The anniversary week trip started on Thursday morning when we got to Midway at about 6:30 am. Traffic was a breeze that early in the morning until the last two miles before the Cicero Avenue exit off of I-55. We were the second and third people to check in for the flight (I checked in online on Wednesday morning)…and we were the first two people onto the plane. We took the front row and there were only about 40 people on our flight so it was not crowded at all. We flew into Washington D.C. in order to save $100 a piece on the tickets. We could then spend the afternoon sight seeing in the nation’s capitol and then drive down to Virginia Beach.

We landed at Washington Dulles about 20 minutes early so it was about 10:30 am eastern time. We were the first off the plane and it took forever to get through the airport. We grabbed some food at Subway inside the airport and then caught the shuttle to the rental car place. We then took off to go across Washington DC (25 miles) to get to the Smithsonian museums and the government buildings. There is only street parking and it is hard to come by but after about 20 minutes we finally find a spot and it had a 3 hour limit on it for us to sight see.

After walking around the Capitol Building, we decided to start heading towards to White House. We ran out of time and decided that we would just dunk into the national art museum that we passed. Here is what constitutes as CONTEMPORARY ART. This is complete and total bullshit that a fcking 2 year old with down syndrome could pull off. How in the fck can any of this shit be considered art? Please someone try to explain it to me but be prepared for me to call you full of shit and in serious need of mental help to come back to reality.

Yes that is just a fricking sink at a 45 degree angle on the wall. That is art worthy of being in a national museum. Damn lucky it was free admission or I would have had to take it out on someone’s ass to get my money back.

Yep…a board painted white on a white wall…your eyes aren’t deceiving you. Yes my dad who has been dead for almost 12 years now could do that…today.

Yep that is 5 different displays in the contemporary art portion of the national art museum and it took a man with an IQ of 2 a total of 3 minutes to finish all 5 pieces.

Thankfully we left and decided that we had nowhere near enough time to walk the rest of the way to the White House so we started back towards the car and started walking towards the Washington Monument.

We came across a sculpture garden and I took a quick pic.

We then saw the headquarters for the Department of Agriculture which is the government agency that Stacy’s dad works for here in Morris. She had to get a picture.

We then continued to the end of the sidewalk and I took this picture. It is debatable as to which is the bigger dick in the picture.

We go back to the car and start heading towards Virginia Beach. Traffic absolutely sucked ass in Virginia as NO ONE in Virginia had any clue on how to merge. It is a difficult thing to do I know. The people responsible for creating that contemporary art surely couldn’t merge either while driving. We get delayed so much that we go ahead and stop in Colonial Williamsburg for supper and eat at an Italian restaurant that was just awesome. The best part of it though was this animal in the parking lot. It looked like a cross between a turkey and a duck. It had a duck bill and body but the head had the red scaley stuff that a turkey’s head has. I couldn’t get a good picture of it but trust me it exists…there was about 7 of them in the parking lot walking around. This was the best that I could get chasing them around the lot:

We then finished the drive to Virginia Beach. It was late when we got to the Holiday Inn Sunspree on the beach and we basically just went to bed as soon as we got into the room.

Here is the view we had from our balcony:

I told Maniwa that I would try to get pictures of hot girls holding a sign saying happy birthday to him and who hotter than Stacy to be the first picture:

All the women on the beach had guys with them and well we didn’t want to start trouble by going up to them and asking to take a picture so Maniwa has to settle for this as the other hot person holding the sign for him:

We woke up and immediately went to the beach…well after I took those above photos. I went into the ocean ladies and gentlemen. There will be rumors that I was scared to death and that I went running for higher land the first time that the water brushed my feet but I will deny those allegations. There is also no truth to the rumors that from the safety of higher ground I kept yelling at Stacy to stop bending down in the water and to be careful not to be swept out to sea and lost forever. I will go to my grave denying those claims. I will also deny that it took being made fun of for 10 minutes because there was a 5 year old body surfing and having a great time by us. I will just say the proof is in the picture…I was in the ocean and pay no attention to the stress on my face:

I did eventually even take off the shirt and bodysurf myself and I must say…I wish I was back on the beach and doing that some more.

We then were going to grab some lunch and drive to North Carolina (25 miles) so I could add another state to my list of places I’ve been. We went to the 7-11 across the street from the hotel first and I asked the cashier if they accepted seashells as a form of currency since we found 2 mini ones on the beach. Stacy read me the riot act for being so lame and I assured her that it was original and comedy gold. The cashier then said that I was the first person to use that line…that day. Grrrrrrrr. We then went to this great place to eat…Beach Bully BBQ. We come out of the restaurant and see this:

Damn flat tire. We called the car rental place and they sent out Triple A to put on the donut (hey I’m not getting my hands filthy on vacation.) We then had to take it to a local Hertz and trade rental cars. Toyota Corolla for Toyota Corolla. We decide to delay the trip to North Carolina and go back to the beach. We walk the strip and get approached by a time share guy. We agree to go to the presentation and get a bunch of free stuff. We eat dinner at a seafood place and walk back to the hotel and go to bed early again.

We get up on Saturday morning and head to North Carolina. First we stop at the 7-11 and get something to drink for the drive to NC. The cashier says “are you going to be paying with seashells again sir?” and Stacy laughs at me for 5 minutes. We then make the drive to North Carolina.

We get back and go on the time share presentation. It lasts about 90 minutes and they are going over the price for the time share unit. $25,000 and ask if the payment plan ($3000 down and $400 a month for 5 years or something like that) is something we would do. The appointment had to be in Stacy’s name since we were not married and didn’t live together because as the guy signing people up on the street said “Single guys would sleep in a broom closet to save money on a vacation.” So Stacy says it is too much for her budget so like a car salesman the guy goes to talk to his manager and the manager comes over to talk to us. He asks Stacy what it would take to get her to decide yes. Stacy tells him that she would have to go home and “consult the Council of Cats (her two cats Imy & Blackey would have to say it was ok).” The manager looks at her like she had a deformity on her face and said “I have never heard that in 11 years of doing this job” and gets up and just walks away. So there you have it ladies and gents…just say that you have a Council of Cats that makes your decisions for you and telemarketers, time share salesmen and other annoying people will run for cover to get away from such a lunatic and leave you alone. They give us our $50 in free dinner coupon that can be used at a few restaurants on the strip and the coupon for 3 days/2 nights at one of their 5 star resorts anywhere in the US at a price of $50 if we use it by May and we go on our way.

We decide to go on a dolphin watching cruise on our anniversary night. 90 minute cruise on the Atlantic Ocean for $16 a person. Not a bad deal. We didn’t see many dolphins and the ones we did see didn’t really do anything but it was such a great time just cruising in the ocean.

We walked from the marina to the RockFish restaurant to use our dinner coupon. It is a restaurant that has a ton of Beatles memorbilia and plays their songs. It was a pretty good little restaurant but we sat outside on the patio due to how long the wait was. The catch to sitting outside…a windstorm was raging and it was 25-35 MPH winds outside so there were only a few of us outside! So yes ladies and gentlemen, I went to a time share presentation in order to have a free dinner on my 1 year anniversary with Stacy. That’s how I roll.

The beach strip was so damn packed that the trolley’s were full and not running properly. We had to walk the 35 blocks back to the hotel at the end of the night and that left us with 5 hours to sleep before having to wake up for Stacy to participate in the Rock N Roll Half Marathon (13.1 miles)…again after having walked 35 blocks to get back to the hotel.

Here are a couple of pictures of Stacy from the Half Marathon. Here she is at the 8 mile mark:

While waiting at the 8 mile mark (I walked 2 miles to get there and hand her Propel water to help her finish the race), I saw a man dressed as Elvis, a band of Super Heroes, a man dressed in a SpongeBob Squarepants outfit and 3 guys dressed as Geico Cavemen race past. It was definitely entertaining.

Here is Stacy crossing the finish line:

Here is Stacy right after receiving her medal for finishing in the allotted time.

I am going to finish this blog by bragging on my girlfriend. She has overcome leukemia and gotten herself into good enough shape that she can do a half marathon. She even beat 1000 people that finished the marathon. I couldn’t do that and I don’t have cancer. This was Stacy’s second half marathon and it seemed to be a lot of fun. The Rock N Roll group do half marathons in Nashville, Philadelphia, Virginia Beach, Phoenix and San Jose, CA every year. Stacy has done the VA Beach and Nashville one. She is going to do one at Disney over her birthday in January. I am going to have a goal to try to get myself motivated enough to do one of these things. You can walk it which is what I would do and you have 4 hours to finish. Stacy finishes in 3 hours and 28 minutes. That might be one of the things I shoot for in 2008…stop being a fat lazy bitch and join my girlfriend on one of these walks…hell just watching the other 20,000 people in these things would be entertaining with the ones that are dressed up in costumes.

That concludes my writeup on my anniversary trip to Virginia Beach. It took me an hour and a half to type all this stuff up so someone better comment on it.

Good Day.

P.S. – here is my map of states visited. I’m up to 27 states and D.C.