NYC or Bust # 5

We arrived in Washington, D.C.  late in the evening and couldn't locate a YMCA.  We finally found a one-star hotel and it cost each of us $5.00.  This was a financial shock since we had become accustomed to paying only $1.00 per night.

We were all impressed with Washington D.C.  I don't want to bore you with a travelogue, but during this one day we visited the following:  the Smithsonian Museum, the Lincoln Memorial, the Jefferson memorial, The Tomb of the unknown Soldier, A tour of the White House, and walked to the top of the Washington Monument; all 532 steps. (There was a long line for the elevator and it started to rain, so we just decided to walk up).

All of these visits were very interesting and memorial.  But the thing all of us remembered the most was a one-way street.  We had turned onto a very interesting street and noticed that there were no cars parked in front of any of the Red-Stone buildings; not even on driveways.  We assumed there was a strict neighborhood building code. Next, we noticed that these buildings were built very close to the street. So close that it was impossible to park on a driveway and not have the back of the car sticking out in the street.  Residents would have to park in their garages.  Next, we noticed the most important thing.  We looked up the street and here came three lanes of cars at a high rate of speed and they were not attempting to get our of our lane.  Finally we understood.  We were on a one-way street going the wrong way.  The oncoming cars started to honk their horns and did not seem to be slowing down.  In order to prevent our pulverization, we pulled into a driveway but then had to pull onto the small lawn in order to get the rear end of our car out of the street. 

Not only did the oncoming drivers continue honking their horns but many screamed some very unchristian like things at us.  One driver noticed our Utah license plates and shouted: "Why don't you idiots go back to Utah?"  Others questioned our ancestry and one creative driver wanted to know how three blind mice could get a drivers license.  After that experience and because of the boorish manner with which we had been treated, we left for NYC.

Grandpa's humor: Whenever I think of this event, I am reminded of a joke I heard some years later. A man was driving home from work on the busy Santa Monica freeway in Los Angeles.  He received a call on his cell phone from his wife. "Honey, be very careful.  I just heard on TV that some idiot was driving the wrong way on the Santa Monica Freeway."  "I know", replied the husband, "but there is not just one; there are hundreds of them."