Wed, 09 Apr 2003 Haha ! I know you all thought that maybe I was too involved with a congressman to write another extremely long peepintom update but here I am - back with more to tell ! Well, it's been about a week since I have updated and a lot has gone on,( no affairs thoe ! ) leaving me pretty much exhausted ! Warning : Read on at your own risk !
Internship :
Still going great, still loving every second of it. It's just such a productive day, there is never a moment when I am bored and they are very easy going about my work tasks. Last week I attended a hearing on NASA that was really interesting and I learned a lot about the new space program they are trying to put into force. This week was full of lengthy ( about two and a half hours each of sitting on my tiny sore butt ) hearings, mainly about the doubling of the NIH ( National Institute of Health ) budget and where and what they are allocating the money too. I also got to attend a hearing on SARS for the latest update and another one on bioterrorism that was really interesting and pretty tense at times. I'm not going to bore you all with details ( there will be plenty of time to bore you later in this email ! ) but if any of you are interested in hearing more about how the House and Senate runs things just let me know because I have been a great sponge soaking it all in ! This job is physically demanding too as I am literally running around the Hill meeting politicians, or in between hearings so I am getting quite my fill of exercise ! But all that running probably just counteracts the lunch I have at Union Station when I can - the most AMAZING food court you will ever see in your life, about thirty different varieties ! I'm salivating just thinking about it !
I got to visit Georgetown briefly last week, their campus is very cute and small, it kinda made me miss UCLA - only for a split second. But unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to peruse around the actual town itself which is supposed to be really cute with a lot of stores to shop at. Hopefully, I will get to hit that up this weekend ! After I watch "Rent" the musical on Sat. with people from the program, Aimee gimmie your review on that !
Friday night we tried going to this club called VIP. It was cool until I got severly groped by this disgusting guy who wouldn't take no for an answer until I slapped him and my guys friends back me up, after that the whole experience was kinda ruined for me. But it would have been nice otherwise, four floors, five rooms to dance in, but expensive drinks. Very Vegas like - but BY NO MEANS VEGAS COMPRABABLE ! On Sat. I went to the Cherry Blossom festival here in town. It lasts for about three weeks and it was the final day of it and the Cherry Blossoms were at their height of bloom. So me and my new good friend Jim ( an attractive gay boy from Santa Cruz ! ) went and walked along the Potomac and saw the Blossoms and much of middle America with their fannypacks and tourbooks walking around. Then we went to the actual festival and had some really good food and watched some dancing and singing. On Sunday had a mini museum day, it would have been longer but some people in our group lag . . . I'd rather not get into it. So, instead of going from 2-5 which is what I had planned I got to go from about 4:15 -5, this weekend I'm going on my own because I hate wasting my time here waiting for people to get ready ! But on the whole, this past weekend was pretty calm since I didn't drink which has provided me with an extremely clear head recently ! This weekend I plan to go out and let off a little steam though, see some more sights hopefully !
I'm getting along great with my roomies for the most part, there is one girl I have taken an extreme disliking too but I am letting it go. She has an extremely offensive personality, very inconsiderate, interrupts people all the time, always makes degrading remarks and thinks she's the most knowledgeable and hottest girl on earth ( since she has "lived in Paris for 9 months" ) but I just try to keep conversation to a minimum. I've realized from going into my friends apts. that our apartment is about twice the size of anyone elses ( because it's a handicapp one )! In fact, the poor people next to us have two bunkbeds to make up for the extra room our apt. takes up ! Oops ! heehee
As for restaurants, I have eaten at two Turkish places which were verrrrrrrry good, you have to like lamb though, which I love and it was done very well. I also ate at a Latin/Meditteranean one which was soooooooo good, good drinks too !I haven't gone to too many other authentic eating places but I intend to ! It just really doesn't make sense to cook here since there are so many places to see and try !
Eventually at some point, I will have to write a research paper when I am here and also write something else for my elective class but I'm just waiting for something to bite me on my ass before I actually spring into action ! Work actually exhausts me - case in point, I came home early at 5 yesterday after 5 hours of hearing and fell asleep on the couch with my pasta bowl still in hand !
I just sent in my app yesterday for aborad travel for Fall 2003 for Spain, so I should know in about three weeks, at most. Worse case scenario I don't get accepted and have to stay my butt in LA, which can't be all that bad I guess. Keep your fingers crossed for me !
As you can tell, things are going 100% great and although it's been about thirty degrees here I am still happy as can be. In fact, I actually enjoy the brisk of the cold, and the inconsistencies in the weather. It's kinda fun having a picnic one day and then waking up to snow the next day ! Hope all is well with you and if you have any special souvenir requests from DC lemme know !
Your fav intern signing off for the night -
Kristine
