Well, it is convention time again. This time I am going all the way to Baltimore, MD! With ACN I have visited more places I’ve never been before, than ever before (not counting my mission!).
This time I got a great deal (more than a hundred dollars less) on my airline ticket by flying into Washington, DC instead of to Baltimore. Only the DC airport isn’t in DC! Go figure! It is actually in Virginia, right across the Potomac River, and it is really the Regan National Airport. I decided to rent a car so I could drive around and see the sites. I may never be here again, right? What a ride! Well, I was having an interesting time trying to get along with all the traffic (and I thought L.A. was bad!, but here, it’s not the freeways that are bad, it’s the rest of the streets!)
So, after getting lost a few times, even though I kept trying to follow the maps I brought along, (thank you Mother for setting a good example and always having that big road atlas along), due to lots of road construction near the Lincoln memorial, I never did find my way there, even when I tried to follow the signs! And that was where I really wanted to go. I had my camera and would just point and shoot and hope I would get something. I drove past the Washington Memorial…oh…about 6 times, while trying to get to all the other places.
I also kept going too far on the Washington Memorial Parkway and in the area I would get off to turn around there was the weirdest multi-intersection. Within 150 feet or so, there were 3 stop lights, each with its own intersection! Just match the stop light number with the matching number to see which car is in which intersection!!! Notice how intersection #2 only has room for one car to sit at the light! Oh brother, who’s idea was that!
I also got as close as I could to the White House, which wasn’t close at all… and the security, of course, was massive! I just kept clicking pictures. This picture looks like I’m close, but I blew it up so you could see it better. Then, I went up the right hand street near the white house to see if I could get a closer shot, which I couldn’t (I couldn’t even see it from there), I passed the Treasury Building.
I just had to call someone and tell them where I was. I called Shawn and told him where I was and how massively crowded it was. While we were talking I accidentally ended up on a freeway that took me right past the Pentagon. I suddenly said to Shawn “The Pentagon, I gotta go!” and hung up on him. I grabbed my camera and tried to take a picture.
I only had 2 hands and if I was on the phone I couldn’t take pictures, right? Not if I was going to drive! I got myself back to downtown DC and I decided it was time to get going to Baltimore, but the maps were very unclear and so since I was on the phone with him…..again, I asked him to help me get on the correct freeway. It was so crowded and it was getting to be rush hour, so I couldn’t look at my maps or I would probably rear-end someone and the maps were confusing anyway and I couldn’t tell about the on and off ramps and what connects to what. So he started telling me which direction to go, but the streets were so crowded and WEIRD, not to mention the terrible signage, that I kept making wrong turns. He was getting so frustrated with me, but he couldn’t see what I was seeing (all the cars, people, signs, etc!), and I was frustrated, too! You try driving in it!! I will never drive there again, if I can help it! I will go on some kind of tour! Anyway I got stuck in some kind of really slow moving traffic jam trying to get to the freeway. While in this jam I saw two weird things I tried to explain to Shawn. There were these signs lit up with green arrows and this really skinny house and told Shawn about them, but said I would take a pictures for him…Shawn, here they are!
I was moving so slowly that sometime I would sit through a red light twice and never move more than 10 feet. I would say “okay, I’m moving” and he would think, 35 mph, but I was just excited to be going 10 or 15 mph and he would think I was passing streets, but when I would name off the street I was passing, he would say, “your only to there”? Then I got to a place to get on to the freeway, but there was no on ramp, so I had to go around a while and get on another way and then there were so many cars I couldn’t get over and ended up exiting, AGAIN! Oh, bless his little heart, he just kept steering me around! We had a few mishaps, but I finally got on the right freeway, going the right way! UGH!
Then on the way I switched freeways, and on the highway in-between them I saw a most interesting sign! You don’t see this one everyday!
Freedom will be mine! 
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