The Heat Chronicles, Day 4, and no this has nothing to do with LeBron

1) LeBron James is highly annoying, and a media whore. I don't want to hear anything more about him. That being said, i'm sure my cousins in Miami are very happy he's joining their probably-going-to-win-the-NBA-championship team.

2) it is inhumane to keep your full time, UNPAID intern in an office on the 3rd floor of an ancient Victorian house with no AC at all when it is over 100 degrees outside. No matter how little clothing I wear or how much liquid i drink it is still unbearable. Plus, I bring my own computer and don't interact with my coworkers anyway so there is no reason I can't work from somewhere else. They can ignore me even more than usual if they let me work from a Starbucks or something.

3) This has been the longest short-work-week ever. I'm finding some excuse to leave early today no matter what.

4) Sorry to be so negative. Sometimes it's just necessary. :/

In other news, we had a "Faces of Homelessness Panel" on Tuesday after work that was interesting. My friend Gheremey works at the National Coalition for the Homeless so he helped put it together. We had 2 speakers who have both been homeless for a portion of their lives. It was really interesting! After, we had an impromptu TWO HOUR LONG 'evaluation' of the program that Lilly, our Vandy coordinator flew up for. No comment on how much fun that was. basically she's been getting a lot of complaints and this was her way of dealing with it, but it wasn't what a lot of people were expecting I don't think.

Last night we had an "Around the World Dinner" between the 6 suites, where we divided up appetizers, entree and dessert and moved from place to place to eat. We had chinese and italian appetizers (egg rolls and bruschetta), fajitas, enchiladas and a yummy pasta for entrees, and then our suite had all-american ice cream sundaes for dessert. it was really fun and a good way to hang out with VIEW people.

And today is finally friday!!!! i'm still trying to tackle this Ambassadors of the Arts Gala that has no direction whatsoever so we'll see where that goes. And tomorrow my friend and AOII sister Meghan comes in town!!!! I'm so excited to have her visiting for the weekend. Maria Gaitan (my roommmate this upcoming year) just got to DC this week and is starting her job. Can't wait to see her too!

4th of July Weekend

The National Portrait Gallery with Cornelius Vanderbilt

Liz Furman's 20th birthday party!

"A Capitol Fourth" Rehearsal

Dinner with Mom & Laura!

I forgot to mention in my last post that we had a Young Alumni Panel on Wednesday night after work. 5 Vanderbilt alumni who all work in the D.C. area came and gave us a lot of advice on our internships, future goals, and what to do after graduation. Long story short, I made a big decision after that panel that I've been leaning towards for awhile. I decided that I'm definitely not going to law school, or at least not right out of undergrad. I'm not sure if it's what I want to do with my life and getting a few years of experience working in DC or somewhere else would actually help me figure out what I want to do plus will make me a better candidate for law school should i decide to go. i'm also considering public policy grad school- but everything after a few years of work in the real world. i don't want to become one of those people who is continuously putting off joining the 'real world' and want to use that to figure out what i want to do in life.

ok, rant aside:

thursday was fine at work, i hardly remember what went on as it's been awhile, but all bets will lead to nothing exciting happened at all. that night laura and mom got in town (yay) after getting lost on the way in from BWI, and i went over and visited with them for awhile. since we were all tired, we called it an early night. friday i was off work to spend the day with mom and laura, and we actually started our day off with visiting my workplace. it was great for mom and laura to be able to see where i spend 40 hours a week all summer! then we went to look at the monuments on the mall- and that took most of the morning! we saw WWII, Vietnam, Lincoln, FDR, and Jefferson. Fortunately, it was the coolest it's been since I've been here- in the low 80's, making it a pleasant walk around the monuments. I forgot how much I love the Vietnam memorial- it's definitely my favorite of all of the monuments/memorials. i'll spare everyone the time of me explaining why!

Then we met up with Katelyn & Jill at the Holocaust Museum in the afternoon. It was so moving- I remembered very little from when I went the last time we were in town. Even though I've read a lot about the Holocaust and have learned about it in school, there was so much information and the museum was very well done. It was certainly a troubling experience and it takes awhile to recover from after walking through. But I'm so glad a museum like this exists for people to remember and learn about this horrific event in our history. We went back to our apartments in the afternoon and rested for a bit, then met up and went to a cute restaurant called Veranda for dinner with my friend Michael Kariya. It was a lovely night with a cool breeze and we got to eat outside at the cute restaurant. It was a really nice evening! That night I said goodbye to Laura and mom and they left the next morning. It was a really quick trip but it was so great to see them!

Saturday morning our suite was planning on sleeping in to kick off the holiday weekend but were instead jarred awake at 830 am by a full high school marching band practicing directly below our window. After many angry phone calls to the Embassy Suites across from us (we live in an area that is completely saturated with hotels/apartments so this had to be bothering thousands of people) they stopped after at least 30 minutes of playing. Oh well, no sleep for us!

Saturday Jill's dad was in town, so she was with him. katelyn, katie and i went to Georgetown which was SO crowded but really fun! we shopped around, met up with jill and her dad, and got ice cream since it was pretty hot in the afternoon. that night, we went to the capitol for the rehearsal of "A Capitol Fourth". it was much less crowded than it would be the next night, and we got to see the whole show! David Archuleta, Daris Rucker, Lang Lang, Gladys Knight, and Reba Mcentire were all performing (although all of them didnt show up for the rehearsal) We had a lot of fun a camped out picnic-style and i have never felt so patriotic! We also met a really cool woman who was sitting next to us. she and her husband, though in their early 60's, own a skydiving business in Oklahoma and have each jumped 2000+ times! They were in the middle of a motorcycle tour of all 48 contiguous US states! Talk about awesome.

On the 4th Katelyn, Matthew and I went to Liz Furman's birthday party at her house in Alexandria. I have never seen such a patriotic gathering! it was tons of fun as michael was there, plus my AOII sisters kelley, veronica and jamie and two of my friends in sigma nu. it was a wonderful time, complete with USA fans, georgetown cupcakes and great barbeque.

that night we went to the roof of Katelyn's office to watch the fireworks. it was a great view and we had no trouble getting there or getting back. that was a relief as we had friends who spent hours getting home! jill's dad ordered us pizza and we watched the re-run of the Capitol Fourth show on PBS.

yesterday, katelyn matthew and i went to the National Portrait Gallery / Smithsonian Museum of American Art. They had a wonderful Norman Rockwell exhibit plus a lot of really great portraits! We got froZenyo after (our favorite!) and then came home in the late afternoon. katelyn and i put together an all-american dinner to celebrate the 4th weekend coming to a close- we had grilled chicken, corn on the cob, mashed potatoes, peas, and i made a peach compote to serve over vanilla ice cream for dessert. rounded off with iced tea and some country music in the background and it was a really nice dinner :)

now, back to the grind in the office. the air conditioning is hardly working today and with it being 100+ outside i'm nothing short of miserable- but hopefully things will make a turn for the better.

the week so far

Monday was great because after work i got to wander around the U-Street area for awhile, then headed over to Dupont Circle and met up with Matthew Taylor and our friend Andrew Maguire. Andrew goes to VU with us and is a counselor at an international diplomacy camp at American university. he doesn't get many days off from his job so it was great to see him! we at a place that is literally called 'the burger joint' and it was really good. then we walked a few blocks over to a frozen yogurt place called Mr. Yogato that Andrew's friend had recommended to him. i didn't get anything, but apparently it was LITERALLY yogurt that was frozen and not everyone's favorite. the place itself was really cool though. froyo shops and gourmet cupcake shops are all the rage here in DC (as they are in nashville) but they have yet to really reach louisville yet (not surprising). TLC is even starting a new reality show soon called DC Cupcake. no complaints about so many yummy things being stationed around me!

I went home after that and crashed early as i was really tired. Tuesday was great at work because to celebrate Anita's (my boss) birthday we went and got Ethiopian food! There really, truly aren't any African cuisine restaurants in all of nashville, and to my knowledge our one and only one in louisville, Queen of Sheba, just opened. I had no idea what to expect but it was really cool. you're served everything in a large, wooden bowl that you share with your group, and you don't use utensils, instead you pick up everything with this spongy bread and eat it that way. sorry for my lack of culturally accurate terminology, but, well, i'm coming from an area that doesn't exactly excel in global awareness ;)

Tuesday night i met up with katelyn, jill and matthew at the Nat's stadium for the Congressional baseball game (democrats v. republicans). it's been going on for 30-40 years and it was a lot of fun watching members of congress play each other in baseball (even if i was forced to sit on the democrat side). the dems won big, and ben chandler (D-KY) played! we sat in front of his interns, mostly from KY, and i found out we had a lot of mutual friends- go figure. then we all went home and used katelyn's quesadilla maker that her mom brought us- yummy!

Wednesday was also fun at work- my supervisor Evlyn is a flamenco dancer and had a show in the afternoon so we all left the office to go see it! she's in a really talented company and they put on an awesome show. definitely a great lunch break!!! the rest of the day went by really quickly. however, my computer crashed AGAIN because let's face it, if you're working on a 10 year old Dell, things aren't going to go very well. the piece of crap was ridden with viruses before i ever got here and we've already had to wipe the harddrive multiple times. so, starting today, im bringing my macbook to work every day and just plugging in the ethernet cable for internet. on one hand im happy about it because i have a lot less wrist pain (which was becoming really bad on the dell) on my macbook, and it works a LOT better. however, i walk about 1/2 mile to the metro from my apartment and then a full mile from the metro to work each way. my bag weighs 20+ pounds and i already did a LOT of damage to my shoulders this year at school carrying around all that stuff, so im worried about it here as well. I don't have a backpack and seeing as i wear a dress or skirt every single day it'd hardly be feasible. im sure ill figure it out soon enough.

today is the last day of my work week as Laura and Mom will get here tonight after dinner sometime! since they're only in town for one full day im taking friday off (hey, they dont pay me- i deserve it!) not too much going on in the office, but we won't be taking any fabulous lunch breaks or field trips today that im aware of- i was getting used to it ;)

Tomorrow i'll be showing Laura and mom around the mall and monuments in the morning and maybe checking out the Smithsonian Folk Life Festival- it has a TON of cool free things going on. then we're meeting katelyn and jill and going to the Holocaust Museum. We might fit in the botanical gardens after that, and then we're meeting michael kariya for dinner. can't wait!!!

Weekend!

well, in the middle of True Blood (the best part of any Sunday), dad texted me requesting a blog update, so, here it is.

friday night katelyn's mom and aunts were in town and didn't leave till later in order to miss rush hour traffic on their drive home to Baltimore, so we didnt all go to the grocery until late. we came home and decided to make stir fry since we had so many leftover vegetables from the office reception/networking event the night before. aside from my apparent ineptitude when it comes to measuring how much water is needed to cook rice, dinner was really good! we didnt finish until almost 930, however, and were all too tired to summon up energy to do much else.

we all got to bed early and got up early saturday morning to go to Eastern Market. Eastern Market is a great farmer's market style, craft fair with over 100 vendors and the best breakfast you'll find anywhere. its a huge deal here and we'd all been wanting to go. we waited in line for an hour for breakfast, but it was worth it. we all got 'blue bucks', aka blueberry buckwheat pancakes which were HEAVENLY :) and shopped around. people here are obsessed with pandas, as they're the most popular animals in the national zoo- so it's a good thing i dont have a little sister in AOII to shop for anymore or i'd be buying this panda stuff left and right.

After looking around for a bit, we went to the Smithsonian Museum of American History. It was really great! It was nice going with girls because we all agreed on what exhibits to focus on and what to ignore. Things we loved- the First Ladies Exhibit, the President's Exhibit, and the pop culture section. Things we ignored- all things related to science and technology.

We rushed home to catch as much of the US-Ghana game as possible. We ended up being able to catch all of the additional time from 90 min. mark onward. sadly, it didn't end as we'd hoped but i'm honestly ok with that, because the US can't be the best at everything, right? ;) Also, i'd be happy if an African country was able to win and Ghana is the last shot at that happening. It is unfortunate that this is the 2nd consecutive time theyve knocked us out of the tournament, however.

Liz Furman happened to be watching the World Cup game in Matthew's suite, so she came over and we all hung out for awhile, and then decided to go to dinner and a movie in China Town, an area i hadn't been to yet. China Town was the first time DC has felt like NYC to me since ive been here. It made me realize how much more i like the feel of DC than bigger cities like NYC and Chicago that i've been to. We had a great dinner and then split up for movies (liz had already seen TS3 and i'm waiting to see it with Maria when she gets in town)

Liz and I saw "Get Him to the Greek" which was hilarious!!! i knew it had gotten really great reviews but i still had my doubts- and they were proven wrong. it was really hilarious and a night with liz is never a bad time!!!

today i got up early and went to an Episcopal Church literally feet from the White House with matthew. it was very interesting and remarkably similar to a Catholic mass (except for the female presider). Afterwards, i hung out in the suite until the VIEW BBQ, which was a lot of fun. Complete with grilling out, music, and pie, it was a great time and it was fun to see everyone and hang out for a bit. After, i went and worked out and then finally got to talk to my mom on the phone (its been weeks!) that was wonderful, and then i made some dinner and the True Blood group convened and enjoyed our favorite television indulgence.

Now, off to bed! Can't wait to see Laura and Mom this Thursday!

week 3

well, another work week is finally coming to a close.

monday & tuesday were honestly awful days at work. i had nothing to do and was entirely bored all day. however, tuesday after work i went down to the hill and had dinner with Matthew taylor and Mary Lamar Washburne. She's been interning since school got out and is leaving today so it was great to get to see her, especially because she'll be in Florence all fall semester :(

I rushed home Tuesday night to watch Pretty Little Liars with the roommates and our friend Gheremey who is a VIEW participant and lives on our floor. We can' t help but love it for how awful of a show it is.

Wednesday was a better day at work. I've finished Arts & Health Month and the website should be launching in the very near future! it's a good sense of accomplishment. Now I'm working on planning the Ambassador's Dinner, which is a 500 person event for the many supporters of the arts in Congress, major organizations, and other arts related industries. It's been a lot of tedious work but it's cool to know I'm working on something that is important to the society.

it has been UNBEARABLY hot in DC this week. hotter than temps in Texas and other areas normally much hotter than DC. We actually set a record yesterday when the temperature hit 100. Walking a mile each way to and from work is miserable in business clothes but oh well!

Last night Evlyn (my supervisor/membership coordinator at the SAH) and I went straight from work to the VIEW Reception, which was held at the Vanderbilt Federal Relations Office, which is down by the hill and is where Jillian, my roommate works. It is a gorgeous building and was a networking style cocktail party for all of the VIEW students, our mentors, and employers. I met some really nice and interesting people- including a man who actually went to Trinity high school in Louisville and grew up on Hanover, which is within walking distance of our home in Louisville! He is going to get Jill and Katelyn and I into a criminal trial so we can watch what really goes on during a court case. Also, Professor Dalhouse, who oversees the program, flew in from Nashville and was at the reception. We got to talking and now I might be babysitting for he and his wife in the fall as they have two twin boys who are 3 (and they live on the Commons in East House!) It was a really nice evening but by the time it was over I was wiped out and my feet weren't too happy with me either. Since jill works at the host site of the event, we got to take home ALL of the gourmet leftovers! However, they weighed about 30 pounds and we had to lug them home via metro...THAT was an experience. We made a lot of friends on the ride home who wanted some of our delicious food. Now we wont have to go to the grocery for awhile!

Today my computer crashed at work (seeing as it is a 9 year old Dell, i am not surprised at all.) the old piece of crap freaks out on me daily and has been through a few too many interns to work much longer. Im on Anita, my boss's computer, since she is at a conference in Baltimore, while a repairman tries to salvage my computer. looks like i might be bringing in my macbook (yay! mac!!!) instead of working on the desktop for the rest of the summer.

Not sure of too many weekend plans yet, other than going to Eastern market tomorrow with the roommates and other VIEW people. It's supposed to be a wonderful open air farmers's market plus it has a lot of booths for jewelery, crafts, and other things. Can't wait!

and i'm back!

Sorry for the delay in posting!

Thursday was uneventful at work- I'm still getting to do a lot for starting up Arts & Health Month, which should be really cool once we've got it up and running.

Liz picked me up from work Thursday night and we went on what became a driving extravaganza. I'm not used to living in a city with tons of traffic and lots of driving- but DC certainly requires patience on the road! We looked around Tyson's mall (wow, i could spend my life savings there) and then picked up our AOII sister Veronica and drove to Bethesda (such a cute area!!) and got dinner at a great Thai place there. Then we dropped Veronica off and then me- but by then it was after 11pm! Let's just say we did a lot of driving around. But that's ok because Liz and i never run out of things to talk about so we had a great time.

Friday at work was fine, and more relaxed because my boss wasn't there. I got to leave a bit early to go to Metro Center for the Ivy League Mixer. It included students from Harvard, Penn, Stanford, Yale, Vandy and a few other places...but basically the Vandy kids were singled out as the dumb ones since we aren't an ivy. It was fun, but it certainly didn't do anything but reaffirm my impression of Ivy league kids and make me very glad i go to school where i do! i got to meet some nice people though and it was fun to get out. The best part was that the frozen yogurt place we've been dying to try, called froZENyo, was only a block away. the suite girls went after the mixer and it was soooo delicious. it far surpassed any other froyo i've had and was delicious! After we went back to the suite and just laid low for the night because we were all so tired.

Saturday was not the best day for me- i dont know if it was the leftover Thai i had for dinner Friday night or something else but i had awful food poisoning all day and literally couldn't leave our room all day. i was getting sick all day and basically just slept the ENTIRE day. i feel better now but it was quite a waste of a Saturday!

So today, i want to wish happy father's day to all the wonderful fathers in my life- my dad, my grandpa Paw Paw, my many great role models that are my friends parents, and many more! I also don't want to leave out my late grandpa Pop, as this is only our family's 2nd father's day without him. All of yall are in my thoughts today and i wish i could be at home in KY to celebrate Father's Day with the family. This afternoon i'm going to try and go to a museum, then have dinner with the suite girls and watch True Blood- because we're all obsessed!

We grilled out!!!

Grilling out- thankfully avoided the rain!

9/11/01 Memorial at the Pentagon

Abe statue in the capitol

don't make too much fun of my inability to be artsy

CLT (currently listening to, for all of you who are not-Clay): Find Your Love- Drake

Monday was uneventful, other than actually getting a REAL LUNCH BREAK. this is revolutionary , since normal lunch consists of silently eating at our desks. Since it was Cara's birthday (our secretary) i lugged a glass tray of iced brownies there as a surprise, and we all went out to lunch to celebrate. We went to an awesome restaurant with great food that also doubles as a performance space and coffee shop (called Busboys & Poets). all 4 of us came home and just ate together and watched TV- Katie and i both watch Secret Life together.

Tuesday all of the VIEW interns were off work (yay!) and went on a group tour of the capitol and the pentagon. the capitol tour could have been better, as we had some organizational issues, but lunch and the pentagon tour were awesome. we had a vandy undergrad & vandy engineering alum who is a doctor and works in the pentagon give us a super cool, private tour. then we got to go outside the pentagon and see the 9/11 memorial, which i also really loved. it was very simple but i'd never heard of it before and was very impressed.

after that, all 4 of us were exhausted from a lot of walking and came back to rest our feet. after a quick turnaround, we went to the nearby farmer's market. it was great to look around, but stuff didn't seem in season yet and was too expensive. we made our normal weekly grocery run and came back. since it's resident-appreciation-month, they had a free barbeque on the porch, complete with balloons and live music and really good food! barbeque, cole slaw, corn on the cob, etc. then matthew, liz furman (who came over!!!) and the 4 suite girls drove to georgetown, which i'm now obsessed with, and went to Baked and Wired, a 1/2 cupcake store 1/2 coffee shop. it was amazing. we shopped a bit and then came back.

our suite is addicted to really poorly acted, poorly written, cheesy television. aka, ABC Family. Naturally, we watch their new show Pretty Little Liars and plan to all summer. It'll become tuesday night routine for sure. This morning Katelyn and i were a bit slow moving, unwillingly returning to work. i was a little later to leave this morning (still got to work 10 min. early) so i got to ride with some VIEW people on the metro. Work was fine, a bit slow today, but i'm getting to do a lot of really great work on the first annual Arts & Health month. its really great to be able to be with the project from its inception and help make it get off the ground.

as usual, g chat saves me from complete and utter boredom at work. the highlight of the day was when katelyn, jillian and i realized we can GROUP gchat. Our lives (and productivity levels) will never be the same. however, it is helping me learn to multi-task, out of sheer necessity.

after work i got to FINALLY talk with katie (Vandy roomie and best friend, not Katie my roommate here or Katelyn my roommmate here- confusing, i know) and skype briefly, do to bad wifi. I lovvvvve her and it was so nice to get to begin to discuss all the stuff we need to catch up on, since she's been out of the country most of the summer so far!

then, the suitemates, minus katie who was at a work dinner, decided to defy gender stereotypes and grill out. we managed to out-grill the gay couple that we shared the grill with (it was quite hilarious, 3 girls cooking big cheeseburgers with ease while 2 clearly gay men cant manage to cook their thin strips of chicken) and enjoyed a really nice, sit down dinner complete with squash, cucumbers and a rich dish with vegetables freshly supplied from katelyn's family. Katelyn and i went to the gym and worked out and then we watched the season premiere of Top Chef: DC. its so cool to see the show set in the city we're living in! im sure we'll watch that regularly too.

i also spent a good hour saving, well, rescuing, Omar's suite from it's filthy conditions. he called asking for cleaning supplies but i soon realized his situation required drastic action. these 4 boys have no trash bags, no cleaning supplies, and no care that their place is trashed, has bugs already, and smells awful. the future housewife in me kicked in to gear and managed to sanitize, clean and organize the whole place. since ive already baked for them too im sure they consider me their house mom haha.

now, off to bed. sooo tired. hopefully seeing liz again tomorrow! also, my boss hinted we might get Ethiopian food for lunch!