Christmas at Mount Vernon

The weather in DC is weird, in a really, really great way.  It was 60 degrees in early December and the landscaping outside of National Geographic looks like this:

 These flowers survive all winter - FLOWERS!

I bought the annual pass for Mount Vernon, George Washington's Estate overlooking the Potomac, partially so I could easily take visitors there, but mostly so we could go look at the sheep whenever we wanted. 

It turns out that Christmas at Mount Vernon may very well be the best time of year to go.  Not only are they all decked out with trees representing each room in Washington's mansion, but they ship in a camel to commemorate the 1787 Christmas when Washington paid 16 shillings to have an exotic pet on hand for his guests to admire.  It's clear that much of what Washington did was simply for show.  I think he would have much rather been farming than entertaining, but those are the breaks when you're trying to form a brand new country and want the capital to be named after you.

Poor camel - 60 degrees is probably cold for you.

There was another surprise: THE actual turkey that President Obama pardoned this year for Thanksgiving.  He will live a long life with another pardoned turkey in a hut almost as big as our apartment.

 I also enjoyed seeing the 16-sided barn that Washington invented to process his wheat.

 16-Sided Barn

The view of the Potomac is amazing.

Alison watches the geese.

 This gingerbread Mount Vernon replica was created by the head White House Chef.  I stood for a long time wondering if anyone would really miss one of those chocolate sculpted trees.

Foo Fighters

It's been a long time since Nathan and I went out, left Alison, and didn't return until the wee hours of the morning, but the Foo Fighters were in town and we needed to go see them.

 11-11-11 - The only picture Nathan or I got of the Foo Fighters before our phones died.

They played at the Verizon Center, which is near DC's Chinatown neighborhood, a place with a lot going on for the plethora of rich (and poor), unattached 20-somethings this city turns out.

 Chinatown's Friendship Arch

Photo Credit: historicdc.net

We tried a new restaurant beforehand that proved to be a lot like Noodles & Company, but for chicken: Nando's Peri Peri.  I enjoyed the $8 heavy-on-the-fruit-flavor pitcher of Sangria.

The opening acts were Social Distortion (which is only on my radar because of this Guitar Hero song) and The Joy Formidable, which turned out to be an awesome band.  Nathan bought their entire CD on iTunes the next day and we've been enjoying it ever since.  Alison especially enjoys twirling to Whirring.

But, nobody goes to the concert for the opening acts.  The Foo Fighters, after 16 years, are simply amazing.  They're pros.  Could I run around screaming for three hours?  Heck no!  Dave Grohl talked a lot about his childhood in Alexandria and his pride at finally selling out the "big-*ss-f***ing arena in his home town".  I'd be proud too.

The set they played was great.  You can find the list here.  I don't think they missed anything.  I hope they come back because I'd go again.

Congress

An email came out to the whole society that began, "If you've ever wanted to walk the halls of Congress, here's your chance" and that's about as far as I read before I decided to volunteer.

The week before the world gained its 7 billionth person, National Geographic put together a special issue just for Congress: a compilation of the articles it has been running all year on the world reaching 7 billion people.

Since we're practically right down the street from the Senate and Congressional office buildings, I was given 15 magazines for 15 occupants of the Longworth Congressional Office Building.  I was excited to see what actually went on at Congress, but first I would have to get past security.

I don't have a staffer badge, and I didn't really have a good reason for being there.  I did, however, wear a suit and have generally found the notion that a smile and a clipboard can get you anywhere to be very true.  I also must generally look non-threatening since people tend to let me through security without a thorough check and strangers have left both purses and children with me before they even knew my name.  This worked to my advantage and I walked right in without any questions asked.

My 15 representatives included Gabrielle Giffords (who I did not meet) and Jim McDermott (who was the only representative I actually saw in the building).

There is a definite feeling in those halls, though.  These aren't just normal offices (although they look very normal).  Everyone's office has a nice nameplate displaying the representative and their state, plus most keep flags outside the door, making everything look very official and important.  Inside, everyone's office is different, but most are decorated in over-the-top admiration for the state who elected them. 

 Halls of Congress - I'm not really sure I was supposed to be taking pictures.

Found a Wisconsinite!  I was later told Paul Ryan "is not one of the good ones".

I can see why everyone wants to keep their jobs.  In addition to the fact that this seems like a nice place to work, there's definitely a general feeling in these buildings that exudes both power and an optimistic viewpoint that people here are really trying to make a difference.  Or maybe that's just me projecting my own vision on what Congress should be doing on the halls themselves.

My mom told Nathan that I'm the kind of person who would step foot inside the halls of Congress and decide to run.  She knows me pretty well.  I would never make it through a campaign, but I think I would do a pretty damn good job in office.

MLK

I love it when people visit because it gives me a good excuse to wander around the National Mall.  Two days after Alison's birthday and only one full week after it opened to the public, I stood in front of a towering Martin Luther King, Jr staring at me with a stern look on his face that could only mean: our work in this country to improve civil liberties is not finished.

Out of the mountain of despair, a stone of hope

It was crowded, and probably the most diverse crowd I've ever seen in a National Park.  I most enjoyed bumping into our favorite ranger, who had wandered over after a failed attempt to gather people for a bird hike.

Ranger Nathan King who gets asked often if he is related to MLK.

That day we also discovered a great place to cool our feet and relax...

 National Sculpture Garden Fountain

...and Alison enjoyed wandering around the FDR memorial with her grandparents.

Maybe next time I'll be able to successfully talk someone into paddle-boating on the tidal basin with me!

Newseum

The Newseum is a privately-run museum in DC and despite its $22/adult price tag, I'd always heard great things about it.  For the first time in its history, it was free last weekend to commemorate the 10th Anniversary of September 11th.

There are a couple of sites around DC where they very clearly have money and aren't afraid to spend it.  The Newseum is one of those.  It is seven floors of news, news history, movies, interactive games, and shops with a giant glass elevator running from the basement to the 6th floor.  At the top they have a terrace with an amazing view of the Capital.  Inside there were a few gems and a few things that made me angry.

First, I should preface this with the disclosure that lately I haven't been very happy with the media.  While I wholeheartedly support free speech, I also support fact-checking and honest reporting.  Sensationalizing every little story just to sell it has driven our economy deeper into recession, further polarized the country, and is just plain fear mongering.  I think our media is out of control and it's time for them to self-regulate a little better.   One trip out of the country and you'll realize how self-centered and off-center our media really is.

The Newseum generally reflects this industry standard by devoting huge areas of the museum to their most successful stories, mainly September 11th and Hurricane Katrina.  They praise themselves throughout for using their right to free speech for good, "Look at us, we trudge through the backcountry and risk our lives to bring you the news.  We're the first ones to get to the biggest stories.  Blah.  Blah.  Blah."  I was not impressed, but it did get more interesting as it went along.

There are a few things well-worth coming to see.

First, they have the largest chunk of the Berlin Wall outside of Germany.

 Berlin Wall

They also have the broadcast antenae from the top of one of World Trade Towers set in front of a backdrop of worldwide front pages from 9/12/01.

 9/11 - The Newseum's favorite subject

There is a memorial to journalists who have died in action with some interesting details about where they were and why.  My favorite room was probably the News History room, where they have front pages from newspapers dating back to 1455 (you can see the front page from when the Spanish Armada was defeated!).  I also enjoyed this exhibit on worldwide freedom of the press.

  It turns out in addition to having the best education, quality of life, and health care system, Finland also has the most freedom of the press.  Should we move?

Alison liked the tour of a real-life news studio (ABC Weekend Something...) and the exhibit on the presidents' dogs.  There are also theaters galore, including a 4D show (which I was scared would include very lifelike paparazzi running after you), and an entire floor of interactive news games where you could report on your own story and post it to youtube (for a price).

By the time I was done, my anger at the press had subsided and I was happy to have seen the museum.  Was it worth the $22?  Not unless you've already seen ALL of the free museums and are incredibly hungry for some drama.

National Gallery of Art

Last Sunday my mom and I went to the National Gallery of Art.  I had been there once before, with only enough time to view the first wing I came to.  I thought it was neat, but was unimpressed by the barrage of French, Dutch, and Flemmish artists I had never heard of.  Alison fell asleep.

This time, we happened to start on the lower level at a temporary exhibit, From Impressionism to Modernism: The Chester Dale Collection, and walked straight into famous artist central.  The gallery may not have anyone's most famous piece, but they have a lot of big names and if I'd studied Art History, I may have been in heaven.  As it were, I have studied Spanish art and was excited to see several Picassos (one from his blue period, one from his cubism stage, and the others were earlier works), a room filled with El Greco, one Dali, a couple Velazquez, and a Goya or two.  In short, more Spanish art than I've seen since my last trip to Madrid going on eight years now.  Here's a sampling of some of the more interesting works they have at the gallery.

Degas - First painting you see in the Chester Dale Collection

Picasso

 

 Monet

 

 Da Vinci - The Gallery's crown jewel, this is the only Da Vinci work in the United States

The entire building itself is art, with marble columns, ancient wallpaper, gardens, and fountains.

It's a great place for babies who love to look and learn!

Earthquake Spam

It's true that when something happens to the East Coast, that's all the rest of the country gets to hear about on the news.  It's because we (I mostly mean the East Coast-based news media) are all pretty self-involved and a bit over-dramatic.  We had an earthquake this week and thanks to all the facebook spam from your friends on the East Coast, you know.  So, while Peru just had a 7.0-magnitude earthquake which blows ours out of the water, I'd like to obsess about our 5.8er this week.

I was in my cube on the 4th floor of our 7-story building on Tuesday (prime earthquake flattening location now that I think about it), when things started to shake.  I'd asked someone when we moved if we ever got earthquakes here.  They said no, so my my train of thought went something like this:

Whoa.
Are we in an earthquake?  No. They don't have those here.
Oh crap, I'm in DC, probably a bomb.
Well, I'm still alive, so that's good news.
I'm sure they would have bombed the National Mall, but Nathan's at MLK - he's probably OK.
Um.  What the hell? This thing is still going?  Holy sh*t this is getting bad.
Holy sh*t what do I do in an earthquake?  Doorway!  Wait, get out of here?
I never learned where the stairwells were in this building.  That was stupid.
No time to move if this thing is going to collapse it'll do it before I leave.
Doorframe, get to the DOORFRAME.  Could this building collapse?
HOLY CRAP IS THIS THING GOING TO COLLAPSE, I NEED TO LEA - phew, it stopped.

We evacuated.  (What I should have known to do right away.) 

Our street during the evacuation.

No phones worked, no internet.  It was pretty hard to get information.  Having never been in an earthquake, I guessed it would be about a 4.0 based on the fact that everything was still standing.  When I found out it was closer to 6.0, I felt kind of proud that I'd been through that.  It was thrilling, in retrospect.

Luckily, in a city ill-equipped for earthquakes, not much damage was reported except to the National Cathedral and Washington Monument, a structure Nathan says he won't go back into unless they give him an option to buy more life insurance.  Lovely.  A few things fell off the shelves in our house and pictures were skewed, but luckily Alison and Grandma went right outside and Alison really enjoyed seeing everyone in the building in one place.

Photo Credit: Nathan King

It took me two hours to get home.  In order to inspect the entire Metro railway system, trains moved at 15 mph for the rest of the day.  I stood on the crowded platform at Farragut West and watched three over-crowded trains go by before I decided to go the opposite direction, then get on at a less-crowded stop.  That worked.  Just as I thought my commute couldn't get any worse, however, there I was, stuck in a super-crowded railcar going 1/4 of its normal speed when I saw it.  The largest spider I'd seen since Kansas crawling up the girl's skirt next to me.  I couldn't move away - too many people.  This might be very close to my worst nightmare, but it wasn't the scariest thing that happened that day.

So, today, as Hurricane Irene creeps up from the South, I'm creating an emergency/evacuation kit.  I guess you can never be too careful.  It's also my opinion that you can never have too much SPAM.

A New Leaf

It's Saturday and I finally know what it feels like to be disappointed that it's the weekend.  OK, that's not entirely true.  I am REALLY excited to spend the entire day with Alison, but two weeks into the new job at National Geographic and I can safely ask myself: why did I wait so long?!  I am now a Project Manager on a team that updates the http://www.nationalgeographic.com/ website.  If you haven't visited lately, bookmark it.  It is forever packed with amazing information.  Don't worry, we're working on getting that flyout to settle down.

I have two reflection topics to share about my first two weeks:

1. My commute rocks.  It takes me 45-60 minutes one way, walking, then riding a bus and train.  That sounds horrible doesn't it?  I know!  So why do I find myself looking forward to it every day?  Probably because I get to catch-up on the news first thing in the morning via the free commuter newspaper, The Express.  I also get to walk around downtown, through Farragut Square, and basically feel like I'm back in Sevilla again enjoying an exotic land.  Maybe the fun of it will wear off, but this sure beats driving.
2. National Geographic rocks.  You know what they do and no one does it better, but did you know their culture permeates through to how they do business every day?  Their buildings are LEED Gold, there's a compost bin on each floor and they recycle just about everything.  There's a photo gallery at the street level of my building (that anyone can walk in and see for free).  If you look up, there are the stars, situated in the exact same configuration that the founders would have seen on the day Nat Geo was founded in 1888.  There is a constant stream of National Geographic-funded explorers giving talks and presentations (that are also usually open to the public, I should add) and they just added a bee hive to the roof.  If all that doesn't make you happy then maybe you're not me!

Life is good.

Mount Vernon

Since it's not run by the National Park Service, I suspected Mount Vernon, George Washington's Estate on the Potomac, would be either lame or over-commercialized.  It was only slightly over-commercialized, but it is a great day trip if you've been all over downtown DC already.

 Washington's Mansion

The cost is $15, but you get to tour Washington's mansion, see his tomb, view several gardens, enjoy a brand-new state-of-the-art museum, and be oriented by Pat Sajak in colonial dress.  They also have a farm with animals and a distillery where Washington made a ton from his homegrown whiskey, but we didn't make it that far.  Instead, we were thoroughly schooled in the awesomeness that was our first President.  Nathan was right when he pointed out that the museum was "not exactly balanced".  For instance, an entire room was devoted to Washington's dentures, with no mention that his teeth came from slaves (they were not wooden).  They did talk a lot about the slaves he kept, but continually reminded you that they were freed upon his death.

 View from Mount Vernon

That tree (near the middle) existed during Washington's time.

Lower Gardens - Stocked with heritage plants set-up the way they were in the late 1700s

Upper Garden & Greenhouse - Washington had lemons and oranges year-round

I don't think there is much you can complain about when it came to the personal and political life of George Washington (his wife burned all but three of their love letters to avoid them becoming public in the future).  He was a pretty good guy with hundreds of towns, schools, and monuments named for him.  His true brilliance really came in stepping down voluntarily after two terms.  He could've been King, but decided to set a precedence that only FDR ignored.

Rest in peace Washington, you have a very nice estate, although crowded during tourist season, on which to spend eternity.

Practice Run

OK, I'll admit it.  Being nervous that I would have no clue what I was doing during rush hour in the Metro Transit System, I did a practice run of my commute on Thursday.  As I suspected, there was really no need for this because DC has the BEST public transportation system ever and I easily got from home to work in 45 minutes and 1/4 of a book later.

The trip really only served to convince me of how awesome my new commute really is.  The bus is clean and quiet, trains come every five minutes, I walk through a park (which had people in full business dress with no shoes doing yoga before work), and I pass no less than four places willing to sell me a hot breakfast for under $4.  Not only that, but my commute ends at National Geographic headquarters!

This is where I report on Monday.

This is a view of the building next to mine, the National Geographic Museum:

Yay!

Shenandoah

I have nearly two weeks of freedom before starting the new job.  This week, we took a family vacation and camped in Shenandoah National Park.  Shenandoah is only two hours from us, so it's a convenient place to escape into the wilderness.  It's not the world's best wildlife or scenic park, but I do enjoy the view of the mountains through the haze.

There is a lot of hiking to be done, including pieces of the Appalachian Trail.  We chose to do a shorter hike to Dark Hollow Falls, which, with the kid carrier, turned into an amazing workout for me.

 Dark Hollow Falls

My favorite part of the trip occurred in two doses.  Each morning, we were treated to a half-dozen hummingbirds feverishly sucking down nectar from the blooming milkweed plants next to our campsite.

 Photo Credit: Nathan King

We didn't see any bears, but that doesn't matter.  The real mission was accomplished: introducing Alison to an amazing park and adding to the world another happy camper.

Photo Credit: Nathan King

And Now For Something Completely Different

Monday I'll go to work, answer some questions, sametime a few friends, have a couple of meetings, then shut down my laptop and end my career at IBM.  On August 8th I will become the newest Project Manager for the Digital Media division of National Geographic.

Photo of the Day: http://www.nationalgeographic.com/

I suppose it's tradition to pick apart my career at IBM and explain why I chose to leave, but I don't want to.  I wouldn't be the person I am today without my IBM experiences, both good an bad.  Instead, as I pack up to leave, I can't help but think about a few important things I learned at IBM.

The highlight of my career was my Corporate Service Corps experience in Tanzania.  You can read about my team here (Tanzania 1).  No one knew this at the time, but this was such a dangerous program to send me on.  Here, I got a taste of what it would be like if I were doing something I loved and making a difference in the world.  I got to scale Mt. Kilimanjaro with Nathan, and watch the wildebeests move in unison across the Serengeti plains.  Yes, my love of travel, culture, language, and environmental change all swirled around and met in one place.  I wish I could have found a similar opportunity within IBM when I returned, but such amazing jobs probably don't exist.  I will be forever grateful for this experience because from it I was able to hone my life goals and begin forging a career path that would make me truly happy. 

I don't think Nathan would be a Park Ranger today (his undeniably perfect career path) if it weren't for IBM's flexibility.  They allowed me to work remotely from several parks, to take days off and work weekends, to basically do whatever I wanted as long as I got my work done.  Surprisingly, with that kind of flexibility, most IBMers end up working all the time and it took me years to figure out how to create my own balance.  That is a priceless skill and one that I'll be using for a long time.  Thanks, IBM!

Finally, I had some fantastic customers and some that made me glad they were located in another state.  I've worked on highly successful projects and disastrous ones (let's just say that I know how to keep my cool when a Vice President is yelling at me).  In spite of some real trials, our team was always able to pull off the impossible.  Of everything I gained in the past six years, the most important thing was confidence.  The confidence to trust my gut, the confidence to push past daily issues, and finally the confidence to do something when I realized IBM wasn't the right spot for me anymore.

It's been an awesome six years.  I'll miss IBM a lot, but instead of "Building a Smarter Planet", I'll be "inspiring people to care about the [amazing] planet" they already have.