Carlsbad, NM

Carlsbad, NM

Monday, July 18, 2011

Day 2
















First of all, props to my buddy Jeff Poynter. Back in Lawrenceville he outdid any of our good deeds today by changing a lady's tire in a grocery store parking lot. Way to go Jeffrey.

Early today we visited Natural Bridge in Virginia - a huge arch over 200 feet high designed and built by God eons ago. We walked around the area and stumbled upon an Indian village with pale faces acting the parts of Indians. One guy who I really think wishes he was an Indian demonstrated how to start a fire. Chief Wannabe did a good job and got it going pretty quickly. Next we visited "Foamhenge." This is an exact replica of Stonehenge but made out of foam. Last summer we saw "Carhenge" and now "Foamhenge." How many more "'henges" are there out there? We then drove approximately 30 miles on Skyline Drive until we got to the northern end. This road is an extension of the Blue Ridge Parkway and has awesome overlooks that look out on the Shenandoah Valley. We tried singing the Shenandoah song, but usually only got to "Oh Shenandoah." Anyone who knows the rest, feel free to send it to us. From there we drove an hour to Washington D.C. because Pee Wee's high school friend and teammate, Mark Laney, is a Lt. Colonel in the Army and works at the Pentagon. He treated us to an amazing one hour tour inside and outside of the Pentagon. It's huge! It has 6 zip codes - I'm not kidding! We visited the 9/11 Chapel and Memorial that pays tribute to all of those who were tragically killed in the terrorist action ten years ago. We weren't the only ones with lumps in our throats.

As far as good deeds, we haven't done any major ones, but we're plodding along. Pee Wee made me jealous this morning when he did one on his own and he was rewarded. I was loading the car in the hotel parking lot and he was at the entrance to the hotel. He noticed how someone had dropped what looked like their breakfast on the ground, so he took a minute to clean up the trash and some hard boiled eggs. The hotel manager saw him do it and she gave him some nice pens and put his name up as "Guest of the Day." He thinks he's hot stuff now. That's OK - he uses one of those mesh pouf sponges in the shower and he has a pink camera.
Then when we were driving on Skyline Road, we were held up for several minutes by a road crew. The guy holding the STOP sign was bored, tired, and looked like this might be his last day on the job. When we were finally allowed to proceed, we gave him a juice box from our cooler, a Good Deed Doers card, and a very brief pep talk. His demeanor in the rear view mirror looked a lot better - maybe temporarily but that's better than where he was.
Our third good deed may be debatable to some, but we're counting it. After Pee Wee's friend took us on our tour of the Pentagon, we insisted that he allow us to treat him to dinner. We explained that this was not as much a repayment for his being our tour guide as his willingness to serve our country. He's expecting to be in Afghanistan soon and we just wanted to show him our appreciation.
That's it for Day Two - we're thinking of checking out Gettysburg tomorrow morning. Good night.

5 comments:

Jim Gassman said...

Monica says men who use lufas are cool.

Aunt Kathy said...

Here's a link with a very nice A cappella rendition of "Oh Shenandoah" and video to go with it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etC59HVD-tg

I don't see any lufas in the video :)

Ethan West said...

I knew my pink camera would get you in trouble Steve! ;-)

Teresa said...

I was on MY Facebook so how did Ethan's name show up on MY comment. The pink camera is MINE!!! LOL

Ethan West said...

Because I was still signed in to my blog