"TREE...TREE"

With all of the info I had to squeeze into my blog entry regarding our monumental tour, I forgot to mention one of the funniest occurences of my time thus far in DC. It's so good, I just can't leave it out!

When we finally started heading home from touring on Friday, the sun had gone down and it was getting dark quickly. We were walking along an ill-lit sidewalk, so we decided to cut through some grass to a better path. Each of us started crossing this yard at a different spot, and out of nowhere, I hear "TREE...TREE!" I look over to find Kristine stuck in the middle of this tree. To clarify, it wasn't a BIG tree, and it wasn't really a small tree, but Kristine had walked right into the middle of its branches. I'm guessing it's one of those moments that you had to be there in order for, but I must have laughed for a good five minutes after she ran into this tree. Come on, who does that?

We went shopping in Georgetown on Saturday. Nearly everything was WAY too expensive for me to purchase, but window shopping was fun. We ran into trouble trying to keep a larger group of people together, just like our zoo adventure, and I was again reminded that I need to work on my patience. Kristine and I ended up splitting up with the rest of the crew (just after Abby's incident with a homeless man grabbing her butt...unfortunate), and we were proud that we made it back home relatively easily. I did attract some attention when I realized we weren't in the correct Metro area and said, "Are we on the wrong side, again?" Some nice guy kindly informed us that we did, in fact, need to be on the other side to get to Union Station, which I obviously had already realized. No harm done. But the track work led for an interesting--crowded--ride home.

After such a long day, we weren't up for anything to crazy. Kristine and I finally tackled a thorough cleaning of our apartment. We're talking scrubbing the shower, cleaning mirrors, mopping the floors, and vacuuming with the least broken vacuum cleaner in the house. It took several hours, and our living space still isn't spotless, but it's definitely 300% better. And for that, I feel much more at home here.

We socialized with the partiers downstairs (including unexpected Creighton freshman and the smoker that Sean had run into in the Metro station Friday) before getting rest for another long day today. Four of us girls went to mass at 11, and then nearly everyone went to one of the Smithsonians (Sackler Gallery) to see some Asian art and fill out surveys for fellow CHIPmates working in this museum. The highlights included very detailed jewelry, a chain of monkeys, cool pottery and a diorama of the DC area. After the museum, we walked (in extremely windy conditions) all the way to Chinatown for the Chinese New Year celebration...which turned out to be a bust. But we did get to see the longest chain of firecrackers EVER on a huge crane (thought of you, Bryan) being lit while fanciful dragons were paraded around by small Chinese men. It was a once in a lifetime experience, that's for sure.

Cabbing to Safeway led to an expensive journey to and from the grocery store, as well as some interesting convos with taxi drivers. We were then forced to do some homework, of which I was surprised to find out that I would have to spend any time doing while here. Although I don't think it will be too taxing, I would rather spend my time exploring the city and chillin' with my housemates. I thought I was finished with this school stuff...

I'm excited for week two at the office. Kristine and I started brainstorming things we'd like the opportunity to do at our internships, as well as things to do in DC, and I hope we can make most of our ideas become reality :)