Theme of the day was jet lag hitting so very, very hard. It started when Jordan woke up at 2am. We got a tiny bit of sleep after that, but not significant. This hotel is weirdly shaped, such that we got very lost trying to go next door for breakfast.
After breakfast, we got the airport shuttle to go to the metro station that is at the airport. Unfortunately, there is track maintenance challenging along the way, so we had to get a bus shuttle between some of the station. Stepping out of Smithsonian Station at the National Mall was like going into a hurricane it was so windy. Tried hitting up Dunkin so that Emily could get her latte she wanted, but it was inside a closed federal building (closed because of the holiday today, not because of Dogs and Elon). Finally did find an open Starbucks, but it was a bit of a struggle.
From there, it was a 20 minute walk to the US Capitol Building. We didn’t know it at the time, but there was a big protest scheduled for it. We saw lots of people and lots of signs. We tried to get into the Smithsonian Air and Space museum, but it was so busy that 4pm was the first entry available. Jordan really wanted to go to a museum, so we went next door to the Museum of the American Indian. This turned out to be a welcome reprieve from the busy streets, with easily accessible washrooms and water fountains. Plus, Jordan played tag with some kids in the massive rotunda (she did also get some education about of it, especially learning about the Code Talkers of WW1 and WW2).
We went back to the protest and it was even larger than when we were first there. Took a full lap around the Capital Reflecting Pond to take it in. One person saw Jordan and hid her sign to avoid awkward questions, but Jordan was getting into the protest spirit. She especially liked joining in with the chants of “Hey! Ho! Elon Musk has got to go!”
It was almost 2pm and despite the takeout croissant from Starbucks, we were starting to get hungry. So we found a place that was open and hit the metro to get there. It was called Immigrant Food at the White House, serving a variety of ethnic foods just in front of Trump’s house. The slogan was “Immigrants have made America great again and again and again” which was an extra fun bonus. The food was actually amazing. Tamarind BBQ ribs, Falafel pita wrap and a Bahn Mi sandwich.
The White House itself was still behind a bunch of construction from the inauguration, so we couldn’t get a good look at it. Trump was in Daytona anyways, so between that and the fences, we managed to avoid getting Emily on a list. Then it was metro, shuttle bus, metro and airport shuttle back to the hotel. By this time, Jordan had passed out hard on the shuttle and metro (20,000 steps will do that to a 6 year old) so we had to carry her between some of the modes of transport. We did manage to wake her and get her through to 7pm and then we fell asleep at 8. Hopefully that is enough to kick the jet lag!
Turns out it was not, and we were all up pretty early. Emily and I had to work from our phones before our flight out at 12:50pm. Luckily, both of our bosses were understanding of the situation and we didn’t have to burn another vacation day. We both can do the majority of our jobs from a phone, but it is a little trickier when it is clearing out over a week of vacation backlog! We fortunately made it back home without any further difficulties, with Ryan and Sinead driving to the airport with Egan so that we could get straight home. We paid a guy from Facebook Marketplace to take his snowblower to the driveway in advance of our return, which might just be the best $75 spent by anyone in the history of spending money.
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