On the way to tour the White House, we had to take two separate cabs, so Char, Marj, the twins and I jumped into the taxi behind Mom, Dad, Lily and Jack. Marj says, “Follow that cab!” I made some sort of off-hand remark about how she’d probably always wanted to say that. A few blocks later, the lead driver turned right and Abby yelled, “Follow that cab!”

The White House tour, in my opinion, was a little anti-climatic. It was actually cooler standing outside the fence a couple days prior and seeing Marine One land and then take off again. The House tour only lets you see about five rooms, and the docents do an admirable job of making sure that everyone moves quietly along. And keeps them moving. I think it took about 10 minutes to walk all the way through.

The Capitol tour, on the other hand, was fascinating. To hear the story of the rotunda painting and all the statues was pure delight, and our tour was very impressive. Someone asked how many statues of presidents were in the building, he thought for about a minute and then said, “Seven.” Of course, he could have been bullshitting us, but he was convincing, nonetheless. (To add credibility, he was able to name the two statues from each state for every member of our tour and knew detailed histories of many of them.)

All in all, it was a great trip. I’ll post more photos soon.