12:00 midnight
July 15, 2003
Wow, this day has really been amazing! I should have written this earlier when I remembered it all, but here goes. Ok, so I woke up, kind of drowsy, and then went to take a shower in the fairly gross showers. Those showers make me feel completely greasy for some odd reason, and my hair just would not dry after I got out! It literally wouldn?t dry whatsoever. So I had to stick it back. Then breakfast, then we met at the busses to go into DC! On the way I saw a few different museums, and the capitol, and the Washington Memorial. I wanted to see EVERYTHING from that point on. Then we started walking from the busses to the House offices, and that?s where I knew that my feet would not be a pretty sight by the end of the day.
The Oregon crew had a meeting with Senator Ron Wyden at 10:30 and so therefore missed the morning speakers. We missed a few key ones like a newscaster, but it worked out. We got lost on our way to the Senator, but finally got there. He met with us for a bit, answered some of our questions about ?No Child Left Behind?, his priorities, and his basic inability to do anything about the Oregon Education System. And that made complete sense since the federal government is only obligated to pay 10% of the total education cost.
Next came the lunch issue. We went down into the Senate Cafeteria and got many choices. It was fairly expensive, but really good food. I got a ?chicken rotisserie?, mashed potatoes, cornbread, and some diet coke. I think I?m becoming addicted to coke again. (Stop the habit now). We then decided to venture down into the Library of Congress. That thing is absolutely huge! It was definitely intense. We went in, went through the security guards, up the stairs, found out WE WEREN?T ALLOWED TO SEE THE BOOKS!!!, and then went to one of the mini museums inside. It?s crazy! You can?t go into the actual book library unless you?re out of high school or on a tour. I wanted to see the books! But the mini museum was pretty cool, and so was the bookshop downstairs. The decorations inside were amazing as well?.so many references to authors and the likes.
Then we went back to the House offices, and I left my key in security and so I lost that for a bit. The speakers I got to listen to were pretty amazing. There was a Libertarian named Ron Paul who was just dead on on most everything. He was exciting to listen to. The rest were Democrats and pretty liberal and this included an African American way too involved in the whole affirmative action mess. One guy wanted to pull out of the UN.
Then came our visit to the Capitol, and we had to walk all the way around (due to our wrong sense of direction) in my terribly uncomfortable shoes. The line was too long to wait for the gallery, so Elise and I left and went back to get some food then went to the park to eat. The Capitol was absolutely gorgeous as well. I definitely want to be elected to public office or something of that manner and live in DC and work in either the Capitol or a senate/rep office. At 5:30 we had a ?Congressional Reception? for many people to meet their reps and senators (but most didn?t show up). Oregon was lucky to get one due to my roommate?s connections. The brownies and shish-ka-bobs were good though. That was that for the day, and then I finally got to take those stupid shoes off!
I grabbed some pizza in the cafeteria (for the 3rd day in a row) and went down to the library to have some quiet and do some research. It was really good stuff. I love the Constitution! Constitutional Law just really amazes me. Well it?s currently 12:15 and time to get to bed in order to wake up on time tomorrow morning!
I?m either on adrenaline or still stuck on jet lag.