Our Nation's Capital--the first 18 hours

Greetings from D.C.

I arrived 18 hours ago after a long travel day. My honey says I make bad travel decisions and I'm in the middle of an itinerary that bears that theory out. Because I'm traveling on IHE business, I had to use the IHE travel agent. We played phone tag for a while and then she got me on the phone, while she had another call on hold. She wanted a decision NOW. I have a friend in the Philosophy department who says that when pressured to make decisions, most people choose one criterion on which to make it, even if the decision should be based on multiple factors. My decision criterion: Delta frequent flyer miles. So, instead of flying direct to Dulles (from which I could have gotten a cab I wouldn't have had to pay for), I flew to Atlanta and then to National. Sigh.

I lived in D.C. for 8 years and miss it sometimes. It's a great city, especially if you avoid the downtown state worship monuments and K Street. I'm staying in Woodley Park, near the zoo. It's an area of the city I don't know very well and, with the exception of my freshman year in college, I never lived in the city without a car.

I went to Kensington last night to see some old friends. R and J picked me up at the Metro station. Their kids had spent the previous fifteen minutes asking if everyone who emerged from the station was me. Was I that guy? Was I the woman in the wheelchair? One of their kids even asked how R and J would know it was me. R said at dinner that she told them she had known me for twenty years. It was one of those, moments. Twenty years. And, we could have known each other longer. It's always amused us both that our parents, who were friends when we were growing up, tried to get us to meet one another. We even went to the same horse camp (Little Lamb sucked, R. Sunshade ruled). But we both tried hard to avoid meeting one another. When we ended up going to the same college (I even applied to it at her father's suggestion because I wanted a D.C. school on my list), we ended up becoming good friends. My snoring in our Rome roomateship and her choice of that green satin for the bridesmaid dress notwithstanding. Still, twenty years.

After dinner I returned to my hotel room expecting some kind of guidance about today's conference agenda and meeting time. Nope. Nothing.

I talked to honey and she suggested I arrive at the earliest time I thought the conference could start. So, I get up early shower and walk the fifteen minutes to the location of the conference. I arrive to discover that the conference starts at noon. Noon.

I wander further down to Dupont Circle and have coffee and a bagel. I'm on the lookout all the while for a place to buy my honey the peanuts she asked for. I asked R and J where to get Virginia peanuts and other than Williamsburg, their best suggestion was Dulles Airport. But then there I am flying out of National.

In the meantime, I had 65 e-mail messages including one accusing me of bad faith. Nice.

AD got a bunch of stuff dropped into her virtual lap last night and she's not even at work yet.

I think I'm going to sleep for an hour and then go back out in search of peanuts.