I said burrr its cold in here

Cheesy pictures are the best

Well this week I got a small taste of DC winterish weather.  There was a high temperature of 48 this week, as in that was the highest temp for the week after Monday.  In addition to this lovely temp, it was also drizzly to rainy and quite breezy.  I would like to take a minute now to thank each and every one of you reading this for paying your taxes which is what paid for my Air Force issue blues trench coat.  It had been in a hanging bag since I graduated from basic training in January of 2004.  I found it while I was packing for DC and this week it was ever so handy.  There only a few things that are more irritating than spending your first hours at work with wet pants from having to walk 10 blocks in the rain as part of your commute to work. So thank you all.

Man about town...or grandpa as the kids in the program call me

I know I look a bit pissed in this picture, but it was a cold rainy morning in which I did not get a good night’s sleep, so I was not super with it at this point in the day.  I will have to have someone take a picture of me later on in the day.

So last weekend my pride and Joy came into town.  It was so nice to have a taste of home.  I went out to BWI to pick her up at 10pm.  Due to my level of exhaustion I took the wrong train to the termination point and had to back track 10 stops to get to the correct train stop in which I had to catch a bus to the airport.  It is a pretty extensive public transportation feat to get to the Baltimore Airport.  But alas I got her and we got back to where we were staying.

Joy in front of Ms. Bunn's house.

The woman that I am working for offered to let Joy and I stay in her house while she was in Dubai at a conference on the International Community’s concerns about Pakistan’s Nuclear Security.  It was very nice of her to let us use her house as a base of operations while Joy was in town.

Joy and my feet at Arlington

Friday morning Joy and I headed out to Arlington National Cemetery to visit Pop Pop’s grave and much to our surprise…

The corrected headstone

The government actually got it together enough to fix Pop Pop’s birth date to the correct date.  I was not expecting it to be correct so quickly.  I wonder what they did with the old stone.

View from the Lee-Custis Mansion

After wondering around Arlington for a couple hours we headed back into the district to try and squeeze in a museum before meeting a friend of mine from work and her fiance for a bite to eat. So we decided on the Natural History Museum and here are our pictures from that:

Easter Island Stone man.

Joy in a big shark's mouth

I call this the Michelin Man Orgy

On Saturday we headed to out to the Cleveland Park area and got lunch at a Lebanese Deli.  Byblos was quite tasty.  From there we headed back to Ms. Bunn’s house to grab some more clothes because it was a bit drizzly and kind of cool and we were going to be meeting up with Josie, Hansi, and Katherine for some fun at the Zoo.  On the way to meet up with them we saw this black squirrel, which is not something either of us had ever seen before.

The Black Squirrel of Death

According to a sign at the Zoo the black squirrel and the eastern gray squirrel (like we are used to in Ga) are the same animal just with different pigmentation.  The Black Squirrel is more common in Canada.  Joy and I had the most wonderful time walking around with J, H, and K and getting to know them.  It has been so long since I have seen any of my family on the Chambers’ side that it was like getting to know them for the first time.  They are such wonderful people and I really hope that Joy and I will be able to make a more concerted effort to see them more often.

If anyone knows what this fruit is, then please let me know. I call it NERF fruit.

Sunday Joy and I left the Bunn residence and headed for the Chambers abode in McLean, Va.  We had an interesting train ride through the city as we were sharing it with thousands of people who were in town for the National Equality March.  Joy learned what LGBT stands for and why all the guys were talking in lisps (I really don’t mean this to sound like I am trying to make fun of them, but it blew me away that EVERY guy talked with an exaggerated lisp as if to perpetuate the stereotype) and the girls were trying to hide their chest parts.  It was nice once we got past the McPherson metro stop and they all got off.

Once in Va, Mike picked us up from the metro station and whisked us off to his house where Joy got to meet Grace, Helen, Jane and Ralita for the first time.  We had some lunch and then went to the ball fields to watch Helen’s softball games.  I love youth sports and it was fun to able to sit and hear “Chambers you’re up.” It is nice to be around family.  After the game we went home and Ralita made a very tasty dinner and we had a good time with our table conversations.  After dinner, Joy and Helen headed to the basement to watch Harry Potter.  Mike, Ralita and I stayed up stairs and watched the late football game.

In the morning Mike and I went out to the Giant to get some doughnuts and then over to a coffee shop to get a cup of coffee.  Once home  Mike and Ralita made breakfast.  After breakfast the girls minus Helen went to the park.  I stayed behind to help Helen with her Math homework.  When the girls got back from the park Joy and I said our goodbyes and headed to the metro to take Joy back to the airport.

It was a great weekend.  I really love seeing my family and I really love seeing my wife, so it was a great weekend.  There was a time when Joy and I were sitting in a McDonald’s having breakfast and I forgot that I was in DC. It felt like a Saturday morning in Monroe, sitting around eating breakfast and spending time together…it was nice.

This week I bought my plane ticket home for Thanksgiving.  Ms. Bunn offered to let me park my car in her driveway for the remainder of the program, so I bought a one-way ticket home in November and I will be driving back to DC.  I am looking forward to seeing Joy, Guinness, Stubbs, Rascal, Mom, Dad, Trey, Shay, Avery, Zach, Chris, Christina, Steve, Erica, Jeremy, Marti, Audry, Norah, Adam, Adrienne, Aaron, Naomi, Drew and the family Grubbs, Michele, Jordan, Tommy, Patti, Charlie, Abby, Blair, Guy, Faith, and everyone else.  Hopefully, I will be able to see everyone, but I won’t hold my breath.  I am really excited about my bed and Wal-Mart too.  Oh yeah…Joy’s family will be in town, so how exciting is that?!  It will be a great time.

According to my D-Day calendar on my phone, I am due home in 61 days.  So 61 days until the next chapter in Joy’s and my life.

Back by Popular Demand

Ok so I have been neglecting my obligations to my friends and family by not posting on here in while.  So, lets talk turkey.

Since my last post, life has been pretty boring by society standards.  I have settled into a bit of a routine of going to work, coming home, and going to sleep (much earlier than my roommate would like).  I find time for food and some school work in there as well.

Here on Ft. Lesley J. McNair there are a few options for lunch.  First, you can go downstairs to the cafeteria which has some pretty good food, but will run you about $12-15 for a sandwich, side and a drink (maybe a cookie too).  Second is you can walk just off base and over to the Coast Guard building and eat in their cafeteria.  They have a very good gyro place, you can get burgers and burritos and they have a big buffet of chinese food and a salad bar.  It usually cost me about $8.25 for a gyro, drink, and a cookie (everything is a la carte, so it adds up quickly)  The final option for lunch lies about 1/3 of a mile from my building.  It is the Old Guard’s Mess Hall.  This was originally intended to feed the members of the Old Guard.  They are the guys that guard the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington.  Well, it wasn’t very cost effective to run a mess hall for such a small group of guys, so they opened it up to everyone.  On a typical day I will get an entree, 2 sides, a salad, a dessert, a bowl of soup and 2 drinks for the amazing price of $4.25.  My friends we have a winner!  I call the place Club 425 and I can be found there between 12:15 and 12:50 everyday. 

Dinners have been a bit more challenging for me.  I have a lot of food in my apartment, but alas I have the tiniest kitchen in the world.  My sink measures 9″x8″x6″ and you can probably imagine that it is a bit difficult to clean pots and pans.  I don’t mind hand washing dishing, but 2′x1.5′ countertop does not accomodate dirty dishes and a drying spot for clean dishes very well.  I have been quite discouraged in my dinner endeavours. 

Tomorrow (October 8.) is going to be a big day.  After work I am going to hop on the Red Line train out to the Greenbelt station and then catch the B30 bus to BWI airport to pick up my life partner.  She is in town until Monday and I am so excited to see her.  Here is our tentative schedule so far:

Friday: Wake up and take a stroll around the Woodley Park area where we are staying.  It is a very beautiful neighborhood and only a few blocks from the Zoo and the National Cathedral.  After a light breakfast we are going to head to the National Mall and go Museum crazy.  I think we are planning on hitting the Air and Space, Natural History, National Gallery of Art and possibly the International Spy Museum.  We shall see how much we are going to be able to squeeze in .  After that we are going to head over to Arlington to visit Pop Pop (we may go and do this first so as to work back toward DC).  In the evening we are meeting up with my co-worker Eva and her Fiance Mathais for tapas and sangria.

Saturday:  This is going to be a big day.  My cousins Josie and Hansi and Hansi’s daughter Katherine will be in town and we are going to the Zoo.  I am very excited for Joy to finally get to meet the Chambers’s side of the family.  After the Zoo the plans are open.  It will kind of depend on what the cousins are feeling up to.

Sunday:  I think we are going to get up and clean the house we are staying in and get it looking nice and clean because it was really very wonderful of the woman I work for to offer up her house for Joy and I to use while she is out of town.  Once it is clean, we are off to McLean, Va to meet up with Mike, Ralita, and the girls for a day of softball and family fun.  We are staying with them Sunday night.

Monday:  I imagine that we will hang out with Mike and fam until it is time for Joy and I to begin our trek to BWI on the rails.

There are tons of things that I want to do and see with Joy here and I am sure that we will have a great time in all that we do.  I would be perfectly happy to just sit in Ms. Bunn’s house and watch tv with Joy all weekend.  Who knows, maybe we will end up doing that, but I doubt it.

As far as work goes, I have not been going to any big high profile events recently.  Well, I take that back, I did go to a breakfast at the Capital Hill Club, which is a pretty exclusive place, to hear the new commander of the new Global Strike Command talk about how the implementation of this new wing of the Air Force is coming along and what its responsibilities are.  The food was great and I felt really out-of-place because no one told me it was a suit affair and I was just in a shirt and tie.  From there we went to the Pentagon for a meeting on a program that we are working on here.  Outside of that day, I have spent my time finishing up my research on Pakistan and their Nuclear Security issues and Pakistani reactions to the Kerry-Lugar Bill and the Climate of Pakistani Nuclear Cooperation.   All of these things are very fun to me, but would probably bore the stew out of most other people.

School has been going…fine I guess.  I have some reservations about one of the classes I am taking and it has kind of diminished some of the interest I went into the class with originally.  It’s all good, I feel like I am picking up the info that I am supposed to be picking up so I guess the class is effective. 

Well that is the last 2 weeks and the up coming weekend in a nutshell.  The one last thing that I guess is worth mentioning is that I shared an elevator with Alan Greenspan last week.  I knew it was him, but i didn’t want to believe it because this dude was like 5’4″ and mildly resembled Mr. Magoo, but if you see him don’t tell him I said that.  I use the reference merely to give the reader an illustration that they can relate to, not in any derogatory manner.