Weekends with Lily

Sort of like Tuesdays with Morrie, not really, but there we are.

I meant to write a blog last weekend called Lavender & lily, but I am a slacker.

I spent a very fun weekend with Lily, her brother Josh, her mom, stepdad and new baby brother Kashti last weekend. They live near York, Pa. I drove up Friday after work, and we had a fun night being treated to Japanese cooking by Lily & Shabbat Dinner.

Saturday, Josh & Lily took me around York. We bought some nerf swords at Target and hilarity ensued.

Saturday night we watched Harry Potter 3 with an online soundtrack by these guys who do comedy mocking while you watch the movie. It's very, very funny.

Sunday, Lily and her mother and I went to a Lavender festival a little ways away from their home in Pa. Pennsylvania is a gorgeous, hilly, and rural state. We drive down curvy roads and under bridges with only enough width for one car at a time. The houses came right up to the road, but they were originally cart/buggy roads, so the houses had once been a normal distance, one suspects.

Hanover, Pa is a lovely little town we drove through. We stopped for coffee at a super cute little place called Merlin's decked out in cats. We also drove through the downtown part of Gettysburg. It's also very quaint.



~~~ skip a week.


This weekend, Lily's mom brought Lily to Annapolis so I could take her around DC Saturday. Friday we ate dinner at the cute coffeehouse in Salisbury, Viva Espresso. then we watched movies. Saturday we got up super early, and drove to the nearest Metro station to take the train to the Smithsonian / Mall station. We saw the Washington monument, the WWII memorial, the Lincoln monument, the Holocaust museum, and the museum of Natural History. It was a long, hot day of mondo walking. :)



We didn't get to go up in the Washington monument as the line for the free tickets starts at 7am, and we got there at 10am, so they were long gone. But you can happily take a picture with yourself and the monument from pretty much anywhere :) The WWII memorial is super pretty with lots of water. The Lincoln monument is hard to get close to with all he swarming crowds, but very impressive. Would like to see it at night.

Unbeknownst to us, the Holocaust museum gives out tickets in 15 min intervals to maintain dispersion of the crowd inside the exhibit. When we got there at 11:00, they were giving out tickets for the 4:00 time slot. (Note: get to DC early on the weekends). Happily, a nice lady and her daughter just gave us their tickets for 1:15 as they didn't want to wait anymore. So we toured the open parts of the museum until 1:15. There was a children's section that was almost too juvenile; a section on the Holocaust deniers and the literature they use; and a monstrous section on nazi propaganda. I was surprised not to see Leni Riefenstahl's name anywhere. I read that autobiography on her, so I figured she'd be at least mentioned. But if so, I missed it.

The actual exhibit is huge and amazingly comprehensive. They give you a little passport before you enter the elevator with the identity and story of a person who lived during the Holocaust. The guide shuttling you from the ground floor to the top floor tells you, you are now witnesses to the holocaust. It was as horrifying as I expected it to be, but moreso. I only cried at the wall for the people who they knew tried to rescue people. Everyone who hid anyone, took in children, or did something else subversive. There was a librarian featured on the wall named Ona Šimaitė. She went into the ghettos under the pretense of fetching overdue books, and smuggled in food and out children. She was caught and tortured but she never gave up anyone's names that she helped or were helping her. She survived and lived until 1970. Librarians are awesome.

Some excitement leaving the holocaust museum. When we finished the permanent exhibit, they weren't letting anyone go down the stairs to the main lobby. the docent/guard told us "I've got something going on down there. You have to wait here." no one was frightened; mostly everyoe was trying to see if they could spot anything exciting. Lily and I stayed out of sight while she bought a pin. Turned out someone left a bag unattended long enough to worry security, and they cleared the lobby to check it out. As they let us go back down the stairs, they said "always keep everything on you in DC."

After spending nearly 4 hours at the Holocaust museum, we scurried over to the Natural History museum, and quickly checked out all the skeletons, bones, plants, bugs, and models while jumping over hordes of people and children. Then we took a couple of quick pictures in front of the Capitol which I have poorly pasted together below :)

Sunday I took us out to Assateague island to see the horses at the beach. It was super busy, there were lots of horses to see. Some even caused a minor traffic back up when we went to leave. Cute baby ponies running amuck. Then I drove Lily back to Annapolis, my 6th trip across the bay bridge this weekend. Perfectly safe :)