing this on my brand new installation of Windows XP on my laptop. Yesterday at work I decided to reboot and when the computer came back up it was the BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH for me. I took it into the boys back at the office and it took them some time but I am now back up and running with a new operating system.
On Saturday morning I got up early and my buddy Igor (here in town from Calgary on the same project as me) picked me up and we headed towards Washington, D.C. He has GPS in his rental car so there was no danger of us getting lost. OK, maybe a little danger. it was the start of the "good luck" trip already as we managed to get to the museum around 11:30AM, which was fine by us. I have to tell you, the place was amazing! The place is just loaded with aircraft of all sorts. I got my picture taken with an SR-71 Blackbird (my favourite plane as a child), the Enola Gay, the Concorde, and my all-time favourite, the Space Shuttle Enterprise. Seeing that thing for the first time honestly brought a tear to my eye. We made it through the museum in record time and decided to forgo the shuttle bus to the downtown museum (it's split into two different buildings 30 mins apart - after all, you need an airplane hanger for most of them!) and instead drive in on our own. Thanks to the GPS we managed to find our way into town. We took a few wrong turns which ordinarily would have been a really bad thing, but instead of being lost we found a great parking space right downtown on a side street only one block away from the museum!
The museum downtown had a lot of cool stuff in it, too. I got to see The Spirit of St. Louis, the actual model of the Enterprise from the TV show in the 60s, and even touch a piece of the moon! After the museum closed we ventured outside on a trek to find the Whitehouse. It was pretty cold and we went on a long walk but did manage to find it - although we didn't realize it until later! We couldn't see it because we were on the wrong side of the park behind some trees or something we couldn't see because it was dark. Oh well, we got a chance to explore a little bit of the city. Our good luck continued when, although we programmed a route straight to visit Nick, we took another wrong turn and ended up on 'M' Street, a place Nick recommended. It is this huge long street lined with trendy shops and restaurants, just amazing! We found a great parking spot when again, there were none available, so fortune was smiling on us. We walked up and down the street and then settled into a restaurant for some supper. After supper we got back in the car and headed up to the university to visit Nick. We were chatting for a bit and then had a little scare when we though our car was being towed, but again we had some good luck in that department. We decided to just drive home instead of staying the night because we were beat. It was supposed to snow, but we were lucky again and got great weather for the drive home. It was a long day so I was happy to be heading to bed!
I slept in the next day and then made preparations to head to Philly for the Royal Rumble. I hopped in my box-on-wheels and made my way for the city. I stopped at McDonald's and had my first-ever cheesesteak. They even sell it at McDonald's here! It was amazing, btw! The directions were super straight-forward and I made it to the Wachovia Center in record time. They made everybody line up outside for some reason and it took a good 30 mins. to get inside the building in somewhat cold temperatures so that wasn't cool, but once inside I was all set. I had pretty lousy seats way up top and a little behind the stage set, but it was a great experience all the same. Everybody was super pumped up about pretty much everything and there were a few neat surprises here and there. All in all, recommended! I rushed out to the parking lot after the show and lucked out by getting out of there in a hurry ahead of the major traffic. The snow eventually started falling that night, which made the last part of the drive home a little scary, but I managed. I had work in the morning so it was time for sleep!
I would like to give a shout-out to some very cool radio stations in the area. First, in D.C. we listened pretty much the entire time to a great oldies station called WQSR. Now I know what you are thinking, but this station was amazing. All the classic, classic tunes that you love to hear and none of the shite. Another one is here in Philly called WMMR. It is a rock station that continually plays good tunes as well. They also have these times where they literally play one band for an entire hour, and on the drive home from Philly on Sunday it was Nirvana. I'm not talking playing just hit songs, but tons of stuff that wasn't even ever on the radio. It was awesome!
This week is already crazy and will continue to be for the rest of the week because we've got a huge deadline at work so I'm pretty much going to be working day and night to get it done.
Here are the photos for you all. First up is some pics from this past New Year's and then on to some photos from my weekend in D.C./Philly!
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