Richmond 2007............the search for a free trip.........anywhere.........
Is is a Bird?? Is it a Plane??
No--it's the beautiful sound of an expense account!?
Your fearless leader has tredged across the wilds of Virginia to discover new lands, search out new people, and bravely go where about a zillion people have gone before....
Oh well, the adventure begins with the plea from my mom to go with her to a city that, according to her, is the murder capital of the world.
Free trip?? Ok, I'm in!!
Turns out, the State Capital of VA is a pretty cool city.
We drove straight there and headed directly to the capital--only to be stopped by a VA state trooper who informed me that you can't park at the capital......so we turned around 3 blocks and parked there.....and walked.
This is the capital...
Pretty, huh?? It was designed by Thomas Jefferson!
It really is beautiful and it has a lot of steps going up to the front.......which you are NOT supposed to walk up......they have a visitor center that goes UNDERNEATH the front lawn......that would have been nice to know!
Anyhoo---the tour guide said that Queen Elizabeth got to walk up the front steps---she said she didn't even breathe hard (which proves she's not American!
).
BA (who REALLY wants to be the President/ Queen/Dictator, when she grows up) was in awe of this building and truly enjoyed the delegate desks where each seat had buttons (YEA, NAY, PAGE...) and a microphone!
She wants a desk just like that now!
We got to see the Official mace that must be present whenever the delegates are meeting!
The mace was brought over from England, but then the colonists got ticked and sold it for $100 and it was melted down.....
So, then they wished that they had one after all......so King George <<insert appropriate Roman numeral>> gave us a new mace in the 1930s!
The Queen got to inspect the mace (which was given to VA by her dad). Cool, huh? And educational!
Here's some other cool pictures--
guess who the statue is?? And see if you can see a rainbow in one of them...
So, after the capital tour, we met up with mom and went to dinner at "Bottoms Up"--a good pizza place, but underneath the train tracks........
(we waved to folks as we were eating.....and held onto our plates!)
We went back to the hotel (Crown Plaza was great!) and went swimming in the pool till pretty late.
A picture of BA and Mom
rotfl2: )
Tomorrow--the Science Museum of VA and HP !!!
Beware--I started DISing a lot when I was home sick.....and here I remain! Maybe the antibiotics induce DIS addiction or something!
Outrageous! 
). So when the boss annouced that she had to send someone to the conference I just looked at her and said "you aren't really considering sending anyone else". My coworkers knew to step back and just let me accept gracefully.
Get well!
