The Lymans Go to Washington: Introduction

The last week of October, Daniel and I went to Washington, D.C., for one of my business meetings.  He went once when he was really young, but this was my first time.  Actually, it was my first time being on the east coast other than PEI, one night in Florida, and airports.  D.C. wasn't quite what I expected.  Everything was . . . larger.  We arrived late Tuesday night and took a taxi to our hotel, the Marriott Wardman Park.  We had a little problem checking into the hotel because of credit card limits and such, but we worked it out, embarrassing as that was!  My work paid for everything but Daniel's flight and, obviously, sightseeing expenses.  Perks of the job!

Our hotel was really large.  Part of it was restored, and part was new.  Our room was in the restored section, which was actually quite beautiful.  We had to walk through a long hallway to access the old part of the hotel.

We had about three days total of sightseeing, and the other two I was in meetings.  Daniel did a little venturing out by himself while I was busy.  This was the DRI Annual Meeting, which is held every October.  This was my first time attending, mainly because I didn't know there was any reason for me to.  My meetings were mostly very productive and helpful for my job responsibilities.  I also got reacquainted with people from other states that I have met before.  It's really nice to see familiar faces across the country.  Our region went out to dinner one night at a delicious Italian restaurant near the hotel.  It was nice getting to know my co-workers a little more.  I also sat by the wife of the Mid-Region Director and had a great time chatting with her.  They are from Nebraska.  I learned about their hometown, talked about kids, shared pictures of kids, and got to talk about the LDS church a little.  (Thanks to Mitt Romney for making people curious about Mormons.)  Unfortunately, I didn't find out until the last 5 minutes that she was an interior designer.  We could have had even more to talk about!  We really had a great time.

One of the blockbuster speakers was President Bill Clinton.  His speech was interesting for the most part.  I'm not very knowledgeable when it comes to politics or world issues, so some of it was lost on me.

Daniel and I hit all the major highlights of D.C. tourism.  We also rented a car and drove down to Alexandria and Mount Vernon, Virginia, and then back up to see the Washington, D.C., temple.  We were following the GPS on Daniel's iPhone and it led us right up through the middle of a national forest in the middle of the city to get to the temple.  So many times I was sure we were going the wrong way and it was getting dark.  But we eventually found the temple.  It seemed so huge and fortress-like.  We just looked from the car because of the weather.

The weather was worse than predicted.  Maybe the humidity made it colder?  It rained most days, sometimes poured, and was really cold (20s-30s).  We also walked until our feet hurt.  Everything looks so much closer on a map than it really is.  But we had a great time.  I loved finally getting to see all of those things; I've always really enjoyed learning about American history.  We flew home early Sunday morning.  Thanks to my parents, once again, for watching the kids.