D.C. FOREVER
So, the chancellor of my school is conducting Porgy and Bess at the Washington National Opera at the Kennedy Center, and my adviser told me that he had agreed to let a handful of students come and observe, and would I like to go, since it was over spring break. I said yes, please! And so there was a
I thought I was going to stay with a friend, but that fell through, so I ended up finding a hotel on expedia.com, listed as 2 star for $80 a night, but it was only a couple miles from the Kennedy Center and it was only going to be for two nights, so I said what the hell.
I convinced Kyle to go along with me, so that I wouldn't be going to a strange city and strange hotel all by myself, plus I love hanging out with Kyle and we've been talking about taking some sort of trip together forever. Plus, he loves D.C. and since I was already going to have to drive there and get the hotel and all, he'd only have to pay for his food. (Although something weird was happening with his card, so he technically still owes me for that. Whatever, he'll get it back to me.)
Saturday morning (although it felt like Friday night, because I'd only had a nap from about 9 p.m. to midnight) was when we were leaving. Due to a really long story, Kyle had to return a car to a friend of his in Raleigh after dropping another friend (Roya) at the airport, and we worked out the time he expected to get there and I planned on meeting him. Well, I google-mapped the trip, and it was supposed to take just under two hours. Now, Kyle gets everywhere later than me. It just happens that way, I don't know why. But I didn't want to be the first one at this guy's house, because I don't know him, and it was going to be before seven in the morning, due to when Roya had to be at the airport. So I deliberately left half an hour late.
I was about halfway to Raleigh when I got a call from Kyle, who was randomly calling me to ask if I was having trouble with the directions, because his didn't make any sense. We figured out that he was about 5 miles behind me on the exact same road, despite the fact that I had left half an hour late. We decided to meet up at the next exit, at which point we compared his mapquest directions with my google maps directions with the state map I had in the car, and found that his made no sense at all, and had we not serendipitously been able to meet up, he would have ended up lost somewhere out in Durham. Oh, Adventure.
He followed me and my directions to drop the car off and then we headed up to D.C. on a very enjoyable drive, chatting and listening to a couple of lectures from this series "Masterpieces of the Imaginative Mind: Works of Fantastic Literature", which was excellent. The professor giving the lectures teaches at UMich and I want to hunt him down and pick his brain. Kyle and I both decided that Richmond doesn't look like it belongs in the south, but it looks like a mini-Pittsburgh.
We got up to the D.C. area at about 12:45 or so, and started looking for our exit...which didn't come. And didn't come. And didn't come. Eventually we were in Maryland, so we decided to pull off and find a gas station to buy a map or get directions because we didn't have an iPhone*. Well, we followed signs at the next exit, but there was no gas station to be found. All we could find was this tiny strip-mall-esque dirty brown building. Keep in mind that the entire weekend was cold, grey, and either misty or lightly raining. This building had three parts: a liquor store, a bar, and a café. The liquor store looked the most well-lit, so in we went. There was no map to be had, but the man behind the counter gave us "directions" (These were very odd, as he barely spoke English and did things like turn sideways so he was facing the same direction as us and point right while saying left, but he eventually drew a picture, so we were okay, because It's a map*) to the nearest gas station, where we would be able to get a map. Kyle needed a restroom, so we walked into the bar in search of one. It was entirely deserted except for the bartender and one dude smoking a cigarette. It also smelled gross as hell. The bartender told us that the restroom was in the café and pointed at a connecting door. Well, in we went and the café (which smelled even worse) had these awful pink walls and was even emptier than the bar, with only a woman back by the order window. It looked, I swear to God, like the location for Tarantino's...well, anything. While Kyle used the restroom, the bartender came in from the bar to take my order, because she was, apparently, also the waitress. Needless to say, I did not order and we high-tailed it out of there. Kyle and I came to the conclusion that we had stumbled across Purgatory and, should we someday return to that spot, it would no longer be there.
From that point on began the exciting adventure of attempting to find the hotel. The gas station didn't have any maps of D.C., but we got directions to the city, at which point we figured we'd be able to get a map. Well, we made it into D.C. at which point we thought we'd be able to find 16th and T, the location of our hotel. We found numbered and lettered streets, however 16th and T didn't seem to exist. We eventually went into a Harris Teeter (which had the incredibly amusing parking meter system which had no coin slot, just a button that started a 2-hour time and was printed "Push for Free Time"*) which didn't have maps. But we were informed that we were in the wrong quadrant of the city. See, we wanted 16th and T North west, and we were in South East, because everything in D.C. apparently exists four times.
Well, we ended up taking a nice sort of driving tour through DC and saw a bunch of monuments and buildings from the street and, after many multi-level or one-way streets and random six-direction intersections eventually (almost 3 p.m.) got to the hotel. Now, I had been worried about this hotel being skeezy. However, we walked in, and it was immediately apparent that there was nothing to worry about. The Windsor Inn is not a hotel, it's an inn. As in what you would find in England. It had the weird, cobbled together lay-out, it had the small but tidy and comfortable rooms, it even served complimentary sherry in the evenings (which I tried for the first time, and it tasted like alcoholic caramel apples). Best of all, it had a kitty! Her name is Mona Lisa, and she lives in the lobby so that everyone coming through can pay her adoration. Expedia had gotten me some outrageous deal, because the room was supposed to be around $200 a night, rather than the $80 I paid. The room had two cute little single beds, free wifi, free tv (that we never turned on), and the BEST BATHROOM OF ALL TIME. It was itty bitty, but the towels, the toilet paper, even the tiles in the shower, were all amazing and soft. Hot water pressure like you wouldn't believe.
It came time to figure out how we were going to get to tech that night, which started at 7 at the Kennedy Center. We didn't want to drive because we'd happened to get an amazing parking spot, plus we had found that driving around D.C. is crazy difficult. I looked at both bus and metro options, which would have cost $3 per person each way and were some variation of this route:
I decided to just check what google maps said about walking. This was it:
1.9 miles each way. Yeah, we walked. It turned out to be a really nice walk, right through a pretty part of D.C. with a couple of statues and things on the way. Getting into tech was a bit of a party. Kyle wasn't actually on the list of people that were coming, but I was the only one who would be there those two days, so we figured it couldn't possibly be that big a deal and decided to ask for forgiveness rather than permission. Well, the door guard didn't realize I was coming at all, so there was a thing where we were obviously there, and we both acted like we were clearly supposed to be there, and eventually, they just let us in. It was amazing. I got to see the SM console (Big Bertha) and meet the stage manager (Beth). It was piano tech for Part 2* that evening, so Beth was clearly stressed and I didn't get to talk much to her. I did, however, meet Christy, the Technical Supervisor, who literally grabbed my hand and stole me away for a tour of the stage and set. She was amazing. And Kyle made friends with the lighting designer, Mark, who invited us to come back to see Hamlet.
I was amazed at how efficient everyone was. There was never a moment, even during holds, when there wasn't work being done. Intense.
We walked back to the hotel and then walked around until we found this Salvadoran/Mexican place that was happy to serve us food despite the fact that it was midnight. Kyle had sopa and I had flautas and plantains. Good times.
We slept for about six hours (it would have been seven, but daylight savings took effect) and got up to grab continental breakfast and head out by ten. We went to the Freer & Sacks galleries and found parking at L'Enfant plaza. It happened to be Sunday, which meant that, on top of all museums, galleries and monuments being free, parking was free as well. At the Freer, there was a Lama visiting and making a mandala, so we watched that for a while and saw the shrine on exhibit. Then we went down to the National Galleries, and spent the rest of the morning there. We didn't see it all, of course, but we saw the French stuff, and the Turner and the Sargent and the portraits of the founding fathers and the Spanish and the Chesterfield collection and the Rothko. Growing up, I had a sort of bingo game involving famous paintings, and, while I didn't know it, the game had actually been a national gallery game. Every couple of rooms, I'd find another painting that I recognized from the game. It was amazing, but very draining. Seeing all of those paintings really took a lot out of me.
Anyway, we then went down to the monuments. We happened to park next to Einstein's memorial in front of the national academy of sciences (he looked like a sad, old toddler) and across from the construction site for something called "The Institute for Peace" (whatever the hell that was supposed to be). It was time to eat, but the only food to be had around the monuments was FOODANDDRINK* so we walked for a while until we found an CVS and a subway, coming across the "Beware of God"* sign on the way.
We got our sandwiches and went down to the monuments. Saw Vietnam, women's Vietnam, Lincoln, Korea, WWI*, and WWII, as well as Washington by virtue of being close to it and it being pretty much obvious. We had our sandwiches sitting on the path between Vietnam and Lincoln. The day was grey and misty and cold - perfect, as I described it, "cemetery weather." Very appropriate for the memorials.
Went down to the Kennedy Center and got some warm drinks and reading time at a café called "Cupa Cupa" and then hung out in the hall of nations and tried to identify all the flags we knew before watching Sitzprobe that night. Sitzprobe is a German opera term for a rehearsal in which the cast sits and sings along with the orchestra. The security people just waved us through and we sat in the house this time to simply listen. AMAZING. God, I can't even describe how wonderful it was. "Bess You IS My Woman Now" had me practically crying. I can't wait for this summer!
We figured out that we were sitting too close acoustically and were getting cone filtering, so we moved back several rows at the break, and for the REST of the night, there was this dude in a green sweater who kept looking back at us. We were sitting only a few seats to his left and several rows back, so it wasn't convenient for him, but he kept turning his head to look back at us which would catch my eye so I'd look at him, and then he'd really awkwardly look down and away. Apparently, there was an awkward moment at the break in the men's room between him and Kyle, but after the show, we happened to run into him by the stage door while I was looking at the paperwork. He walked in, stood there, obviously wanted to say something, we waited, and eventually, he just said "Hi" and ran away. I'm convinced he wanted to ask for Kyle's number, but Kyle thinks he, for some unknown reason, wanted to as me something. He couldn't say what, though. We decided, later that that moment was to be forever known as "awkward encounter" and he was probably Pocahaunted.*
After tech, we said our goodbyes and drove down to the Jefferson memorial. Parking was a huge, intense adventure, but we eventually got there (and saw the George Mason memorial on the way). Jefferson is a hero for both me and Kyle, and the monument is gorgeous at night. Right on the water, shadows of leaves on the marble, gorgeous scale and drama. We decided that we have to take a trip to Charlottesville together so that I can show Kyle Monticello (Jefferson's house).
Back to the hotel, back to sleep at about 1 or so. We had to move the car by 7 a.m., so we got up at 6:30 and hit the road. The drive back was so fast and easy, we couldn't believe it. We listened to a bunch more of the Fantastic Literature lectures and talked and talked, even inventing "Lexemplar."* I dropped Kyle in Winston and had lunch at his place before coming home.
Was cold and wet a lot of the time, walked easily over 10 miles, not including inside galleries, got ridiculous blisters. Spent a lot of money (although less than I expected to) and didn't make great outright contacts. STILL, It was easily one of the (if not THE) best trips I've ever taken in my life and I can't wait to go back, especially with Kyle. We need to do the Hirshorn and the FDR and the capitol building and the national aquarium and so on and so on. We've decided that we have to be come Kenan Fellows* together so that the adventures never have to end.
*We didn't have an iPhone - one of several phrases that got repeated umpteen times on the trip.
*It's a Map - Another oft repeated phrase, usually when we were able to use the amazing technology of maps. Comes from the fact that my roommate has confessed to being incapable of reading a map, which confused both me and Kyle greatly. Drawing a picture is what people do when directions are too difficult to explain. How can you not read a map? It's a Map.
*Push for Free Time - The parking meters clearly simply wanted to make sure that you used the spot for grocery shopping rather than permanent parking, so you'd get ticketed after the two hours, but it started a fun "what if" game of things like "What if it dispensed not, free time, but freetime? I could use that machine in my life" or "What if it really gave out time that you could keep and use later?" or "What if there was a society in which you could buy time, but you were buying it from the poor? What would it mean to be "time poor?" That last one is so intriguing to me that I think I have to write a short story or something on it.
*Part 2 - We figured out that they were doing the three-act opera in two parts, with intermission coming in the middle of the second act. So it felt like Act 2, but it was really just what they'd placed after intermission.
*FOODANDDRINK - as displayed on brown info signs accompanied by pictograms of fork & knife. This, apparently, meant little street vendors of hot dogs and pretzels that looked generally gross and not real food.
*Beware of God - The sign, of course, said "Beware of Dog", but Kyle misread it and started a long joke on how you better watch out for God. It was doubly funny, because the sign was across from a tennis court with no possible place for dogs.
*WWI - It was off in a corner, and we only happened across it because it was next to the path between Korea and WWII. It was tiny and dirty and in disrepair, with no signs or anything. It was, by the way, only for D.C. residents who had died in the war, unlike the others. Kyle and I got into a discussion about how the country likes to pretend WWI didn't happen, despite the fact that it was huge and horrific and massively important. We talked a lot about how the memorials reflect our feelings on the wars they commemorate. WWII is triumphant, Vietnam is sad, almost guilty, Korea is painful and ghostly. WWI is, sadly, almost non-existent.
*Pocahaunted - A term coined by Rachel meaning "both having to do with Disney and severely creepy"
*Lexemplar - Lexical Exemplar. The word we invented for when one word sums something up so incredibly perfectly that no other word will do.
*Kenan Fellows - My school has a program that every year, four D&P and directing students, after they graduate, are given 9-month paid fellowships at the Kennedy Center. DREAM COME TRUE.
I thought I was going to stay with a friend, but that fell through, so I ended up finding a hotel on expedia.com, listed as 2 star for $80 a night, but it was only a couple miles from the Kennedy Center and it was only going to be for two nights, so I said what the hell.
I convinced Kyle to go along with me, so that I wouldn't be going to a strange city and strange hotel all by myself, plus I love hanging out with Kyle and we've been talking about taking some sort of trip together forever. Plus, he loves D.C. and since I was already going to have to drive there and get the hotel and all, he'd only have to pay for his food. (Although something weird was happening with his card, so he technically still owes me for that. Whatever, he'll get it back to me.)
Saturday morning (although it felt like Friday night, because I'd only had a nap from about 9 p.m. to midnight) was when we were leaving. Due to a really long story, Kyle had to return a car to a friend of his in Raleigh after dropping another friend (Roya) at the airport, and we worked out the time he expected to get there and I planned on meeting him. Well, I google-mapped the trip, and it was supposed to take just under two hours. Now, Kyle gets everywhere later than me. It just happens that way, I don't know why. But I didn't want to be the first one at this guy's house, because I don't know him, and it was going to be before seven in the morning, due to when Roya had to be at the airport. So I deliberately left half an hour late.
I was about halfway to Raleigh when I got a call from Kyle, who was randomly calling me to ask if I was having trouble with the directions, because his didn't make any sense. We figured out that he was about 5 miles behind me on the exact same road, despite the fact that I had left half an hour late. We decided to meet up at the next exit, at which point we compared his mapquest directions with my google maps directions with the state map I had in the car, and found that his made no sense at all, and had we not serendipitously been able to meet up, he would have ended up lost somewhere out in Durham. Oh, Adventure.
He followed me and my directions to drop the car off and then we headed up to D.C. on a very enjoyable drive, chatting and listening to a couple of lectures from this series "Masterpieces of the Imaginative Mind: Works of Fantastic Literature", which was excellent. The professor giving the lectures teaches at UMich and I want to hunt him down and pick his brain. Kyle and I both decided that Richmond doesn't look like it belongs in the south, but it looks like a mini-Pittsburgh.
We got up to the D.C. area at about 12:45 or so, and started looking for our exit...which didn't come. And didn't come. And didn't come. Eventually we were in Maryland, so we decided to pull off and find a gas station to buy a map or get directions because we didn't have an iPhone*. Well, we followed signs at the next exit, but there was no gas station to be found. All we could find was this tiny strip-mall-esque dirty brown building. Keep in mind that the entire weekend was cold, grey, and either misty or lightly raining. This building had three parts: a liquor store, a bar, and a café. The liquor store looked the most well-lit, so in we went. There was no map to be had, but the man behind the counter gave us "directions" (These were very odd, as he barely spoke English and did things like turn sideways so he was facing the same direction as us and point right while saying left, but he eventually drew a picture, so we were okay, because It's a map*) to the nearest gas station, where we would be able to get a map. Kyle needed a restroom, so we walked into the bar in search of one. It was entirely deserted except for the bartender and one dude smoking a cigarette. It also smelled gross as hell. The bartender told us that the restroom was in the café and pointed at a connecting door. Well, in we went and the café (which smelled even worse) had these awful pink walls and was even emptier than the bar, with only a woman back by the order window. It looked, I swear to God, like the location for Tarantino's...well, anything. While Kyle used the restroom, the bartender came in from the bar to take my order, because she was, apparently, also the waitress. Needless to say, I did not order and we high-tailed it out of there. Kyle and I came to the conclusion that we had stumbled across Purgatory and, should we someday return to that spot, it would no longer be there.
From that point on began the exciting adventure of attempting to find the hotel. The gas station didn't have any maps of D.C., but we got directions to the city, at which point we figured we'd be able to get a map. Well, we made it into D.C. at which point we thought we'd be able to find 16th and T, the location of our hotel. We found numbered and lettered streets, however 16th and T didn't seem to exist. We eventually went into a Harris Teeter (which had the incredibly amusing parking meter system which had no coin slot, just a button that started a 2-hour time and was printed "Push for Free Time"*) which didn't have maps. But we were informed that we were in the wrong quadrant of the city. See, we wanted 16th and T North west, and we were in South East, because everything in D.C. apparently exists four times.
Well, we ended up taking a nice sort of driving tour through DC and saw a bunch of monuments and buildings from the street and, after many multi-level or one-way streets and random six-direction intersections eventually (almost 3 p.m.) got to the hotel. Now, I had been worried about this hotel being skeezy. However, we walked in, and it was immediately apparent that there was nothing to worry about. The Windsor Inn is not a hotel, it's an inn. As in what you would find in England. It had the weird, cobbled together lay-out, it had the small but tidy and comfortable rooms, it even served complimentary sherry in the evenings (which I tried for the first time, and it tasted like alcoholic caramel apples). Best of all, it had a kitty! Her name is Mona Lisa, and she lives in the lobby so that everyone coming through can pay her adoration. Expedia had gotten me some outrageous deal, because the room was supposed to be around $200 a night, rather than the $80 I paid. The room had two cute little single beds, free wifi, free tv (that we never turned on), and the BEST BATHROOM OF ALL TIME. It was itty bitty, but the towels, the toilet paper, even the tiles in the shower, were all amazing and soft. Hot water pressure like you wouldn't believe.
It came time to figure out how we were going to get to tech that night, which started at 7 at the Kennedy Center. We didn't want to drive because we'd happened to get an amazing parking spot, plus we had found that driving around D.C. is crazy difficult. I looked at both bus and metro options, which would have cost $3 per person each way and were some variation of this route:
I decided to just check what google maps said about walking. This was it:
1.9 miles each way. Yeah, we walked. It turned out to be a really nice walk, right through a pretty part of D.C. with a couple of statues and things on the way. Getting into tech was a bit of a party. Kyle wasn't actually on the list of people that were coming, but I was the only one who would be there those two days, so we figured it couldn't possibly be that big a deal and decided to ask for forgiveness rather than permission. Well, the door guard didn't realize I was coming at all, so there was a thing where we were obviously there, and we both acted like we were clearly supposed to be there, and eventually, they just let us in. It was amazing. I got to see the SM console (Big Bertha) and meet the stage manager (Beth). It was piano tech for Part 2* that evening, so Beth was clearly stressed and I didn't get to talk much to her. I did, however, meet Christy, the Technical Supervisor, who literally grabbed my hand and stole me away for a tour of the stage and set. She was amazing. And Kyle made friends with the lighting designer, Mark, who invited us to come back to see Hamlet.
I was amazed at how efficient everyone was. There was never a moment, even during holds, when there wasn't work being done. Intense.
We walked back to the hotel and then walked around until we found this Salvadoran/Mexican place that was happy to serve us food despite the fact that it was midnight. Kyle had sopa and I had flautas and plantains. Good times.
We slept for about six hours (it would have been seven, but daylight savings took effect) and got up to grab continental breakfast and head out by ten. We went to the Freer & Sacks galleries and found parking at L'Enfant plaza. It happened to be Sunday, which meant that, on top of all museums, galleries and monuments being free, parking was free as well. At the Freer, there was a Lama visiting and making a mandala, so we watched that for a while and saw the shrine on exhibit. Then we went down to the National Galleries, and spent the rest of the morning there. We didn't see it all, of course, but we saw the French stuff, and the Turner and the Sargent and the portraits of the founding fathers and the Spanish and the Chesterfield collection and the Rothko. Growing up, I had a sort of bingo game involving famous paintings, and, while I didn't know it, the game had actually been a national gallery game. Every couple of rooms, I'd find another painting that I recognized from the game. It was amazing, but very draining. Seeing all of those paintings really took a lot out of me.
Anyway, we then went down to the monuments. We happened to park next to Einstein's memorial in front of the national academy of sciences (he looked like a sad, old toddler) and across from the construction site for something called "The Institute for Peace" (whatever the hell that was supposed to be). It was time to eat, but the only food to be had around the monuments was FOODANDDRINK* so we walked for a while until we found an CVS and a subway, coming across the "Beware of God"* sign on the way.
We got our sandwiches and went down to the monuments. Saw Vietnam, women's Vietnam, Lincoln, Korea, WWI*, and WWII, as well as Washington by virtue of being close to it and it being pretty much obvious. We had our sandwiches sitting on the path between Vietnam and Lincoln. The day was grey and misty and cold - perfect, as I described it, "cemetery weather." Very appropriate for the memorials.
Went down to the Kennedy Center and got some warm drinks and reading time at a café called "Cupa Cupa" and then hung out in the hall of nations and tried to identify all the flags we knew before watching Sitzprobe that night. Sitzprobe is a German opera term for a rehearsal in which the cast sits and sings along with the orchestra. The security people just waved us through and we sat in the house this time to simply listen. AMAZING. God, I can't even describe how wonderful it was. "Bess You IS My Woman Now" had me practically crying. I can't wait for this summer!
We figured out that we were sitting too close acoustically and were getting cone filtering, so we moved back several rows at the break, and for the REST of the night, there was this dude in a green sweater who kept looking back at us. We were sitting only a few seats to his left and several rows back, so it wasn't convenient for him, but he kept turning his head to look back at us which would catch my eye so I'd look at him, and then he'd really awkwardly look down and away. Apparently, there was an awkward moment at the break in the men's room between him and Kyle, but after the show, we happened to run into him by the stage door while I was looking at the paperwork. He walked in, stood there, obviously wanted to say something, we waited, and eventually, he just said "Hi" and ran away. I'm convinced he wanted to ask for Kyle's number, but Kyle thinks he, for some unknown reason, wanted to as me something. He couldn't say what, though. We decided, later that that moment was to be forever known as "awkward encounter" and he was probably Pocahaunted.*
After tech, we said our goodbyes and drove down to the Jefferson memorial. Parking was a huge, intense adventure, but we eventually got there (and saw the George Mason memorial on the way). Jefferson is a hero for both me and Kyle, and the monument is gorgeous at night. Right on the water, shadows of leaves on the marble, gorgeous scale and drama. We decided that we have to take a trip to Charlottesville together so that I can show Kyle Monticello (Jefferson's house).
Back to the hotel, back to sleep at about 1 or so. We had to move the car by 7 a.m., so we got up at 6:30 and hit the road. The drive back was so fast and easy, we couldn't believe it. We listened to a bunch more of the Fantastic Literature lectures and talked and talked, even inventing "Lexemplar."* I dropped Kyle in Winston and had lunch at his place before coming home.
Was cold and wet a lot of the time, walked easily over 10 miles, not including inside galleries, got ridiculous blisters. Spent a lot of money (although less than I expected to) and didn't make great outright contacts. STILL, It was easily one of the (if not THE) best trips I've ever taken in my life and I can't wait to go back, especially with Kyle. We need to do the Hirshorn and the FDR and the capitol building and the national aquarium and so on and so on. We've decided that we have to be come Kenan Fellows* together so that the adventures never have to end.
*We didn't have an iPhone - one of several phrases that got repeated umpteen times on the trip.
*It's a Map - Another oft repeated phrase, usually when we were able to use the amazing technology of maps. Comes from the fact that my roommate has confessed to being incapable of reading a map, which confused both me and Kyle greatly. Drawing a picture is what people do when directions are too difficult to explain. How can you not read a map? It's a Map.
*Push for Free Time - The parking meters clearly simply wanted to make sure that you used the spot for grocery shopping rather than permanent parking, so you'd get ticketed after the two hours, but it started a fun "what if" game of things like "What if it dispensed not, free time, but freetime? I could use that machine in my life" or "What if it really gave out time that you could keep and use later?" or "What if there was a society in which you could buy time, but you were buying it from the poor? What would it mean to be "time poor?" That last one is so intriguing to me that I think I have to write a short story or something on it.
*Part 2 - We figured out that they were doing the three-act opera in two parts, with intermission coming in the middle of the second act. So it felt like Act 2, but it was really just what they'd placed after intermission.
*FOODANDDRINK - as displayed on brown info signs accompanied by pictograms of fork & knife. This, apparently, meant little street vendors of hot dogs and pretzels that looked generally gross and not real food.
*Beware of God - The sign, of course, said "Beware of Dog", but Kyle misread it and started a long joke on how you better watch out for God. It was doubly funny, because the sign was across from a tennis court with no possible place for dogs.
*WWI - It was off in a corner, and we only happened across it because it was next to the path between Korea and WWII. It was tiny and dirty and in disrepair, with no signs or anything. It was, by the way, only for D.C. residents who had died in the war, unlike the others. Kyle and I got into a discussion about how the country likes to pretend WWI didn't happen, despite the fact that it was huge and horrific and massively important. We talked a lot about how the memorials reflect our feelings on the wars they commemorate. WWII is triumphant, Vietnam is sad, almost guilty, Korea is painful and ghostly. WWI is, sadly, almost non-existent.
*Pocahaunted - A term coined by Rachel meaning "both having to do with Disney and severely creepy"
*Lexemplar - Lexical Exemplar. The word we invented for when one word sums something up so incredibly perfectly that no other word will do.
*Kenan Fellows - My school has a program that every year, four D&P and directing students, after they graduate, are given 9-month paid fellowships at the Kennedy Center. DREAM COME TRUE.