Washington DC, Day 4: Switchblades, Baby Elephants, Infected Piercings and Dirt Art

Today we had a relaxing vacation day.  We all needed a break from the stupid maniac-pace I was setting for us but THERE IS SO MUCH TO SEE!  I feel pressure to see it all!  It's not possible!  And if you try, it's no longer a very fun vacation.  We started off by sleeping in.  It was great.  Then when we got moving we took a train directly to the Old Post Office where the kids could get their fill of tacky crap and junk food. 

Sam bought a comb that looks like a switchblade.  That will be fun to try to get through airport security.  It will bring back the trauma he went through when he was 8 and we went to California and told him to pack his own carry-on with stuff he wanted to do on the plane, and we never checked what he put in there.  He packed a screwdriver that looked like a gun.  It got confiscated at security and he was inconsolable.  He said, "What did they think I was going to do, unscrew the plane!!!"  We had to lie to him and tell him they would mail it to us just to get him to give it up. 

Then we walked down to the Natural History Museum and watched an Imax movie about baby orphaned elephants and orangutans.  It was fricking adorable.  Then we tried to walk around the exhibits but it was so crowded that the kids started freaking out.  I'm not a fan of crowds either, but I seriously thought they were going to go ballistic on the millions of morons who would step in front of us and stop, or crowd into a doorway and stop, or stand in a moving line and stop.  Keep the flow going, people!  What I found especially annoying today was the people who think to themselves, "Hey, I think today would be a good day to bring my baby and two-year-old to a crowded museum on a hot day, and I'll do it with our new stroller that is the size of a golf-course lawnmower!  Yay!  That's a great idea!  We'll go during nap time to ensure that the kids will be EXTRA whiney and nobody will enjoy themselves AT ALL!"

Like this but bigger, with at least two cranky kids and a couple of dipshits pushing it.

We left without seeing the Hope Diamond, but I've seen it before and to tell you the truth, it's no biggy.  We got out on to the Mall and collapsed in to the grass where we were so comfortable and relaxed that we just sat there and watched people for a loooooong time.  It was like heaven.  Sam read a book, I watched people, and Kira was digging in the ground, but I pretended I didn't notice because she was busy and not bothering me.  This is what she was making. 

It's her initials in mounds of dirt, outlined in twigs.  She wants to go back tomorrow and see if it is still there.

Then we took the train home and listened to this incredibly strange woman loudly tell her friend about all her piercings:  which ones she got first, which ones hurt the most, which ones took the longest to heal, which ones left the biggest scars etc. etc.  Her nipple piercings were "almost not worth it" because of the intense infection she got which manifested itself in swelling, redness, and black pus. Public transportation has it's drawbacks. 

Tomorrow we are going to my boyfriend's house, Mount Vernon. 

My boyfriend

I get to see his last natural tooth, his death bed and his slave quarters!  I don't think I'll be able to sleep tonite, I'm so excited!  The kids: not so much.