Lost in the Smithsonian...

I got together with Mik and Jenny again for a Memorial Day weekend filled with culture, food, and a little bit of chili sauce.

We started our adventure at the Smithsonian Castle, which I'd never actually be in before. Since it takes about 30 seconds to see the whole thing, we then quickly headed over to the Sackler Gallery to look at Asian Art. The Sackler Gallery is really cool because its three stories of art are completely underground. It's also very confusing because (while underground) it connects to the Freer Gallery, which also houses lots of Asian Art, and it also connects (again underground) to the African Art Museum. The divisions between the three museums are not very well marked, so after wandering aimlessly and getting very turned around, we were quite confused when we wound up on the first floor of the African Art Museum, when we had started out in the Sackler. Oh well.

 Smithsonian Castle from the side not facing the Mall

 African Art Museum (above) and cool elephant sculpture

from inside the African Art Museum (below)

After our adventures in the three aforementioned art museums, Mik had to go home to catch a very important soccer game, so Jenny and I were left to our own devices. We decided to check out the American History Museum because neither one of us had been there recently.

Pretty trees on the Mall

What a mistake! Being Memorial Day weekend about every one and their mom, uncle, sister, and great-grandmother were in DC and I think about 3/4 of them where in the American History Museum. So, after fighting the crowds to catch a glimpse of Michelle Obama's inauguration gown, headed down to Chinatown to grab some lunch and then navigated the Metro back to Mik's place.

We saw Pirates 4 (not in 3D) that evening, which was really good and then ate dinner at a cool restaurant and called it a day.

On Sunday, we went out to brunch with a few of Mik's friends at this British Pub called The Queen Vic, it was interesting, but my cornmeal pancakes were surprisingly good! Since we were feeling pretty full we decided to walk the 10ish blocks to Union Station instead of taking a taxi. Jenny's phone was acting funny so we crisscrossed DC looking for an open Verizon, eventually finding one and finding out that her battery was just acting wonky.

Jenny and I still wanted to see the American Indian Museum, so we dragged Mik back down to the Mall to see it. That museum has the coolest architecture ever. The inside's pretty cool too, but the outside is awesome.

For dinner that night, we finally went to Sticky Rice, which is a restaurant I found on the internet somewhere and have wanted to go to ever since. It did not disappoint! Dinner was phenomenal, with the exception of the time that Mik squeezed the bottle of chili sauce and accidentally squirted it all over my head and back. Fail.

I had to go home on Monday, but before we did we when to Eggspectations for breakfast. I love that place. Our waiter was amazing too... he brought me free orange juice because everyone else at the table was getting their Vitamin C and he felt bad for me. Haha. It was fresh squeezed and seriously amazing. Like an orange in a glass. Then he brought us free cake too. A perfect way to end the trip!