Walking With the Fatcats

My favorite vacations are the ones that I take to previously unvisited American cities. Cities that don’t get a lot of publicity as fun tourist spots – such as St. Louis and Nashville – I have found to be as enjoyable as Paris or London. It’s nice to see one’s own country.

When my parents announced that we would be going to Washington, D.C. for five days this August, I was ecstatic. Another city to check off the list.

The long car ride there produced the requisite three hour nap and awful breath. Upon waking up from this nap, it felt as though my soul was being sucked through my eyes due to excessively dry contact lenses. Plus, I recently got Invisalign. Though it’s true they are not as obstructive as braces, the makers don’t tell you it takes some time to get used to pronouncing certain sounds with the device in your mouth. Though by now I’ve bathically gotten uthed to the Invithalign system.

Much like Robert Horry in Game 5 or Macbeth in Act 2, the lack of parking at the hotel was a complete dagger. Our room was the standard small hotel room with two beds and a TV, but the hotel’s main lobby and interior were breathtaking. I could only wonder what dignitaries had passed through those doors, perhaps a young Henry Waxman, his wispy moustache just a twinkle in his eye.

Like most teenage American males, I have a bureaucracy fetish. My heart fluttered when we passed the Federal Trade Commission building, imagination running wild at the thought of some inoffensively well-groomed young bureaucrat regulating interstate commerce. I also saw the headquarters for the company that handles all online course transactions for many schools, Blackboard. I was going to go inside, but the building was scheduled for routine maintenance.

The walk we took that first night included a stop for water at a local frozen yogurt shop that was wonderful. I was forced to spring $3.00 for a bottle of Fiji water, which angered me for one main reason. Fiji filled its bottle with environmental and green imagery, and even infused it into its logo. However, by the time the water is flown from across the Pacific, bottled, and shipped to this distributor, enough carbon has been used to eat a horse. Granted, I’m not allowed to use cogent metaphors until the Department of Literary Devices approves my requisition document, but you understand the hypocrisy that infuriated me. Furthermore, the frozen yogurt store had a poster that touted a local television news story about it that stated “Immortalized until the end of time by NBC10 Washington”. If there is one thing in this world that I am sure of, it is that the regional affiliate of NBC in the mid-Atlantic does not hold the key to immortality.

Blackboard was not the only entity to have an impressive office building in Washington. Both National Public Radio and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (provider of PBS) were housed there as well. I like NPR, even though their broadcasts are invariably either an extended interview with the deputy education minister of Latvia, an opportunity to win an answering machine recording from Carl Kassell, or Car Talk.

Day 2 of 5

Day one, the day of our arrival, did not present an opportunity to do much sightseeing due to the fact that we arrived at 10:00 pm. Day two was far different. Battling the oppressive D.C. heat, we took public transportation to the Georgetown neighborhood of the city. It was gorgeous. There was a thriving commercial district, and more interestingly, Georgetown University. Much like how my school has a few people who arrogantly believe they are smarter than you because they know what level the Dow is currently at, I couldn’t shake the feeling that many people in the Georgetown area - not necessarily students - thought they were smarter than me because they knew that Ohio was a swing state. Despite this, the Georgetown visit was among the highlights of the trip.

The area was undeniably upscale. The houses near the university were all neatly kept and new looking, nothing like the off campus housing in Philadelphia. The campus itself is beautiful, and you can see down into their football stadium without entering it. The Hoya football team was going through training camp, though I can’t say I like their chances for the upcoming season given that me, my mom and my sister beat them 49-7 during a scrimmage, and we only gave up the touchdown because my sister was a great nose tackle and we foolishly switched to a 4-3 defense.

A different neighborhood, called Foggy Bottom, was explored next. The State Department and the Federal Reserve Building were in fairly close proximity to where the bus left us. Obviously, Hillary Clinton and Ben Bernanke are the big names, but it’s still the preseason, and I’m excited to see if Assistant Deputy Undersecretary of State Adam Dimichele can make the squad this year or if Rhett Bomar’s going to beat him out. Sadly, due to a cartographical error – namely, we walked ten blocks in the wrong direction because of my inability to read a map – they were left unseen.

Day 3 of 5

I had never seen the Capitol Building, White House or the presidential monuments. Fortunately, every famous building in Washington is close to a large, rectangular, national mall-looking type of area. Day three was finally the day to visit them all.

The Capitol Building was first. Undeniably awesome to soak in all the history of the great men and women who built the country. I even saw the spot where Senator Henry Clay, known in the 19^th Century as “The Great Compromiser”, forgot to take out the Senate trash can when it was his turn. Clay defused a sticky situation by “totally promising to get the next two”, adding, “brah”.

We soon walked past the White House. Hard to wrap one’s head around all the major events that had taken place in a building just a few hundred feet away, from President Roosevelt fighting the Great Depression to President Fillmore fighting boredom. Mr. Fillmore bravely won the War on Ennui through a then-brilliant strategy of constantly refreshing ESPN and Facebook. There were also some crazy people protesting President Obama over something stupid a few yards away from us. I think they wanted him to denounce Eggo for using whales in the manufacture of its delicious waffles. Well, then where am I supposed to get my daily suggested amount of Beluga, hippies?!? Didn’t think of that, did you!?!?

After leaving the White House and the Capitol, we went over to the epicenter of the nation’s fatcats, K Street. K Street is home to the major lobbying firms in the country, from oil companies to organized labor to a despicable cartel that hoards marble pillars, coffee tables, and mildly interesting books known only as the Lobby Lobby.

The Lincoln, Washington, and Jefferson memorials were next. I was surprised by how pristine all of them look despite being out in the Washington weather through the decades. Though they were all stunning up close – especially Jefferson’s – I couldn’t help but feel that these were finesse monuments that simply would not be able to win in January.

Day 4 of 5

We spent some time at a few museums today. The city has far too many museums to see them all, so prioritizing is one of the Pepsi Keys to the Game. The other two, of course, are “Get Off to a Good Start” and “Bend but Don’t Break!” Anyway, the National Archives held the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Declaration of Independence, so it was obviously first on the list. I’m just thankful that the country was founded two hundred years ago and not now, because the National Hard Drive would be way less cool.

A quick stop at the Library of Congress included an inspection of Mr. Jefferson’s personal library. One particular tome, A History of Mineral Waters, truly made me appreciate how little there was to do in the 18^th century.

The archives held a lot more than just the three Charters of Freedom. Hilariously, the light in the room with the sensitive documents was kept at “two footcandles of intensity”. Yes, our measuring system is actually that hilarious. A footcandle is the intensity of light given off by a candle one foot away from you, I was told. “A sunny day is over 12,000 footcandles!” read one placard. Finally, a way to clear things up around here! It’s nothing but footcandles from here on out for everything.

The National Portrait Gallery, which included portraits of all the presidents, was visited later that afternoon. I don’t know who designed the Gallery, but I thought it was pretty telling that the more interesting, historically significant presidents such as Washington and Lincoln got enormous portraits and the minor presidents like Franklin Pierce basically got postage stamps. Washington and Lincoln had so much pull that even their respective entourages got to have portraits of them in the Gallery, like Washington’s older, less successful step brother and lovable portly friend.

Day 5 of 5

On the way back to New Jersey, I learned how to pump my own gas.