One of the things that is sort of magic about working in Washington, DC, is the potential for chance encounters with well-known people.

The best time to go see tourist sites in DC is in January through early March, before Spring break when the throngs of tourists start to arrive, and keep coming through summer. Except for the occasional group of school kids on a field trip, you usually find the museums, monuments, and other attractions uncrowded in the bleak winter months. You can take your time to stroll around and not get jostled by others, or be asked to “move along” by building guards because you’re holding up the line.

On Tuesday, a colleague from work and I decided to go explore the new Capitol Visitor’s Center, which was built underneath the U.S. Capitol Building. This monumental behemoth, which cost $621M ($440M over budget) to build and took three years longer than planned to open, now serves as the gathering place for tourists wishing to see the Capitol Building, and for visitors who have business with Congress in the actual Capitol Building. (Most visitors who have business with Members of Congress meet with them in their respective offices, which are in nearby Senate or House office buildings).

When you get to the Visitor’s Center, of course you have to go through a magnetometer. I even had to “get wanded” since my Chippewa Firefighter Boots I was wearing set off the alarm. I just rolled my eyes and endured it, and tried not to remember the happy-go-lucky days of my youth when you could walk right into the Capitol Building and wander around on your own.

You make your way to a ticket desk. The clerk was delighted to tell me that they had “a few walk-up tickets available.” Yeah, right… “a few.” The place was fairly empty. We decided to pick a time for our tour a little later, so we could walk around and have lunch, too. The restaurant in the Visitor’s Center is nice, but it is pricey. Even the Smithsonian eateries are less expensive than this place. Perhaps they’re trying to make up their cost over-runs on the backs of visitors. But I digress….

When we queued up for our tour, we were escorted into a large theater, where we were shown a movie about the Capitol and Congress. As one would expect, the Capitol’s history is as storied as it is magnificent. And Congress thinks the world of itself. But I digress….

After the movie, you exit the rear of the theater and are given a wireless headset. A tour guide briskly walks you around and you end up in the Rotunda of the Capitol Building. The Guide explains the art and frescos, and some of the history of the building. Even though perhaps I’m jaded about Congress, I still remain in awe and stare with wonder at the Capitol, especially from the inside. It is indeed magnificent.

As I was staring gape-jawed upward at the art within the Rotunda, I heard a Capitol Police Officer say rather loudly, “stay here, don’t move!” I looked around, and saw that my little tour group was being herded against a wall. We were told, “just wait here a minute.” I thought that perhaps the Vice President, who is the President of the Senate, might be walking by.

Well, yes, he did… and so did the President! I actually got to see and wave at President Obama. The President had come to the Capitol that day to plead his case for the Economic Stimulus package. It is not common for the President to come to the Capitol to press for passage of legislation. But this legislation is the biggest thing that Congress has considered in quite some time, and is very important to the President, and to our country.

So here I am, standing there, gape-jawed again. The President really looks like he does on TV. His smile is warm and gracious, he seemed quite friendly and affable. He reached over to shake hands with a couple kids who were in the front row of our group. Then he quickly walked down the hall into the Office of the Speaker of the House, which is right off of the Rotunda area.

Wow… cool, huh? This doesn’t happen every day to us commoners.

The Capitol Visitor’s Center is nice. However, except for some statues and large paintings, the place is rather barren. The movie is nice. The tour, however, is really short. You don’t get to see much. But heck, it’s free, and it’s our Capitol, where the people’s work is done. If you visit, live, or work in DC, go see it. Your visit should take about an hour to 90 minutes. You can even get tour tickets for free on-line in advance at this link. I strongly recommend that after you tour the Capitol through the Visitor’s Center, to use the tunnel and go visit the Library of Congress, just across the street. Now that is an amazing place. Enjoy!

Do you remember the “cone of silence” that never worked in the TV comedy Get Smart? Well in Washington, DC, we have the “Cone of Dumbness.” It sits right over the beltway that surrounds the city. Every time the weather forecasters predict a “snow event,” the cone comes down and without a doubt, everyone inside it goes brain dead.

Today “they” predict two inches (5cm) of snow to fall during the day. Mind you, it’s NOT snowing yet (at 6:30am ET). OMG, you would think the end of the world is here. What’s worse is that later this evening, we may get up to to 2″ of sleet — predicted to fall in the evening. Sure, tomorrow will be bad for commuting, but not today. Though you wouldn’t know it from all the mass hysteria.

Last night, I forgot about the snow prediction, and dropped by the grocery store on my way home from work to get some grated cheese for dinner. Ooops… shouldn’t have done that. The lines were incredibly long and it looked like the store had been decimated. I kid you not, one guy who couldn’t find a cart was standing in line juggling milk, butter, eggs, diapers, and a bunch of other stuff, while cradling a cell phone in his ear, whining to his wife about the store not having whatever he wanted to eat for dinner. I bailed from the store and just came home.

Then at a meeting last night, would you believe one woman even had the temerity to ask the local zoning officials if schools would be closed today. The zoning folks have nothing to do with deciding if and when to close schools. Just what was this woman thinking? (or smoking?)

The TV news isn’t any help at all — they hype it up so much that it’s no wonder everyone goes nuts. And you’d think: a large number of residents of the DC area come from “snow country.” That is, they came here from places that would get lots of snow every winter. They handled it just fine. They dressed properly for it, too. But not those who now live or work within the “cone of dumbness.”

This morning, the SUVs are on the road, in 4-wheel drive mode — and it’s not snowing (yet). This little snippet from a local news source just had me rolling on the floor laughing:

Bill is making plans for getting out and getting to work today. “If it shuts a few things down, it probably won’t shut down that much. And I have four-wheel drive, so it’s about time I got to use it.”

I just betcha he’s the type of guy who gets in his 4WD and tries to drive on ice like it’s a dry road on a sunny day. I’ll see him (or his kind) in a ditch on the side of the road, standing next to his vehicle, out in the snow, yapping on a cell phone. It happens all the time.

Salt trucks are idling in the parking lot, waiting for the “go” signal. Schools closed for the prediction. And at the Metro subway stop were the yuppies in their tassled loafers or dress wingtips, thin socks, suit jacket, no hat, no gloves. I betcha the minute they see a flake of snow in the air, each and every one of them will be trying to rush home before they get snowed in for the rests of the century.

I’m so glad I don’t have a response role any more as I had with previous employers. I can just sit back, watch, and have a good laugh at the “cone of dumbness” doing its thing: causing the yuppies to “lose it” and get hysterical over a dusting of snow. I’ll just wait patiently in my office for the crowds to thin out, then meet my partner and go home. Carefully, but dressed appropriately with tall, warm boots, cord pants and longjohns, several layers on top, a coat with a hood, and mittens (which are warmer than gloves). We’ll be okay.

And for those of you from snow belt areas, don’t laugh too hard at this. It’s just a part of the local DC culture — forget everything you learned and rush into mass hysteria all for a few flakes of snow.

Life is short: enjoy it, even if it’s about stupid stuff!

This is a post about my ongoing tirade about those nuts who yak away on their precious cell phones while attempting to operating a 5,000+ pound machine. Hang the f— up and drive!

After witnessing a fellow biker get creamed on a highway five years ago by a cell-phone yapping yuppie who said, “I didn’t see him,” I have been on a tear to get my state’s legislature to adopt a law to ban using a cell phone or texting while driving. Ideally, ban all forms of communication in all ways while driving — and that includes using hands-free devices.

Well, that ain’t gonna work. (The hands-free ban)… but, here I am again facing this year’s legislature where the senator from my district has proposed, once again, a law to prohibit talking on a cell phone or texting while driving. Yeah, Mike, I’ll be there with you, again, to testify on the bill and attempt, once again, to persuade the committee to pass the bill out of committee to the full State Senate and then to the House and get signed by the Governor.

[Oh man, do I feel exactly what the back of the shirt in this photo that I found on the ‘net expresses.]

But again, I remain skeptical. I mean, after all, with a part-time legislature who lives, eats, and breathes on their electronic gizmos to talk, text, and even to write legislation while driving (honestly, you should see the laptop setup in one Delegate’s car!), I just don’t think it’s going to work. But we’ll give it the old college try, once more.

And I still have my doubts after observing what happens when a law is passed, but not enforced. I work in the District of Columbia. DC passed a law two years ago that prohibited use of hand-held cell phones while driving.

I often take walks at lunchtime. For the past several months, I have stood on a busy corner for about 5 minutes and counted the number of drivers who go past and who are yakking on their hand-held cell phones. On average, within five minutes, I count 89 drivers yakking away on hand-held phones. I have never once seen anyone given a ticket for the offense. So I question, why pass a law if it isn’t enforced?

Come on, people! Wake up! We managed to survive quite well in the era before cell phones were invented. I know some of you don’t remember that time, but we didn’t communicate back then by chiseling on stone tablets, either. The world still turned ’round, and business still got done when you couldn’t yak away on your cell 24/7. Just be reasonable: hang up and drive!

Rant ended… for now. Look for me in Annapolis this session, once again, where I’ll continue to bang my head on the proverbial marble wall about this issue.

My goodness, my hometown is still a trash heap after the concert at the Lincoln Memorial on Sunday, the Presidential Inauguration and Parade on Tuesday, and the right-to-lifers lame protest on Thursday. While one conservative blog is blaming all the trashing of DC on supporters of Obama, what it isn’t blogging about is all the trash left behind by the right-to-lifers on Thursday. Most of them are (R)-people, and are just as messy as anyone else.

Thanks for coming, thanks for spending over US$1,000,000,000 (yeah, that’s right, US$1 Billion) for our local economy. But thanks also for leaving over 90 tons of trash that’s blowing around the city, and thanks for absolutely ruining whatever turf there was on the national Mall. It’s all a big dirt pile now. GO HOME! … and take your trash with you.

This video that I found on YouTube is interesting, and at least shows a positive attitude about cleaning up the mess: