Good news: I feel like blogging. Bad news: It’s 12:36 am.

Well, today turned out to be quite the jumbled compilation of new experiences! In a way, though, this was a good thing; I’ve been feeling a little moody and tired and unexcited lately about getting out and doing touristy things and exploring D.C. and broadening my horizons and so on and so forth, and I got to see and do a lot of new things today that helped energize me again about living in such a fantastic place with so many opportunities to take advantage of.

It all began at 8:30 am, when I rushed out my room down to the computer room to frantically print a map of the Lincoln Theater, where I was supposed to be for a special meeting at 9 am, and then zipped out of the Barlow Center as fast as I could for the Metro. It was a typical Tuesday morning at the Metro: tons of people moving in every which way except for the way I have to go, people who stand IN FRONT of the Metro maps posted around the station and on the Metros to help us figure out where we’re going, old ladies carrying bags and suitcases in front of my path, a man with a little kid (always....always), and people who refuse to “walk” on the left side of the escalator like you’re supposed to. I’ve never seen a Metro train as crowded as the one I boarded at Foggy Bottom this Tuesday: I had to literally shove some people just to barely fit inside the doors, and didn’t have an inch of free space once I was in. I just kept my eyes on my bag to make SURE that no one tried to take advantage of the crowded space to do a little theft. I’ve never had anything stolen, but there’s always a first time, and for that reason I never carry anything of value in my unzippable pockets (and I always keep my zipped pockets tightly zipped).

Thankfully, the Metro cleared out after a few stops, and I made it to L’Enfant Plaza, where I had a bit of difficulty trying to find the right green line train. A confusing and blatantly false sign led me to climb the wrong pair of escalators, but, through some miracle, I was able to make it to the right platform seconds before a train, headed in the right direction, took off. It was now a little past 9:00. I leaped inside the unlabled train and only discovered when it began moving that I was on the wrong train—it was the yellow line, not the green line, and it was eventually headed in the exact opposite direction of where I wanted to go. !@!*@!& #*!@!@!@!&&@!&@!(#!*#!!!! (With apologies to Daniel—I couldn’t help myself!) Fortunately, the driver let us off at a station where a green train would be coming within a few minutes, and he turned out to be telling the truth. The green train came, I got on, and got off at the right stop. Yay!

Then came a bit of a tender mercy. There’s almost always two exits at each Metro station, and I invariably end up taking the wrong one when I’m in a hurry and don’t know the area. I was late and not exactly sure where the Lincoln Theater was, so I randomly picked an exit and rushed for it when the Metro stopped. I felt a good feeling as I went out—which I took as confirmation from the Spirit that I had made the right choice... :) Then I got out and realized that I had taken the wrong exit and had no idea how to get to the Theater and would be much more late than I already was. Then—saving grace!—I overheard a lady who had just come out of the Metro ask a gentleman where the Lincoln Theater was. He pointed her in the right direction, and I immediately latched onto her, commenting, “That’s where I’m headed too!” She was agreeable to walk together, and I was very grateful for her presence, as she navigated the streets much more ably than I would have, and singled out the obscure looking Theater while I was still trying to find the street signs. She was a nice, elderly lady working for a hotel company, and had a very distinct New York accent, which was a bit startling at first—I’m not very acquainted with New York accents (other than the horribly exaggerated Doris Rathbone), but they are very interesting to listen to!

I got yet another tender mercy when we came inside the Theater; the first 30 minutes of the “meeting” were spent in eating a continental breakfast and socializing. Feeling no worse the wear for missing the first round of hot coffee, I got myself some muffins and orange juice, and chatted with a few nice people before we were ushered into the Theater.

The meeting was a preview of events that would be taking place in D.C. as part of the National Cherry Blossom Festival. I took notes; it was all very fun and interesting and exciting and feel-good-about-yourself sort of stuff. We eventually went around the entire auditorium and introduced ourselves, and I’m pretty sure I was the only person to say I was an intern with a company. Which makes me pretty important, I think. Or just goes to show how sadly understaffed the Communications department at NMWA is right now. Either way, I was glad I got to go. I sat next to a really nice lady during the presentations in the Theater itself (which was GORGEOUS, by the way! Very decorative and patriotic and 1800s Lincoln-ish, even if it wasn’t the famous Ford) and she even gave me her name and email and told me to ask her any questions I had about anything while in D.C. Isn’t that nice!? And all I did was sit next to her for a few minutes and make some pleasant conversation and tell her a little bit about myself. This “networking” thing must work!

Well, after the meeting, I decided to walk from the Theater to the museum. It was a pretty good walk—maybe 20-25 min.—but the weather was nice and the streets didn’t look dangerous, so I enjoyed myself. I’d never been in this part of town before, but it was actually pretty nice. There was an elementary school, which I’d never seen before in any part of D.C. (shoot, I’ve never seen any kids in D.C. in places other than the Smithsonian museums on weekends), and some residential apartments, and some little shops, and then bigger company buildings as I got closer to the center of town. I got back to the museum before noon, so I could have technically fulfilled my phone duty that day, but I had already switched with another intern for Wednesday, so I just enjoyed yet another holiday from that detestable task. Tomorrow marks my return to phone duty, and I am not looking forward to it...

I did miscellaneous work stuff during the day and finished a paper for PolSci 399R class which was due tomorrow. Then one of my supervisors told me about a meeting they were going to have at 4 about blogging and social networking, and it was going to be hosted by one of the groups who had sponsored the Lincoln Theater event that morning! So I was excited to attend that, and it did turn out to be really interesting. I got a lot of good tips for blogging, which I will have to share with you some time... ;)

The meeting ended a bit late and I didn’t leave work until 6 p.m., but I didn’t mind. I walked home in the wind (it’s been really windy here for the past few days for some reason... I usually love wind, but not so much when it’s cold and windy at the same time) and stopped at Safeway to do the shopping I had really NOT wanted to do this week (unfortunately, I didn’t plan very well last week, apparently, and ran out of bananas, grapes, apples, broccoli, and carrots all at the same time—yuck). I then went home to the Barlow Center, looking forward to doing nothing that evening but turning in my PolSci paper and relaxing.

And then! Exciting news! One of my fellow interns, Jason, had procured two free tickets to the Qatar Philharmonic Orchestra’s concert tonight—a rare and exotic event which was apparently coinciding with the collection of really cool Arabian dresses which were just installed at the Kennedy Center. He couldn’t go himself, but didn’t want to lose the chance to get free tickets (Ah, the inability to turn down free stuff! Obviously a guy after my own heart...), so he sent out an email asking if any of us would like to go. I knew that the chances were slim that anyone would, since it was so last-minute, and since even I—who would do almost anything for FREE tickets to, like, anything—was feeling like I would much rather stay at home, but I did NOT want those free tickets to go to waste. However, since I had already taken advantage of one of Jason’s previous generous/free offers to see the National Symphony Orchestra perform The Firebird for free , I felt it was someone else’s turn, so in my response to Jason, I told him to go ahead and give the tickets to anyone else who responded besides me.

Soooooo. Flash forward to 7:30 pm, and I’m in the Kennedy Center with two tickets in hand. No other takers for the second ticket. But there’s a really big crowd at the concert, and the tickets are actually prime seating—the very second row in the right side of the orchestra!—so I got a very clear view of the front-row performers (i.e. violin sections, some of the bass, the conductor, some of the special performers... I have yet to ever get a good view of the drum players, the brass section, or the flute/oboe players. That’s the only problem with these up-close free tickets!).

The concert was really incredible, perhaps the best one that I’ve been to at the Kennedy Center (Whew! Sure glad I never paid to see those other ones that were sub-par!). There were a few technical glitches of course—things like the conductor kept coming in late, maybe three or four minutes after the orchestra had seated themselves, and the program didn’t match the performance in two spots—but nobody’s perfect.

I did very much enjoy watching the “first violin” concertmaster, a young man who looked almost EXACTLY like a certain cute guy whom I know and rather like at present! (Sorry, no names or descriptions forthcoming... perhaps later. As in, after we’re married happily ever after and have at least three kids) Anyway, my attention was pretty much hooked on this one violinist throughout the entire evening, and his talent did not fail under close scrutinization (nor did his looks, I might add). He was really the most remarkable violinist I’ve ever seen. His concentrated intensity! His emotional passion! The ease and grace of his movements! His straight and beautiful posture! His daring half-smiles during the most difficult parts! AAAAAAhhhhhh....... and SWOOOoon. And I never thought the day would come when I wished that a concert were just a little bit longer... I guess Obama was right—now IS the time for change.

After the concert, I waltzed myself home to the “da-da-da-dum” of Beethoven’s 5th, and went to bed at an unfortunately late hour after chatting with friends, eating dinner, Internet surfing, and reading scriptures and Mattimeo (yep, finished Redwall—that’s actually when it really hit me how long of a time it’s been since the early morning drive and first plane trip from Salt Lake City to Chicago).

Sorry for the late posting of the post—I did finish most of it yesterday when it all took place, but was a little too tired to get it all done. Hope you enjoyed reading it all the same!