Carolinians Take the Capitol

Last month, my mom and her four sisters played tourists in D.C. It was the sisters chance to explore and hang out together so I insinuated myself just twice: to host a dinner at my apartment and to tour the Capitol.

I took no photos of dinner, but I made stuffed shells, Caesar salad, and garlic bread. Mom brought an amazing caramel apple cake and some wine. Despite the shells being a bit cold due to a bit of a detour that brought them to my place later than expected, I'll call the dinner a success.

The next afternoon I took a few hours off work and met them at the Capitol Visitor's Center. Despite living a mere mile from the Capitol for 2 years, I never made it to the new Center, and my last Capitol tour was from Karey circa 2006, before I was even a Washingtonian.

The tour was given by a very knowledgeable and polite child – seriously, he was only 18 – and was well worth the time. I think we all greatly enjoyed the stories and history of everything, as well as a little hypothetical verbal smack down talk against a couple politicians.

A visit with some fellow Carolinians.

Rubbing this spot, where they wanted Washington to be buried, for luck.

The rotunda took my breath away again.

This is one of my favorite paintings that I repeatedly studied in school and even wrote a short essay on once. It never fails to make me smile.

On my last visit my favorite spot was the Old Supreme Court Chamber. We got to see it again and it definitely is still great.

However, my new favorite spot was getting to see the Old Senate Chamber. Why is that, you ask? Because this is where Senator Preston Brooks of South Carolina (of course) beat Senator Charles
Sumner of Massachusetts WITH A CANE in the 1800s. And who says politics is boring?

In verifying the names on Wikipedia I found that Brooks died at a mere 37 years old. Probably serves him right. It took Sumner 3 years to recover but he did return to service and lived to be 63. So he wins!

Just for fun, I took a picture of the floor where it very well could have happened and a picture of the ceiling, which would have been poor Sumner's view during the literal smack down. History nerd forever!

We all enjoyed the demonstration of the whispering spot.

As well as the staircase where presidents wait to enter the chamber.

And, not to be shallow, but there were some pretty shiny chandeliers, too.

Thank you, America.

Day 243: Quack quack

Busy, busy day full of walking and eating and melting and DC sights! The day started out with the official new thing of the day, my surprise for Joey, a Duck tour of DC. I've seen these around the city and thought they would be tourist-rific. I have been waiting for a willing victim to visit so I could subject them to cheesy tour guides and gawking DCists on the sidewalk.
It took us around downtown, and then directly into the Potomac for a little river cruise. And it ended with complimentary quackers, which we wasted no time putting to use.
But the fun didn't stop there. We saw the Japanese WWII Memorial, had lunch, saw the Navy Memorial, and then set off for the National Archives, Joey's first visit. I was very excited this time to see the Treaty of Paris, which officially goes on view in October.
We made a quick stop by the White House to call on George and Laura, and then headed for the Nats v. Braves game, my first Nats game at night.
I should be happy they won, but you can't undo 15 years of vicariously cheering for them through the brother. It was still a good game though, even though we narrowly missed death by a scary fast line drive.