Washington DC Day 1

Tom told me the beds in their hotel are fancy $3000 beds! They had brochures about it in their room. They are called "Heavenly beds." They requested a room with two queen beds but with Hotwire, you get what you get. So they got a king bed only. So Tom called downstairs for a roll away bed. He is such a sound sleeper that he volunteered to sleep on it. Well when it came up, it was a roll away bed with a "Heavenly mattress." He said it was more comfortable than our bed at home. We hate our bed so I can see the next thing we start saving up for will be a "Heavenly bed." Tom and Brittanie had a good day in DC. Unfortunately, got a late start (big shock for us Sightlers huh? hehehe) and ended up not doing the trolley today. They decided to walk around on their own and do the trolley tomorrow. They are exhausted because they walked about five miles today. When they got back to the hotel to relax and send me pictures, Brittanie fell asleep on the bed. When he and I were about to hang up, Brittanie woke up and they were going out to eat.

But here are the some of the pictures from Day 1 in DC.

Inside the Smithsonian:

Archie Bunker's Chair from "All in the Family."
The first computer, ENIAC

The first John Deere plowGeorge Washington's uniformJerry Seinfeld's "puffy shirt" from one of the episodes of Seinfeld. The red sweater at the bottom of the picture belonged to Mr. Rogers. (Tom has a better picture of his on his site. The link is at the bottom of this blog entry.)Dorothy's Ruby Slippers and the Scarecrow costume from The Wizard of Oz. Here is the original movie poster from the Wizard of Oz. (Brittanie and I are big fans of The Wizard of Oz. I used to watch it every year with my mom and as Brittanie grew up, she and I watched it together. We now own the DVD.)Here are the manacles that Levar Burton wore when he played Kunta Kinte in the movie "Roots."Orville and Wilbur Wright's first plane.Tom facing the Washington MonumentBrittanie took this picture. I thought it was a cool perspective. She has a flare for photography.Brittanie against the Washington Monument.The flags around the Washington Monument.
She is in her element around all those flags. Brittanie is the most patriotic 16-year-old I have ever seen.

The Ford Theater (where President Lincoln was shot.)This is the actual balcony that Lincoln was sitting in when he was shot.

The buildings:

Just ignore the stupid hippie protesting signs behind her. That's the back of the White House.Here is the front lawn of the White House.This is the Dwight D. Eisenhower building....the predecessor to the Pentagon.Brittanie in front of the Capitol Building.Tom scratching his head facing the Lincoln Memorial.Here is a better view of the Lincoln Memorial.

Tom and Brittanie had lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe. Here are some pictures of them there. Tom said their waiter was a bit scary....looked like a big thug, and didn't smile. But the food was good.The "thug" waiter took this picture. hehehe

There is Tom in a big gift shop.

They did have some rain this afternoon but they bought some umbrellas and tried to find a short cut back to the hotel. Even though they were worn out, they had a great day and are looking forward to riding the Met and taking their trolley tour tomorrow. There are about 20 more pictures that I didn't put on my blog. I picked out the best ones and put them on here but if you want to see them all, check out Tom's picture gallery. They aren't edited and in fact if you want to see the details of any picture, click on the thumbnail and it will show you bigger picture and if you click the bigger picture, it will show you the full sized HUGE picture so you can see details. They are using my old Canon G3 camera. Tom didn't want to take my Rebel because it is so big. But the G3 is a Canon and still takes pretty good pictures! Click here to see Tom's photo gallery for Day 1.