The kids are going with the estranged, who doesnt have the great judgement in the best of times, to do monument visits in DC.
So aside from the minor detail of it being over 100 degrees, (Good Grief!) how is it in DC? Power in the city? All the little angels being good?
Please tell.
Soup
What are you talking about?
Today was better than yesterday. More gas stations open, fewer lines, both at the gas stations and the grocery stores. Fewer blocked roads. But the power is still off (I type this with deep gratitude to my 20KW standby generator, but it still costs about $150 in propane per day to run, ouch.). Lots of places are still closed. It's still a little dicey to get around.
But tomorrow will be better than today.
In the meantime, on tour in DC in July is, as others have noted, brutal. Lots and lots of crowds. In recent years, the percentage of foreigners visiting our fair capital at this time of year has risen dramatically. Folks from certain cultures can be a bit more aggressive with their crowd behavior than that to which many of us are accustomed.
The weather will add to this the first part of this week - temperatures in the 90s and 30% chance of thunderstorms. Which means, it will be thunderstorming somewhere in the DC area pretty much throughout the day.
The addition of having lots of places without power doesn't improve the situation.
sitetest
Those monuments are there to promote pagan idolatry of THE STATE. They're not the American ideal. They're Roman. Borderline blasphemous. And some of them (not the new crap) are indeed, awe-inspiring. I'd be more worried about that sticking with the kids than I would the weather or Metro mishaps.
The Smithsonian is cool. And the Nats are home and awesome.
I guess that depends on whether the Estranged has tickets to fly out of Washington DC to an unknown destination.
As long as they are just going to see the monuments and tourist areas.
Not much helpful info ... is this a day trip? Or will they be in DC for a few days, staying at a hotel? There are many really nice hotels, but a number of ‘fleabags’ too, and those are not well located.
If they stay close to the Mall and tourist areas, they should be fine. The monuments themselves aren’t AC’d, most are just outdoors.
I imagine all the Smithsonian buildings that line the Mall have had their AC restored. The Capitol and various House/Senate office buildings; the SCOTUS bldg and Library of Congress should also have their AC restored.
Assuming they don’t have respiratory problems, and if they carry and drink lots of water and use sunscreen, wear shade hats, and normal heat/sun protections, they should be all right. Not comfortable, but fine.
Be sure to have them stay in the touristy part of the city (monuments, museums, mall, etc...). Before I moved to NM in ‘92 I worked in DC’s war zone (Anacostia, SE Heights) and it was pure jungle. There’s also other pockets of nastiness through out the city.
It hasn’t gotten better since I left. Please let me know when everyone returns safe and sound, OK?
There are parts of the city in which I live where I wouldn’t go...in broad daylight...with a police escort.
D.C.? No, thank you. I was there in the 60s. It was bad enough then.
DC is actually three different worlds:
1 - Tourist World.
Well policed and fairly safe during normal visiting hours.
Be far away before dark.
2 - The Streets of the Powerful and Filthy Rich.
Well policed and safe at all hours.
You are not welcome there.
3 - The Nasty Underbelly.
Not as bad as Detroit, statistically. (but the DC police lie about the statistics)
Only fools, druggies and lost tourists venture here.
Hotel rooms are hard to find because there are still hundreds of thousands w/o power in the DC Metro area. I am in Bethesda, and Bethesda/Rockville is bad (we will not get power back by Thursday, they said). My office is in No. VA, and we have power now. Some gas stations cannot pump...not the best time to be here...good luck.