The pictures speak for themselves

NOTE: These pictures are completely candid.
No items within them were manipulated in any way.

This is my dad's office.


This is my mom's office.

Dad's office, view 2. (Notice the neatly arranged santa hats on the window seat.)

Mom's office, view 2.

Dad's closet. Every shoe in place.

Mom's closet. I think a few of the shoes found their matches.

And then there's me: the product of order and chaos.

I certainly have the clutter angel on my left shoulder and the tidy angel on my right.

This begs the question: What will my closet look like in twenty years?
Will all of my santa hats be in a row? Or will my spouse mistake my office for an area under FEMA's jurisdiction?

Only time will tell.

Dear Pandora

Dear Pandora,

The way you bring David Archuleta's Christmas tunes into my home is delightful. What would I do without you (and David)?

After seeing "A Christmas Carol" at Ford's theater, my heart is filled with Christmas spirit. But you Pandora, only you, maketh my heart overfloweth.

God bless us, everyone.
(But especially you, Pandora.)

Love,
Lynne

The National Christmas tree outside the White House

Confession: TJ

I would move back to D.C. just to buy my groceries at Trader Joe's.

I am torn between two worlds.

I know that I will be going home soon, packing, cleaning.
But I can't go home yet.

I know that I can't go home yet, so I try to nest and feel at home here, but I know I'm leaving soon.
So it doesn't really work.

I know that I need to plan for next semester, but it causes me to worry about things not part of my life right now. Forces me away from the comfort I feel now.

I know change is coming, so I (like any rational person) just want the change to come so I can deal with it.

But it's still distant. And I am still torn.

A Norwegian at the Greek Festival

A few weeks ago my friends and I roadtripped it down to Richmond, VA to see a friend run a marathon. Of course, while she was out there running 26.2 miles, we were stuffing our faces at the Greek festival. [mmmm...]

Since we left really early in the morning, I did my makeup in the car and threw on a hat for the day. Standing in line to receive my decadent spankopita and pork souvlaki, the woman serving mentioned that she liked my hat. It looked very European.

She thought for a moment more and said, "Norway, you look like you're from Norway."

I'm not sure all my relatives can boast such a striking Norwegian resemblance as to elicit comments from total strangers (this has happened more than once), but I certainly do my part.

My ancestors would be proud.

For a little laugh

http://www.bestofthe2000s.com/creative1.html

Watch "Swear Jar." I almost fell off my chair it's so funny.

My new obsession

iMovie.

I can't get enough.

My op-ed about gun control

Being in Washington you get used to disagreeing with people. This is one issue that makes complete sense to me and I am perfectly fine disagreeing with whomever wishes to disagree.

http://universe.byu.edu/node/4151

IT'S HERE

The Swine Flu has arrived at the Barlow Center. The nerve.

So far it's two doors down from my apartment and isn't allowed to come out for a week. But it's only a matter of time.

Meanwhile, every fifteen minutes I attack light switches, door knobs, and people with my Lysol wipes.

I will never surrender! I will defeat this yet!

Leaf peeping at the Shenendoah with the Summerhays

A few weeks ago, Steph, Jake and I drove up to Shenendoah National Park for the afternoon to see the fall foliage. The fact that Stephanie and Jake have a car now, combined with my desire to go "leaf-peeping" (and having my life practically threatened by my native-Virginian friend), made a trip inevitable.

We had many adventures, including red-knuckle driving through pouring rain and wall-like fog. But ultimately, the colors (as you can see below) were definitely worth it.

Issue of the week

Gun control has been bumping around my head recently in light of the recent shootings and two Second Amendment briefings we had on Friday. Post to come.

Wastebasket Writing

This week at work, I got the chance to write our weekly editorial-style article called the "Wastebasket." It was really fun, mildly stressful, and an overall good experience. I think my bosses were pleased with my work. Just so you know, it's not a white paper, it's not a scholastic essay (although I do have reliable sources), it's a snarky editorial. So don't be surprised if it's slightly (read: heavily) stilted.

(You can link to the website here. The Wastebasket is on the right side, and the related factsheet that I also spent a lot of time on is in the center section called, "The Amazing Waste: Hydrogen Fuel Cell Funding" Also, if you feel like commenting on anything relating to me, please do so on my blog, not on the website.)

Trivia about Lynne

Thanks to my Gabrielsen genes, every Sunday night I have a mini-panic attack about going back to work/school.

Lucy and Ethel went to D.C.... in the rain.

My mom, my aunt, and my cousin came out to visit me in D.C. a little over a week ago. They happened to bring with them rain, sleet, wind and temperatures in the forties. Let's see, humidity + wind chill + temps in the 40s = DANG COLD.

We had many adventures and ended up losing/breaking/demagnetizing two umbrellas, a camera, two metro cards, and quite nearly our sanity.

But it was really great to see my family and show them around the city I love, even if it was colder than spit.

In the Capitol rotunda. Dayna inspecting her camera after a mishap with...dropping it on the floor.

Good ol' Brigham Young

The cool little train-ish thing we got to take under the Capitol. (We didn't want to walk outside, it was cold and wet!)

Trying to manage umbrellas, cameras, blankets in the wind and rain.

Confession: HSM

There I said it. It's out in the open. I like the High School Musical (HSM) movies.

No, you don't understand. I really like the HSM movies.

I like the energy, I like the dancing, I like the music, I like the cheesy jokes, I like the you-are-not-locked-into-your-stereotype theme, I like that it's fun, and I think Zac Efron* is dreamy.

For those of you scoffing right now, my defense is this:

• There are worse things to be obsessed with (e.g. Halo, Facebook, RPGs).

• High school IS overly dramatic, cheesy, contrived, fun and ridiculous, remember?

• If I lived my life solely to please others( i.e. pretend not to like HSM as much as I really do), I would deprive the world of the many refreshing quirks in my personality.

*For the record, Zac Efron is older than me.

Even I'm flabbergasted

I have 167.5 credits at BYU.

I still have three semesters left.

HOLY. COW.

On looking Scandinavian

A few weeks ago someone asked me where my family was from. After replying that I grew up in Utah, he asked where my ancestors were from. I told him my dad's side comes from Norway. He looked pleased and started nodding, "ah, that's where the eyes are from."

I was surprised by our conversation because I don't look tremendously like anyone in my family. How could I look like my great-grandpa was born in Norway?

Then, after weeks of arranging schedules and one random run-in on the metro, I found (or rather, re-found) a cousin who proved that I wasn't adopted from Norway and shipped to the U.S. as a child.

Ahem. I present to you--the nebulous, expansive internet--Jenna and Lynne, the floaters in the Gabrielsen gene pool:

Ice cream in Annapolis (bless the person who invented chocolate fudge)

Okay, I'm not related to this guy, but I was drawn to him all the same...

In front of the Nited States Aval Academy.

The little things

It's official: the starbursts (tropical, of course) that I keep at work have gone stale.

This is great news because it means I didn't consume the entire bag in 48 hours, like I did with my last candy purchase (mini-heath bars).

It's the little things in life that make you happy.

My favorite street performers

Like most big cities, D.C. has a few street performers. Some play jazz on a trumpet or saxophone with a back track, one guy plays his steel drum, and as you saw in a previous post, some play crystal glasses.

But these guys are my favorite. Everytime I come across them, I want to buy their album, but I never have any cash!

At least this time I had a camera. Here is a glimpse of their genius.

Older men hit on younger women here. And it's weird.

For your enjoyment, an anecdote to illustrate my small-town, Utah naivety:

It was my second week in D.C. I had just gone to my first hearing on the Hill and was riding home on the metro. I was wearing a fantastic suit from Calvin Klein and carrying my laptop, so I imagine I looked a few years older than 21.

I stood up because my stop was coming up, and as I did so, a man stood up to give me something. At first I thought he was just being nice and trying to give me his old metro pass, because he said, "I think you should take this." He had a weird look on his face. Enough to make me wonder if he was all the way "there" mentally, even though he looked well enough put together.

I realized that he was handing me a business card, not a metro pass.

I stupidly said something like, "are you sure don't need this?"

He replied, "take it if you ever need a contact in the military". And then smiled a weird smile. Yep, I thought, lost his marbles.

As I was riding the escalator up to the surface, staring at this business card, "Dept. of Defense, Saudi Arabia Program Director," I realized what had just happened and gasped out loud.

And then I laughed, because it's not every day that I get hit on by a military officer in his 40s.

Superman: Ride of Steel

At our half-priced, frightmares, Six Flags extravaganza on Saturday, my favorite ride was "Superman: Ride of Steel."

The only thing that was more unsettling than the sharp drops and completely horizontal loop-de-loops is the fact that the rollercoaster kept breaking down. Not what you want to hear whilst cheating death at 50 mph.

Oh, and the only thing cooler than this ride? Riding this ride at night! Zooming along the track with the g-forces pushing at your head and the wind pushing tears out of your eyes in the pitch black is like Space Mountain on steroids.


Needless to say, we went four times.

I also enjoyed "Batwing," a roller coaster where you are lying down and flying face down along the track.




It was AWESOME.

I was disappointed not to see a Spiderman ride, but Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne were definitely good to us at Six Flags America.

I met Jim Matheson

It was a Tuesday.

I sat there in a white plastic chair shivering in the Great Room of the Barlow Center. I did have on a pink cardigan, but every time I best the air conditioning machine by wearing appropriate clothing it has to show me up and turn itself a few degrees colder.

But nevermind, I looked around the crowded room. You could tell most people were students and you could tell most people were LDS. The few who didn't fit the mold were probably also people of religion, come to hear a Congressman discuss how his faith affects his public service.

The Congressman was late, as he was voting in the Capitol building moments before arriving.

He flashed a 100-watt, billboard-quality smile at everyone in the room and sat down in the front.

After a prayer, song, intro etc, the Congressman gave about a 20-minute address on the importance of giving back to the community, in whatever capacity possible.

He opened it up for questions. Within five seconds, someone asked him about the role of government in regards to health care. Later on, he would get questions about social issues (someone essentially asked how he could be a democrat and reconcile himself with the Church), gerrymandering, more health care, and the sensational partisanship that pervades elections. Someone even gave him a chance to publicly criticize the Obama administration. (He didn't take it.)

Being a skillful politician, he handled every question well. He answered intelligently, clearly, and with a minimal amount of corny jokes. He avoided the questions he didn't want to answer. He used charming anecdotes to support his points. He gave enlightening responses to the health care questions, expressed his frustration with the extreme talking heads on cable "political" shows, and suggested that we won't see truly moderate candidates (and he feels that most Americans are truly moderate) until state legislatures stop drawing mostly-partisan district lines in order to encourage real competition after the primary.

He seemed to understand that, being a politician, you can't please everyone, and that a lot of the people there walked into the room with their minds made up. He handled even the most provocative questions with grace. As I mentioned before, there were a few bad jokes, but as I've learned, politicians are very good at self-deprecating jokes even when they're yelling ar each other. They wouldn't get anywhere if they lost their marbles every time they disagreed with someone.

After the closing prayer, I aggressively went up to shake his hand and to ask for a picture before anyone else. (And I was the first.)

Being a politician, I knew he would agree.

Note: I didn't feel like this picture was particularly flattering, so I changed it to sepia. Everything looks better in sepia.

At the end of the night, I felt confident that Rep. Matheson was very smart, very articulate, and mostly a good guy.

I hope I can volunteer next fall to help him get re-elected. (Since I can't even vote for him--I'm not in his district!)

"Saying it looked good for a Communist building is like saying, 'you don't sweat much for a chubby girl"

I just got on facebook and saw that one of my most entertaining and engaging professors is retiring in December. I took an honors lit class from Prof. Alan Keele the semester after I got back from Jerusalem. I wish I had written down all of the things he said that made me laugh or that made me think. He is a different "breed" of professor at BYU, but because he is different, he is invaluable. I think BYU's students were lucky to learn from him over the past few decades.

Here are some of the quotes in the facebook group I just joined ("Alan Keele was my professor)

(Btw, there are many more where these came from, but I simply can't remember them! Just imagine every single class full of definitely biased commentary from a center-left professor at an extremely conservative school. It was fun.)

"The only thing [the TA] said that I disagree with is that the papers look pretty good."
"Here the logic slides sideways off the page."
"One time this actually made sense; forget about it now."
"My brother who is a retired religion professor and is suspicious of me gave me his usual lecture…"
"It’s actually a real accident of history that we aren’t all speaking Turkish right now."
"Can you see the problem with damning people to hell for old times?"
"Mormons need to be inoculated against believing the wrong things."
"There’s an infinite number of things you can do wrong in this class."
"My son and I spent two weeks in Spain randomly riding trains from one mosque to another and also admiring the beautiful women."

and my personal favorite...

"Saying it looked good for a communist building is like saying, 'You don't sweat much for a chubby girl.'"

Five Minutes of Fame

Today there was an article in the Washington Post about the database I've been working on at work on and off the past few weeks. Check it out:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/28/AR2009092803862.html

This is cool because I specifically looked up and documented all of the earmark requests and campaign contributions for Senator Cochran, and now it's NEWS! Our office was really buzzing because of the publicity as well. I talked to CNN, Reuters, Huffington Post, NPR, and a few other random reporters. By "talked to" I mean I answered the phone and transferred them to someone who could really talk to them. But it was still cool.

(If the link doesn't work look it up by the title, "Defense Bill, Lauded by White House, Contains Billions in Earmarks" by R. Jeffrey Smith)

Two sayings to help you be brave

"Defeat appears to me preferable to total inaction."
-John Adams

"Go Forward"
-My superman keychain

What I Love About Fasting

Today is Fast Sunday.* Irony of ironies, Fast Sundays are anything but fast, as most of you know. Since we do not eat or drink anything for the equivalent of two meals on Fast Sundays, every minute is unnaturally long. If you listen carefully in church you’ll hear a choir of rumbling stomachs at any given moment in the congregation.

So, in light of the constant thoughts of food and hollow bellies on Fast Sunday, why do we fast? Why do we participate in something borderline masochistic on the first Sunday of every month?

The simple answer is, we weaken our bodies to strengthen our spirits. I love fasting because of (1) the reminder to pay fast offerings, (2) the opportunity to practice physical restraint in the name of something higher, and (3) the symbolic role of Christ as our Nourisher, or the Bread of Life.

Fast Offerings. Fast offerings are donations specifically to the poor or needy of the community. We choose to give the money we would have spend on two meals on Fast Sunday and donate it to the church to distribute locally and internationally. This conscientious sacrifice helps remind us every month that we have enough to give to others. We are testifying that we have enough bounty; we are content.

Fast offerings also recognize the Lord as our ultimate provider. I have food everyday. The fact that I have food and clean water sets me apart from a good portion of humankind. Committing to recognize the bounty in my life—even minimally—is something that turns my mind to those around me.

However, I could also donate money to the needy without fasting. Writing checks is not difficult. But, the personal sacrifice that I make by actually going without food consecrates my heart and mind to my donations. I am not just donating to placate my conscience. I am making a sacrifice right now, by going without food, and in the future, by going without money, to help others.

Mind Over Body. The most significant lesson I learn every month from fasting is that my spirit has power over my body. On Fast Sunday, my body needs food. My body is weakened and naturally inclined to sneaking a dorito or string cheese. However, when I fast, I choose to do so knowingly. I know that my body will be weakened, and I know that I will feel pain. I choose to fast anyway. My body wants to eat, but my mind chooses to overcome that desire. As a human, many of my actions are self-preserving and influenced by bodily needs (I need to sleep to be healthy, exercise and eat well) to keep my strength up. However, fasting reminds me every month that my actions are not controlled by my body. I choose my actions; I am not victim to natural instinct.

This reminder strengthens me. I become more confident in my ability to control and triumph over other weaknesses. If I can pass up a delectable brownie when I am extremely hungry, then I can do anything! It becomes easier to keep the law of chastity. I find myself more willing to exercise and less willing to oversleep.

The Sacrament Symbolism. The only food and water that we ingest during our fast is the bread and water of the Sacrament. Because I’m hungry, I usually try to grab the biggest piece of bread so that my stomach doesn’t howl and gargle as loudly as it can (and sometimes does) during Sacrament meeting. But I also love the symbolism that Christ is truly the Bread of Life and nourishes us always. It is to Him we owe everything. Fasting seems insignificant, compared to His sacrifice for me.


Ultimately, I enjoy fasting, not because I enjoy starving myself (I don’t), but because of the blessings for doing so. I am grateful for the opportunity to fast as a church every month.

*I understand that it might not be Fast Sunday for everyone, but we have stake conference the week after general conference, so there you go.

A look inside the mind of a typical Washingtonian (as observed by me--a reliable witness and diligent student of human behavior)

If you're only on the metro escalator for a minute, you don't notice. But if you're emerging from the depths of the earth where some of the trains operate (cough cough red line cough cough), and you have to entertain yourself to avoid falling asleep before reaching ground level, you notice that your hand is slowly moving away from your body.

And, since it's a new-fangled-moving-staircase escalator machine (and you are still disoriented from the metro ride), it takes you a moment to figure out what the problem is, regardless of how many college degrees you have.

Am I getting an ear infection? Is my sense of balance off? Am I still dizzy from the train and simply imagining my hand is getting away from me? Is my hand self-aware? Audaciously trying to escape from my body in broad daylight, ninja-like?

After staring at your hand for several moments as it continues to stretch away from you, it hits you:

The moving railing of the escalator to get on the metro is moving ever-so-slightly faster than the actual escalator.

Ha! The triumph of a logical solution! Yes! That is the solution to your spatial disorientation for the past 30 seconds! A wave of self-satisfaction washes over you. But, as quickly as it came, another thought hits you:

Why in the world can't the escalator keep up with the handrail?! I mean, I would have been able to think about the mini cilantro dumplings waiting for me at home for at least 30 more seconds...sigh.

How annoying.

Homeless

I did it. I gave in.

There was a man outside Trader Joes selling a newspaper called "Street Sense" for $1. He asked every person if they could spare a dollar for the homeless and when they avoided eye contact or just ignored him completely, he would still say thank you, in a non-bitter way.

So, I gave him a dollar. I had just finished buying food, for goodness' sakes, the least I could do was give a dollar.

Random Observations Concerning Work

• A particularly entertaining earmark I came across at work today..."The Operating Room of the Future"

• I came across an earmark destined for none other than Socorro, New Mexico! Say hi to the $2 mil we sent there, Paul!

• I saw that Hackensack is an actual town in New Jersey! (An unintended consequence: I had "Movin' Out" stuck in my head for three hours.)

• I came across a company called "Moog Inc. - FloTork." You can't make up a more ridiculous name.

• I sat in on a quarterly planning meeting today and figured out how non-profits work: proposals, grants, and results. And the cycle never ends, by the time you find out if you got a grant or not, you have to start writing a proposal to apply for the next year.

• Sometimes we put C-SPAN on in the background at work, and today the woman taking votes sounded just like Katharine Hepburn! It was strangely comforting...

Doing the Washington Walk

People walk quickly here.

Even if you're just walking to the washroom, you need to walk with purpose.

This might be partly because time in transit is time wasted. The sooner you get to your destination the sooner you can get on with your life/your goals/your dreams.

Don't know where you're going? You'd better figure it out, because the people behind you do know where they're going and they are not going to slow up for you.

Random Thoughts About D.C. Not Having to Do with Politics (That would have to be a completely separate post)

• I get motion sick on the Metro sometimes. I don’t know if some of the drivers just really like playing with the brakes, but I get pretty woozy after 20 minutes.

• It would take you twice as long to get anywhere if you strictly follow the pedestrian traffic signals. For those of you who are wary of my moral character for admitting that I jay walk every day, all the time (cough cough Charlie cough cough), let me ‘splain.

If the streets in Salt Lake are laid out like a grid, the streets in D.C. are laid out like a toddler took a crayon and drew a picture of “spaghetti” all over your neat graph paper. The streets in Salt Lake are often four/five lanes and cars are coming from both directions. Here most of the streets I cross are about ten feet wide and only one way. So, rest assured that I never jaywalk across a busy intersection, and rarely across a street that has cars coming from both directions. I have only gotten honked at a few times, and I like to think that was because of my girlish charm, not my reckless, lawless jaywalking.

• The homeless people fascinate and distress me. It’s the ones who don’t beg for money that really seize my heart with a rigid fist until I can turn the corner and distract myself with everyday events. What can I do? We are not encouraged to give to them. And like I said, it’s the ones who don’t even ask for money that I am compelled to help. There is one man in particular, probably about 45 years old that sits on the same street corner 6 out of 7 days. It’s interesting. You’d think he’d sit on a bench, or in a park, but he sits at the same intersection. He sits crosslegged with his white hair sticking straight up and his back to traffic. He never looks unhappy. I rarely see emotion on his face. It’s pretty clear that he has some kind of mental disability. But I wonder what his life is like. What he does all day on his corner. What he sees, where he goes when it gets colder.

• I always seem to get caught walking behind someone who is smoking. It also always seems to happen when the wind blows the smoke right in my face. It’s disgusting. Especially cigars.

• I have to be careful about my typing technique or else I will injure myself. Seriously. I actually type that much. And if I get lazy, my wrists and tendons will start to tingle.

• We played two ridiculous but ridiculously hilarious games at FHE tonight. One called duck fighting and one called ninja war or something like that. I haven’t laughed so hard playing an EFY game in a long time.

• Days go quickly here! No time for frivolities. If you hesitate for a moment, this town will leave you in the dust.

Saturday Sept. 19 or the National Zoo

After a luscious morning of sleeping in, we went to Eastern Market this morning around 10:30.

Eastern Market is a fabulous outdoor market about three blocks east of the Capitol. The normal jewelry, painting, and art booths are there, as well as several West Virginia farm stands with fresh fruit and vegetables. The best part about Eastern Market? The samples. Crisp, fresh fruits, salsas, and hummus out to taste in the beautiful fall morning. I even found fresh figs! (Ever since my roommate Lana gave me some fresh figs last summer, I’ve been looking for them in stores. But, alas, they are exceptionally uncommon. They were obscenely expensive, but worth every dollar.)

I found a good souvenir for myself and a good Christmas present for mom. I would love to go to Eastern Market again.

Heavy laden with our purchases, we wandered down to the Folger Shakespeare Library near the Library of Congress. Not the same as the Folger coffee brand, but the FSL possesses the most comprehensive Shakespeare collection in the world. It IS the Folger that publishes the “Folger Shakespeare Edition” To put it in context, FSL possesses 79 original Shakespeare folios, a collection in England possesses 5. We will try to go back there in October when they present “Much Ado About Nothing” in their old-fashioned theater.

In the afternoon we went to the National Zoo. We saw the pandas (and a baby panda!), some cool reptiles, the cheetahs (my favorite), and a bunch of other animals.

By the time we left the zoo, our legs were definitely sore from cavorting all over the city. We made it home just in time to eat dinner, take a breath, and run downstairs for the BYU game.

You never see pay phones anymore! We took a picture of the archaic relic.

Some beautiful "brain" flowers at Eastern Market

Sep 13-19 or Catching up

Okay. Let's try to review this past week in an organized manner.

Sunday (9/13):We are at church most of the day on Sundays.

And I kind of like it.

I had the luscious opportunity of sleeping without my alarm clock on this morning. I woke up around 8:30 and had a delightful morning until I realized that I was going to be late! I finished my yummy breakfast, hastily finished my hair and ran out of the Barlow to the bus station across the street.

Church was great, dinner was great, and we got to watch the CES fireside with Elaine Dalton. She gave a great talk and I was quite edified.

Monday: Busy, busy, busy. Work and then rush home to cook for dinner group and then rush to FHE to give the lesson and facilitate the game. At 10:30 all of the things I was in charge of--projects at work, dinner, and FHE--were over!

Tuesday: Tuesday was a lot of data basing at work. I had to take breaks from typing so my wrists wouldn’t hurt. Tuesday night my friend Abby asked me to cut her hair. While she has ever reason to trust me personally, she has no reason to trust me cosmetically! But me, being fearless, agreed if she really wanted me to. It looked pretty good, but we have yet to discover if I really did a good job, she hasn’t straightened it yet.

Abby was nervous before she let me at her head with a pair of scissors.

Wednesday: Ten minutes after getting to work, I left for a Natural Resources full committee hearing in the House. Five hours later, I returned.

I will try not to bore you with details about the bill discussed (the CLEAR act, HR 3534), but the Secretary of the Interior, Secretary Salazar testified, so it was a big deal. The hearing was PACKED. Even the overflow room was like Disneyland during spring break.

Sidenote: I ran into one of my friends from the Barlow Center who is interning with Rep. Chaffetz! I got to sit with my friend John during the hearing and it was good to see a familiar face on the Hill.

Probably the most notable thing that happened during the hearing was Sec. Salazar’s announcement of the end of the Royalty-In-Kind (RIK) program. TCS has opposed this program for awhile, and we were thrilled when he announced the end. You can see what we wrote about it here and here. Basically, it’s a program where oil/gas companies can make royalty payments in oil/gas rather than cash, so they play the market and give the U.S. oil/gas when prices are low and delay when prices are high. As a result, taxpayers are out millions of dollars that are rightfully theirs.

I guess another notable thing is that Rep. Bishop (R-UT) literally yelled at the Secretary for not being transparent enough. Salazar joked about his passion, but I'm surprised Bishop didn't have a heart attack.

At around 12:30 the hearing went to recess until 1:00 and I went downstairs to get some lunch at the cafeteria. Who would have imagined the wonders I found in the basement of the Longworth House building! First, the cafeteria was packed and amazing! (What isn't packed on Capitol hill?) You could get anything there and it all looked good! Since it was crowded to the gills, and I thought I’d get weird stares if I actually tried to decide what I wanted by looking around and figuring out the system, I just grabbed the first packaged thing that looked good and went outside (where I had room to breathe) to eat it.

A LOT of people work in the Longworth building. Also, downstairs I found a coffee shop, a creamery (for ice cream), an office supplies store, and the special private Subway track that runs between the Capitol and the Senate and House buildings. It’s a great idea because if you had to walk from the House to the Senate, it could take you awhile. I bet if I had walked around a little bit more I would have found a dry cleaner and an amusement park as well.

Thursday: Another hearing at work and then tons of homework and reading when I got home. Since I had put off my homework all week (in favor of much more fulfilling pursuits: talking to friends, writing in my journal, reading the news, going to bed early), and I finally paid the price. I had to stay up until two to finish a paper for class.

Friday: We had two great briefings. One by some BYU alums working for the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) and one by Bart Marcois, the president of the Eagle foundation. Both were engaging, thought-provoking briefings, but you'll have to ask me about them if you're interested because this post is already long enough.

However, after Mr. Marcois' presentation I did decide that I watch too much television/movies. I really don't watch that much, but there is so much more to do!

After changing out of our business attire, we hopped on the metro and went to the Old Town area in Alexandria. It was beautiful! We went on a walking tour, window shopped, grabbed dinner (Thai food---yummy!) and ice cream (cherry vanilla with chocolate syrup), and got back on the Metro.

We went to the Air Force and Pentagon memorials on the way home. Beautiful architecture, especially at night.

Reposing on an ancient park bench in Alexandria. Okay, so the bench probably isn't ancient, but it was next to the older house in Alexandria, so it was pretty old by association.

I am reading the tour book that led us on a walking tour of old town!

The tree lined streets of Alexandria are very beautiful.

Looking into the window of the church where George Washington's funeral was held. (Everything closes at five here.)

A common sight for me, but not so common for you! Abby taking Rachel's picture in front of a classic southern-style mansion/house.

Abby taking my picture in front of a classic southern-style mansion/house. (But you can tell it's southern simply by my damsel-in-distress, Scarlet O'Hara pose.)

Most of the girls who went to Alexandria (a few were shopping down the road)

Waiting for the Metro.

I didn't know she took this picture, but it's candid, so I like it.

At the Air Force memorial. It is hard to pose with artistic concrete.

Lynne and Abby tired after a really long day of walking many places.

An AMAZING guy we saw playing crystal glasses in Alexandria! He is very very good. I got his business card, just in case I ever need a man who places crystal glasses.

Second day in Philly or Sep. 12

We left Valley Forge pretty early and got to Philadelphia before nine. We went over to see the Liberty Bell first of all. It was okay. Mostly just a bell with a crack in it.

We toured the Constitution Center, a new multi-media museum in Philly that is AWESOME. My only complaint is that they didn’t let us take pictures (if we wanted a picture taking the oath of office, you had to pay for it. Lame.) There were videos, touch screens, audio telephones, and many other things chronicling the history of the constitution and how it applies to us individually and as a people. It was very well done. I imagine that more new museums will be structured like this in the future in order to satisfy the A.D.D. video game generation too restless to read paragraphs on the wall.

We toured Independence hall next, the building where they signed the Declaration of Independence and wrote the Constitution. It was cool to see the building even though the only thing that was original is Washington’s famous chair with a “rising sun” on it. And the fact that National Treasure filmed a bunch of scenes there. Our tour guide looked like Benjamin Franklin, but told us that he actually impersonates John Adams. (Apparently there are a lot of Ben Franklin impersonators in Philly. Whoda thunk?)

Then we had a few hours of free time. We went to go get real Philly cheesesteaks at a place called “Jim’s.” We heard that really Philadelphians had their steaks with steaming hot Cheese Whiz instead of slices. Being fearless, I accepted the challenge. It was very good and greasy. See the picture below.

We wandered back and see a few other historical sites. Benjamin Franklin’s grave, the tomb of the unknown soldier of the American Revolution, the old town hall, and the first house of the Supreme Court. We went back to the visitors’ center and leisurely perused the gift shops (something that was actually very refreshing).

As I was ordering a yogurt parfait with fresh raspberries to keep my blood sugar up, (I had almost fallen asleep in the History Channel documentary we went to.) I heard a woman scream behind me. I turned around just in time to see a large black woman face plant on the cement floor and start seizing. She was with a group and it sounded like she has had seizures before, but it was still chaos for a few minutes. I decided to stay out of it. I told the clerk behind the desk to call 9-1-1 and in about four minutes the paramedics were there and she had relaxed a little. I won’t forget the sound of her hitting the floor. The most terrifying part of the whole thing was how powerless and shocked everyone was. It took a second for everyone to figure out what to do. At first we just watched her, and then realized that we needed to help. The question was, how? What is there to do, but call for help and wait for them to come. She already had people around her, holding her on her side, and people directing traffic away. I felt a responsibility, but I also felt that sticking around would have been less helpful. So I left.

After a great, greasy pizza dinner, we got on the bus and our professor’s nine-year-old son announced the movie we would be watching on the ride home with an acre-long grin on his face: “National Treasure.” The bus exploded! We have all been aching to see National Treasure since we got here. N. Cage cavorts all around D.C. and Philadelphia and we have been almost everywhere he goes! We saw independence hall and the liberty bell today, but it was almost cooler to see them on the movie again! Because we’d just been there!

Independence Hall. The building in which they (the founding fathers) signed the Declaration of Independence and wrote the Constitution.

Ind. Hall after messing on my computer.

Abby and I in front of the great American symbol of freedom, the Liberty Bell.

This picture is hilarious, so I left it in. Scroll down to see what it was supposed to look like.

Chatting with the lifesize statues of members of the Constitutional Convention.

Waiting to go into Independence hall. (l-r Mark Williams, Prof. Goodliffe, Elder Ellsworth)

Prof. Goodliffe's adorable son, Ben. He was sharing all of his goldfish with the starving college students.

These two college students decided to reward Ben for being so generous. They ate their goldfish like synchronized raptors/dinosaurs. Ben loved it.

Our tour guide who looked like Benjamin Franklin but actually impersonates John Adams.

In the room where the Constitution was written.

Sepia version of sitting-on-a-bench-in-the-building-where-the-Supreme-Court-first-met

My genuine Philly Whizsteak

My traveling buddies. (l-r Rachel, Jennifer, Leslie, Abby)