VA day TWO

VA Day TWO!! I woke up in Reston,VA at Rob and Erin's and realized that I did not have any pantyhose. I am the kind of girl that likes to wear skirts and dresses no matter WHAT the weather is 17 degrees in Lewiston,Utah and I am wearing a skirt:) So Erin, Emily and I decieded to walk to the Safeway ( a grocery store that my dad retired from that is in that part of the US) The cool thing about Reston,VA is that the town was entirely designed and planned and one of the things that they planned is tons of walking trails in well the "woods" so we leave Erin's apartment and from the parking lot just like that are deeeep in the woods of Reston on a trail. I think that Spike would REALLY enjoy these trails a lot :)... I need to go have tithing settlement soon which means Spike's walk today is going to be in the dark... brrr...So Erin and I are walking on this trail and I was like these trails are SO COOL I mean EVERYONE in Reston should use these trails! she said that some people consider them unsafe and that some people will not even let their wives go on those trails. I did not see anything that I thought was unsafe and this is one of the reasons I got Little Boy Spike people are a LOT less likely to mess with you if you have a large dog with you that may or may not be nice but WILL jump on you if given half the chance.. The other interesting thing about these trails are that in VA there are houses EVERYWHERE like we are in what seems like a wooded area but if you look up you will see we are really just in the back of a townhouse neighborhood.. or someones yard... something like that..here in Utah places like that are NO WHERE near houses. It was harder to take pictures in VA because so many times there would be someones living space in the back of my picture! or cars goin by ! or well just tons of people... BUT don't get me wrong I really liked walking on that trail in Reston the picture above is one of Erin kissing Emily on the trail :)... Safeway is a huge grocery store. I am not used to huge grocery stores. I am also not used to a whole AISLE of wine....wow...back on the trail, I talked to everyone that had a dog and I noticed that most people there have mixed breed or shelter dogs. Spike may be one of the only full Labs there where here he is one of many..

That night I went out to eat in Washington DC at a place called Oyumel. My friend Dave found this place on the Travel channel and really wanted to go. Dave and his wife Crista and children Morgan age 6 and Hunter age 2 picked me up at Rob and Erin's and we drove to the Vienna Metro station. We took the orange line to metro center then the red line to Gallery Place/Chinatown. It was so amazing to be in Washington DC at night all those big buildings and bright signs. We walked down the street which was very full of people, it was Friday night and there was a Washington Capitals game at the Verizon Center. We passed a few homeless people including one that was sleeping in the door way of a building he or she was all the way covered with some of that stuff that goes in between carpet and the floor... there was another guy out there with a sign and a couple of kids and he was like I NEED MONEY I GOT KIDS! When we got to the restaraunt it was packed. They said they could sit us in a booth if we did not mind being squished. I thought that it was a regular sized booth and did not feel squished at all...but then again only Morgan was on my side.

The menu was very interesting they had beef tounge taco's which Dave tryed- I almost wrote on my FB the next day that Dave had got tounge but I did not think that sounded right so I did not.I was to scared to try that or the goat... I mean I like goat cheese all right but I just thought of all the goats around here and taking Spike on walks with Walter and Kellie's goats and Mitch's goats and well I was just not ready to eat goat. They also had crickets on the menu. I did not get those because to my knowledge Dave had not unknowinly cast us in a reality show like wait crickets? you mean people in America eat those that are NOT part of reality shows who knew?? I did get the baby pig... because well um I eat pork all the time and well um yeah... it was VERY TASTY!:) We also had a lady make avocado at our table and even though Dave and I said we were the only people that were going to eat it and both of us said we did not mind how spicy it was, Dave even said that he liked it so spicy that his nose ran. She did not put the peppers in she let us do that. She also made it in what looked like a HUGE BOWL when in reality it did not have that much BOWL space...I don't know what I expected though because she only had two avocados and anyone knows that you can not make much guacamole with two avocados.

I must have drank 4 or 5 cups of water and Sprite while I was in there because I had to go to the bathroom twice while I was there and then when we got to the Metro I had to go again and I mean I had to GO... like I could not wait until I got back to Vienna and for Dave to find somewhere in Vienna I had to GO then. I was able to last while we waited for the metro at Gallery Place/Chinatown. there were a TON of people there because the hockey game had just let out and the metro was running less because it was later in the night Dave walked down to a big group of people and we found out they were getting in a fight. It took awhile for the police to come so they just stood there and screamed at each other while their friends held them back. This one guy was like " HOLD ME BACK! HOLD ME BACK!" I knew then that I had lived in a small town for a long time because I thought I was in the middle of a Law and Order episode or something like I was seriously WORRIED that someone was going to pull out a gun and just start shooting BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT HAPPENS ON TV!!! and I was like um where is Elliot and Olivia??? or Lupo and Bernard?? where is someone because we got Dave's KIDS here...but all was well it was just some drunk hockey fans getting in a fight. We finally got on the metro and took it to Metro center where I could not hold it anymore. Crista, Morgan and I went upstairs and outside to found somewhere to go to the bathroom. We found a very nice hotel that did not notice that we used their bathroom and wow I felt SO MUCH BETTER. When we got back we realized we had been gone longer than twenty minutes so we had missed our train to Vienna. so we had to wait another twenty minutes for another one. Dave pointed out that there was something on the computerized moniter that said the red line was running slow because someone fell onto the tracks at some station. Dave was like maybe that is why it took the police so long to get to that fight.

We finally got on a train headed to Vienna, VA there was a drunk guy that was sitting across from me and since I had been playing peek a boo with Hunter he asked me if Hunter was my son I said no he is her son and pointed to Crista. He asked if we were sisters and said that Crista looked so young that she must have been fifteen when she had Hunter. He asked how we knew each other and I said I dated Dave in HS and he was like WHAT and you are OK that you are all out here together. I said that was in the EARLY 90's! I said I dont even KNOW who I am going to marry but I certainly do not care what he did in the early 90's! HECK I don't even care what he did in the early 2000's. hahahah. The man asked me how old I was and I said I was 35. He was like did you graduate in 1993? I said that I did and he was like NO WAY I AM 35 and I GRADUATED in 1993.. Like YOU DONT SAY... that is freakin AMAZING... WOW... he then asked where I lived and I said Utah and he was like wait? are you a Mormon? I said I sure am and I thought OH NO PLEASE DO NOT THINK ME AND DAVE AND CRISTA ARE POLYGAMISTS PLEASE!!!! and he then went on to tell me that Mormons' should not drink caffiene because it is a stimulant and he met a Mormon once that said we don't drink caffiene because it is a stimulant. I said Mormon's can drink caffiene if they want but I don't. He was like NO YOU CANT DRINK THAT IT IS A STIMULANT... then he forgot all about what he was asking me about and asked me how old I was and when I graduated HS and you are NEVER GOING TO BELIEVE THIS : He is the SAME AGE AS ME and graduated the SAME YEAR AS ME! ...

there was also a drunk guy that almost fell into a bunch of people he waved his arms like a windmill and said whoa whoa whoa whoa and some people caught him and he was OK. The drunk guy by us talked to Crista about the Capitals game and other stuff then asked me how old I was and when I graduated HS ... and crazy thing is he is as old as me and graduated the same year as me... crazy how that works out...

after he got off another guy said he knew about Utah because there are a lot of ski resorts here and that he had been to Park City. I have never really had people talk to me about ski resorts before but hey I have not been home in the winter for a long time. so I guess winter sports are on peoples minds at this time of year

we got back to Vienna and saw a sign that said the "issue" as in someone falling into the red line train had been cleared up.. we have no idea what that meant..and Dave took me back to Reston. I got in at about 2:30 or 3Am which basically became my bedtime the whole time I was in VA.

IT WAS A GREAT DAY! I love going to cool restaraunts and just doing stuff like I did on this day spending time with wonderful people like Erin and Emily and Dave a Crista and the kids.

I am so grateful that I was able to spend such quality time that day with Erin and Emily. I seem to spend so much of my time in VA traveling from one place to another or at tourist attractions that I have not had much quality time with people and this trip I had a lot...in fact I even had some quality time I was not expecting... what a great blessing!

I am also glad that I got to meet Dave's wife and kids. His wife is very nice and very pretty and his kids are VERY CUTE and VERY WELL BEHAVED!!!!! SUCH GOOD LITLE KIDS!

made me want to move back and spend more time with those awesome families! :)

PS it is 14 degrees here now and I did take Spike on a walk in the dark:)