In Which I Observe Natural History

While retracing Monday's steps yesterday morning, I discovered my Kindle in the driver's side door pocket of Jason's car.  I have no idea when or how it slipped in there, which activates fears of old age forgetfulness. I decided to ignore those fears in favor of not having to go to the German Bakery to try to explain in person what a Kindle is to the old German-accented man who answered their phone when I called searching for it. He was very confused and somewhat angry about my asking if he had seen one.

So, yay for return of the Kindle!

I then took myself back to the Smithsonian to visit the last museum on the Mall on this trip, the National Museum of Natural History.

It was crowded and, while snazzier in the displays than I remembered, it was still lacking in actual interesting artifacts. Seeing the dinosaur bones was about as exciting as seeing the Native American artifacts in the museum across the way - meh. I'm from the west. There's a dinosaur bone sticking out of the mountain next to my parent's house. Not that exciting.

So I watched the people instead. Jason and I were talking last night about the invisibility of the single traveler, and it's true: when you're in a crowded place, surrounded by families, couples, and school groups you kind of... disappear. Which makes for excellent people-watching.

But I did take pictures of some of the other things I saw. Here you go!

Ooh... blue...

"Neanderthal Yourself" Photography Booth

Replica of French Cave Art.  Sadly, no Herzog narration.

A Touch-Screen Game

... which I won!

(That one's for my former students. Go dexterity exercises!)

Meh.

I do like geological displays like this that emphasize the variety of nature.

Randomly, a display of Korean wedding clothes.

People-watching in the Grand Foyer

Llama!

 

 

 

 

I did get caught in a rainstorm afterwards, which always makes me happy. We also watched Persuasion over dinner when Jason got home, which likewise made for a good day's closing.