Book 2: The Golden Thread Day 40 (July 18, 2015)

Today was purely roaming. Cameron, Black, and I went first to the Supreme Court, then the Library of Congress. That place was full of amazing historical things that made me wish I remembered more of World History and AP Euro, but I know many of it still and it made me so happy to try to find Machiavelli in Thomas Jefferson's book collection or Euclid or Montesquieu (I'm biased towards French Enlightenment/French Revolution anythings).

I would post pictures and I might, but they are pretty bad and it does take a long time to get through them...plus I'm slightly backlogged on posts just because I'm lazy and put them off. Until they start piling up again and then I get mad at myself.

Anyways, the place was cool, with allusions to the 9 muses and a lot of writers (Tennyson, Longfellow, Milton...the list goes on and on and on) as well as the Minerva Mosaic. I really wish I could have gone into the reading room, but I think you have to make reservations ahead of time for that. It's a really quaint, quiet place, and how cool is it that you're housed in one of three buildings that holds all the books ever published in the US?

Then, we walked to Eastern Market, where all these little shops set up tents along this street. Many were antiques, such as clothes, prints, vinyl records. Also, lots of jewelry and clothes. Lots of clothes. I've been to a few farmer's markets, but none were as diverse or large as this one.

I forgot to wear sunscreen, so my cheeks started to feel like they were burning up. In the shade, they didn't hurt, but it did hit 94 degrees today...

We stopped at this gelato place and there were all these flavors of gelato. I was lame and got a 3flavor mix of stracciatella, nocciola, and postachio, which are all not that exciting, like mango or banana or crema (which I asked to try, and it tasted a little like a lemon pound cake).

Next stop was Navy yard, where there were all these restaurants and quiet greenspaces. There was a waterfountain, that ended up being a pool for children to wade in. There was a peaceful spot with willow trees by the Anacostia River, and we relaxed there.

We ate a "snack" instead of dinner at Takorean, which is this Korean taco fast food restaurant, not unlike Chipotle in the way they service. One order came with 3 tacos, a perfect number for us 3, and so we ordered one steak, one chicken, and one pork. And then there were various "slaws" and one of them was kimchi. And then there were different salsas you could add (hence the mexican part of the fusion).

And that concludes our busy day today. We walked 6.5 miles, biked probably another mile, and I am very very tanned/burned because I was an idiot who forgot to wear sunscreen. Tomato today, onion tomorrow.