Plants A Plenty and Native Americans

Good Morning bookshelf and Roger's shoes.

 Good morning birds that wont stop fighting outside my window.

 Good morning shadow 

 Good morning vitamins and pills I take by the bucket load.

 Most importantly good morning eggs, toast, and facon (not a typo, it's meatless bacon). I love you. Same time tomorrow?

More Sightseeing

Facts about Arlington Cemetery:

•  Averages twenty-eight funerals everday
• More than 300,000 people are buried here
• Veterans from all the nations wars (from the American Revolution onwards) are buried here

 "When we assumed the soldier we did not lay aside the citizen." -George Washington

Arlington Cemetery is huge.  Like massively, properly, beyond impressively huge. Ever inch of which, it seems, has a headstone paying homage to a fallen soldier. The sheer number of fallen Americans is shocking; and to think, this does not even begin to cover all of the lost military men and women (let alone the injured).

Drugstore Shenanigans

It feels like there is a CVS on literally ever block here in the District. This leaves me a happy lady, I absolutely adore CVS. Is it the most glamorous place on earth? Hell to the no. Is it magical? Yes. You can literally buy anything there and I love it. Need a dish scrubber and some red lipstick? No problemo! Even more importantly CVS is an essential component in my plan to beat the heat and humidity (because seriously, I'm so over sweating 24/7. I'm running out of napkins to wipe my sweaty face with for cripes sake!) How does CVS become a part of the cool down plan? So glad you asked. It pretty much boils down to this: stop in every CVS you see. Simple and effective, I like it.

 Not only do they CRANK the air conditioning meaning a quick cool down, but look at all the drinks you can choose from! Magic!

 They even sell canes, interested?

 I had a lady-date with myself last night after Roger met up with some friends last night. Also invited to the party was my BFF cookie dough ice cream, which was consumed as it should be, straight out of the carton. Sadly, this means I picked out all the cookie bits and I'm left with chocolate chip ice cream. I don't regret this.

I also invited my kindle to join me a bubble bath after putting it in a zipbloc bag. Quick poll: Am I on the only friz-eak that does this?

 I had a pretty boring day to keep it honest, but here's what I saw on my walk today:

Rain, rain, go away. Please?

Last night Roger and I went on a walk after dinner. Sounds fun, right? It was....until Roger decided to utilize a five finger discount and snag himself some carpets. Behold the act as it unfolds:

 Super dodgy right, because you are all reading my blog I will draft you into my side of the argument. Thank you for your support, I'm glad it's completely voluntary (or not). Lets start at the very beginning, because according to my girl Julie Andrews, this is a very good place to start (Sound of Music anyone?) Behold the carpet in it's original habitat.

Looks super sanitary, right? False. This my friend, is where bed bugs breed. That itch you feel on your skin? SELF PRESERVATION. Roger is a teacher and in need of carpet for his new classroom, everyone remembering grade school story-time fondly? Good. Bet you $10 your teacher did not jack those homey rugs from an alleyway the way my crazy boyfriend did. Without a second thought he grabbed those carpets and began to pull them from their grimy surroundings, I start flashing back to every bedbug story I've ever heard. I will not lie to you internet, it is at this point I start to lose my cool. In my head I see hoards of bed bugs, a gosh darn invasion overtaking our apartment. Just like in the Velveteen Rabbit we will be forced to throw all of our things into some sort of sick funeral pyre. Goodbye cute shoes, goodbye white noise machine, goodbye everything. I can't standby and let this happen! There is noooooo way I am about to allow those carpets in my apartment! Roger, on the other hand, is not dissuaded. He assures me he will put them in our basement storage unit. I know better, there is no way these carpets will fit down there....He is a liar. Roger. Read this. You Lie.

He continues dragging the carpets out of the alley, I start to notice the questionable stains marring the white rug. Oh good lord, who knows how many people had sex on this carpet? Even worse someone could have died on this carpet! Oh good gravy by touching these carpets we are contaminating a murder scene!! We argue about the carpets fate for the next two blocks, all the while Roger carries the two heavy carpets. I am admittedly not much help, A. I have noddles for arms, carrying heavy items it's just not one of my skills. It's the sad truth. B. I DON'T WANT THE BED BUGS TO GET ON ME.
They jump ya' know (Please note, I don't know if this is fact or my own crazy leaking through), if I get too close to Roger and the carpets I'm done for.

 Thankfully blocks later he comes to his senses and discards the rugs. It's too hot to carry such heavy (sick nasty) carpets for the remainder of our fifteen minute walk. Say it with me all, VICTORY. All is not well though, still the threat of bed bugs lingered, after all he was all up in their grill - I hose him down with purell and walk an arm distance away so the bed bugs don't jump on me. No bed bugs for this lady, thank you very much.

Spuds Strike Back

Behold the disaster that was yesterday evening. I decided to make mashed potatoes for dinner, potatoes are good right? What could go wrong with potatoes? Spoiler alert: everything. I peeled potatoes like a boss (only dropping a few of them in the trashcan...eh, you boil them anyway right? Totally enforcing the five second rule here).

The water kept boiling over and making a mess of the stove so I decided I would be clever (yeah, right) and sit on the arm of the sofa closest to the kitchen (seen below in exhibit A) so I could run in like Speedy Gonzalez and remedy the situation. No big deal, I am the master of my kitchen. That is until I jumped off the sofa, ran into the table below and created a disaster zone.

RIP white lamp July 2011-August 2011, you served us well and always lit up the room. The poor unsuspecting illuminator tumbled and busted apart along with the glass vase that also sat on the table and held seashells and sunglasses. Such a mess.

Unfortunately the series of events does not cease here, when I go to detach the beaters my the electric mixer I inadvertently turn it on, WHAM, mashed potatoes everywhere, I am now wearing dinner, except its not as cute as when those naked girls lie down on a table covered in sushi, I was just a not-so-hot mess. I will forever refer to this night as Curse of the Spuds 2011, may it never happen again.

Anyway, onto the next: Today I took the metro. It was not the midnight train goin' anywhere, just you know, your everyday train going somewhere.

 I loved the look of this old vacuum store.

 Hello little kitty!

Towers of Babel

I love taking in all the sights the District of Columbia has to offer. Second best is taking in the tourists taking in the sights! In the past few weeks I've seen more Europeans than I ever did during my time abroad (this is an exaggeration- artistic creativity, I'm running with it). My first week living here a poor Japanese man came up to me with a map begging for directions. I still have no clue where he wanted to go, the map he was pointing so desperately at was sooooo not in English and when you combine my horrible sense of direction with general newness to the area he could not have approached a worse person.

 

Still, this was my time to be a diplomat for America! It was my civic duty to help this tourist. I squint at his map, look around blindly for a street sign, anything which will help me figure out what the hell I'm doing, there is nothing. I look again at his map, and poke knowingly at the small drawing of Dupont Circle surrounded by Japanese, "That," I tell him, "is somewhere over there" with an offhand gesture that lands somewhere near CVS, and walk off as fast as I can. Hopefully the next opportunity I have to represent this great nation runs a little smoother.

 

Being surrounded by so many different languages is waking up my need to travel! Until then, I'm going to close my eyes, sit back, eavesdrop and pretend I'm in France!