Visit to the big house

On Sunday I got up at the should-be-illegal time of 7 a.m.* in order to stand in line at the White House for a ticket to their bi-annual grounds tour. I had never heard of this before, but after reading about it on the DCist, knew I must see what it was all about. So to the other end of Pennsylvania I went, yet again. Twenty-five minutes after entering the line, I had my ticket, a grumbling stomach, droopy eyes, and three hours to kill. Ugh.

After a trip to Starbucks and a nap in front of the Washington Monument, where a security guard woke me to make sure I wasn't dead, finally, I was off to the president's humble abode with free reign to...stick to the path, stay off the grass, and try not to draw the attention of the many, many Secret Service agents standing grimly about. (Even though there was a really cute one I wouldn't have minded attracting the attention of, but I'm thinking that only would have happened if a felony was involved. And I'm just not that desperate for a date. Yet.)

It was absolutely wonderful, in a subdued, lazy Sunday, surrounded by trees and flowers sort of way. But it's exactly this type of thing that is why I live in a city in the first place. I will definitely be back.

I have finally decided to use a Flickr account and hope to slowly move the approximate 10 other online albums I have to here. I have so many pictures I never share because it takes so long to upload them here, so hopefully this will help me be less lazy. So go here to see some from Sunday's tour. Titles on all, captions on most. The first few might be kind of boring, but they get better, I think.


*I don't get up until at least 8 a.m. for work. In the words of my roomie: "You get up insanely late for a working person." Yes, I do, just another reason why I love my job. (I might have already posted that quote on here but it makes me laugh.)