#5325 - out of the blue
last wednesday festive and i went to a happy hour at a restaurant here in dc for people attending the white house tweetup and/or the nasa STS-135 at headquarters tweetup the next day. some of these people had flown in from across the country for these events, and it was nice to be able to get an idea of who else would be attending the events. at one point we were introduced to a very cute girl who happens to be in charge of the white house twitter account - apparently she started as a volunteer during obama's campaign, moved up the ranks, and soon became in charge of the official white house twitter account and other new media for the executive office of the president. and she's only 25 years old!
they said that the arrival ceremony for the president of south korea would be cancelled if it were raining, but that they would also make an announcement on a particular phone line at 4:30 AM on thursday morning after evaluating the weather that morning. i was surprised to hear that the ceremony would continue as scheduled since it was pouring like crazy, but i was glad to hear that it was still on.
we made it to the white house around 7 AM and through the long line of attendees and three levels of security (at the first two they checked IDs, and at the third they had people go through a metal detector and get wanded and turn on all their electronics to show that their devices were actually cameras and phones and such). i've had more invasive security screenings getting on to an airplane than when i was being allowed on to the white house grounds and just dozens of feet away from the president of the united states.
the ceremony was scheduled to take place at 9 AM, but it was still raining like crazy. at one point the rain let up, but then they made an announcement that because of the inclement weather the ceremony would take place indoors but that the guests could stay to see the motorcade. i felt bad for all those people that came from out of town just to see a car pull up, and many people decided to leave. michelle and i ended up getting to stand up against the rope line and we had a perfect view of the troop review after people started to leave, and then maybe about 15-20 minutes after that initial announcement they made another announcement that the ceremony would take place outside after all. unfortunately, we didn't have a good view of the presidential podium, but i was able to get a few photos of obama and the south korean president from where we stood. i need to import my photos and see how they all turned out.
at the end of the ceremony, obama said that he was going to say hi to a group of schoolkids on the opposite side of the podium from where we were standing, and the kids went nuts. one guy standing near us said "quick! if anybody has any kids, send them up front now!" so obama might come over to our side, but unfortunately he didn't come around our way to shake hands.
the rain came down again during the ceremony, and by the end of the ceremony it was starting to pick up heavily again. we ended up getting brunch at a mcdonald's over by farragut west then headed back to my apartment to nap since by that point we had already been up for about 7 or 8 hours and it was barely noon.
we went back into the city to nasa headquarters around 4 to see STS-135 mission commander chris ferguson and mission specialist sandy magnus give a presentation; for about 30 minutes they talked about their spaceflight experiences, and then for the last 30 minutes or so they did a q&a with the audience. there were a few good questions, a few funny answers (apparently being in space makes you constipated until your body figures out how to poop in space), and even though it was a short presentation it was still very interesting. afterwards, mission commander ferguson was escorted off to another meeting or something, but mission specialist magnus was able to stay and sign some autographs, so i now have an autograph of one of the crew from the final space shuttle flight. i also was able to get a second autograph from her that i gave to anne for her (early) birthday this past weekend, too.
we joined several of the tweetup attendees for dinner; a few of them i had been following on twitter for some time previous (one was a friend i made from the nasa juno tweetup, another was another attendee of the nasa juno tweetup that i didn't get to meet, and a third was a tech columnist who i started following on twitter many months ago when he was a tech writer for the washington post), but we made some new friends there too including an australian who's doing malaria research in baltimore and heads back home in 2 weeks, a girl from germany, and a few other people who drove or flew in to dc for the tweetup from other places in the united states.
friday afternoon i got a text out of the blue from caryn, one of the girls i met on okcupid months ago. she had originally messaged me and we had a good conversation going while she was out of town, and when she arrived back in maryland we ended up going out on a date in annapolis back in june and really hit things off. unfortunately, just after that first date, she was laid off from her job working in the GIS department of a college on the eastern shore, and i moved to dc. even from annapolis she's about 30-45 minutes away, and she's about 75 miles away from my place in dc. i was glad to hear from her, and she asked me if i had any plans for the weekend. when i mentioned that i'd be in salisbury (also on the eastern shore) on saturday with mom and dad to celebrate my sister's birthday, we decided to make plans for dinner. specifically, we made plans for me to go over to her place for dinner saturday night (she offered to cook, and it was my job to choose a few recipes for her to pick from).
friday night i went to the hirshhorn museum for their "hirshhorn after hours" event. they turn the courtyard of the museum into a dance club with bars and a dj, and this time they had a live band too. even though the museum is free, and it costs money for the after hours events, it's kind of nice to be able to browse the museum with other people dressed for the occasion and have a drink and dance. i was most interested in the warhol "shadows" exhibit, and the hirshhorn is the perfect venue: the curved wall makes it so you can't see the whole exhibit at one time, and so it just appears to stretch on and on and keeps you guessing at what comes next. the dj was ok, but the band itself was pretty awful - a really acquired taste, and since i couldn't get into them at all i figured at that point i might as well just go home. i couldn't drink anyway and planned to get up early to go for a 9-mile run for my training on saturday morning before going to visit anne at salisbury.
saturday morning i ended up not going on my run, but i met up with mom and dad and anne in salisbury where we had cake and gave anne her presents (mom and dad gave her not one but two balloon sharks that are remote-controlled so you can have them fly around the room), and we went out for dinner. after dinner i drove the 90 minutes from salisbury over to caryn's place in chestertown.
i had emailed her a few recipes that morning, and in response she asked "how do you feel about irish pubs? ;)", which says something about my recipe choices, haha. so, we went to this irish pub near her house, went out for a drive to a local park and sat and talked and walked along the water and out on a pier to sit and talk some more before going back to her place.
probably the funniest quote from the night was when we were talking about tv shows and things we watch, and i mentioned how when i'm cooking i'll put on old looney tunes cartoons, and she laughed and said "know what i put on when i'm cooking? NPR.", so then i had to connect the two and showed her this.
we ended up cuddling on her couch watching tv until around 2 AM when we decided it was time for bed and she wasn't about to kick me out since i wouldn't get back home until almost 4 AM. as it was, we didn't go to sleep for another few hours. :P
sunday morning we talked for another hour or two on her back porch while we watched her dogs run around her yard. she felt bad that she pretty much disappeared 3 months ago: she's still looking for a new job, and she said that in the past few months she basically became a hermit and didn't leave her house that much. she's just about resigned herself to the fact that she'll probably have to move to the western shore of maryland to find a new job. she's not a stranger to driving from her place out to columbia or dc or places like that - she used to go to a climbing gym over in columbia fairly often - but it's not a very convenient drive to do on a regular basis. the difficult thing would be finding someplace to live - she has a large house (it's inexpensive on the eastern shore, and she got her house back when anybody could get a mortgage… and i do mean "large": her garage is as big as my entire apartment) but she'd need to find a place big enough for her and her three dogs and one cat. at least they're small dogs (two are rat terriers, one is a dachshund), but it's not like she can get an apartment like mine and expect it to work.
while a 75-mile drive isn't ideal, it's not so bad if we do want to try to start a relationship. i'm hoping that this might go somewhere, but if it doesn't i can completely see why. i'm glad she reached out to me, though, since it sounds like she might still be interested in me. i really enjoy talking with her too, so we'll see how things go.
sunday i went for my 9-mile long run that i was supposed to do on saturday, and then i was supposed to go to the embassy of sweden for a concert. the long run really tired me out and i ended up passing out on the couch for a few hours instead. oh well. :/