Day Five: Washington DC

We left Biltmore Thursday and spent ten hours on a seven hour drive to DC, mostly because of rain. We did stop for a while at the thriving metropolis of Abingdon, VA. We had lunch at a little place called Pop Ellis's Soda Shoppe and Ice Cream Parlour, which was full of old pharmacy memorabilia like a nasal syphon. Works by suction! There was an article on the wall by the bathroom informing bathroom-goers that Obama had come to the restaurant in 2008. He drank a vanilla milkshake and ordered a cheeseburger and sweet potato fries to go.

Across the street from the restaurant was a juried arts and crafts fair, so we walked around a little before we left. Steve bought me a necklace made out of an antique button (1880 - 1910), and I bought some kettle corn. Next to the fair was a book and antique store. Steve bought an Ontario arithmetic book that's about 100 years old, and one called "The Folklore of Capitalism" from 1937. I bought a Reader's Digest guide from 1971 called "You and the Law," which includes such useful facts as where you can and can't enter into an interracial marriage, the difference between when you can and when you should call a lawyer, and (curiously) how to escape from a burning building. I also bought " Pittsburgh: A Picture Book To Remember Her By" (1986), "Heidi" (1939), and "The Goebbels Diaries: 1942 - 1943" (1948). The last one is a little weird, I know, but I flipped through it and thought it was fascinating (and terrible, obviously) the way he talked about public perception outside German-occupied countries of their treatment of the Jews as if it were basically a political or PR problem.

We finally got into Washington Thursday evening. We grabbed a quick dinner at our cushy hotel and then went for a walk to see the White House at night. Very cool. The main building that you can see from the street is just the residence. The west wing is totally obscured by trees and the Eisenhower Executive Offices Building. I guess they don't want the public staring through the Oval Office windows while the President is trying to work.