Imagine me walking around trying to contain my political/dweeby/touristy glee while pretending to maintain somewhat of a professional facade. Not easy. Can't be totally sure if I even pulled it off. Plus it was my first time in Washington - and I must say the city sure kicks some ass.

A bit of a perverted town, though. I saw:

the Big Wang and the Huge Boobie

But I also saw some art:

Hahaha.

So the mapping project I'm working on with National Geographic involves the Center for Sustainable Destinations (a really neat dept) and several very cool people in other departments (their Maps Dept is soooo awesome). My primary contact there is a very nice fellow named James and we're pals by now. He called me last week a few days before we were scheduled to meet, to invite me last-minute to a reception at the Sackler gallery at the Smithsonian - his director, Jonathan, had just come accross the invitation on his desk and panicked - the reception was that very night and he was already committed elsewhere. So James was to attend, and was nice enough to invite me along.

I was again pretending to be only midly excited, and I calmly responded Sure Thang. Then I immediately ran out the door and proudly took the metro all by myself, but ended up walking around for half an hour because I could not find an entrance to the damn gallery. I could SEE it, but the whole mall of galleries was gated off (it was after closing time) and there was no percievable entrance. Hmm. It was frickin' cold out. BRRRR. When I finally ran into James he was just as confused, and the damn gallery looked dark from where we were. Eventually we found a guard but he was totally clueless. Stupid guard. What the hell?
James then pulled out the invitation and it read "Wednesday March 23rd". Welllll, that explained it, Wed was the 22nd! A typo! Maybe it was for the next day. DARN. By now we were frozen in the cold night and James felt terribly. I was disappointed but of course it wasn't his fault. Oh well. Life goes on.

The next day I get an email from James: "Guess What. Amazing. My Boss had the WRONG YEAR. What a joke. My sincere apologies to dragging you out for a chilly wild goose chase." Hahahaha. Shit.

When I had my meeting with them a couple of days later, I passed Jonathan's office, and suddenly I understood how it was possible that such a thing could have happened. Hahaha.

Okay.

So my cousin Alejandro works in DC and lives in a lovely neighborhood near Embassy Row (he's the Mexican ambassador to the OAS - I'm proud to brag about it, but I mention it because it matters to this thread). My last night in town I stayed with him in his purdy house. Accross the street lives the French ambassador, in a huge manor much bigger than any other home in the whole area. Damn french bastard. Two doors down from my cousin, however, lives - GET THIS - Donald fucking Rumsfeld. I nearly shat myself with the giggles when he told me. I didn't believe him. When he pointed out the black SUV permaparked in front I accepted it, especially since it remained there the whole time I stayed with him, with some poor hemorrhoidal SS dudes sitting in it. I took a walk around the block that day and went clickclickclick, hoping I wouldn't get tackled for doing so. I am a brave photojournalist, I am. Hardeeharhar. Alejandro then told me how he had set off his home alarm accidentally one night after he'd first moved in, and immediately heard a loud boom over an intercom from outside asking if he needed help. Oddly comforting, I guess.

Anyhoo. When I called my dad to howl about Alejandro's neighbor, he informed me that his nephew's house was technically Mescin Soil. Sweeeeet. So I asked Alejandro: if I stood on the porch and waited for Rummy to come home from a long hard day engineering lies and death, then flipped him the finger and flapped my arms like a bird and hollered CHICKENHAWK CHICKENHAWK CHICKENHAWK and then ran back inside and slammed the door shut - I was safe, right? They couldn't do anything, right? He uneasily responded to the affirmative. COOL! I said. But then he offered that I would probably not be able to re-emerge from the house again.