What's that smell?

Since we were checking things off of our bucket lists....mostly so we don't ever have to go back to smell New York City ever again, Buddy indulged in completing two more things I wanted to do. Eat a hot dog in Central Park. Ummm, we did it and the hot dog was not good. Hot dogs in general aren't that great, so I'm not sure why thinking eating one in the middle of Central Park would all of a sudden make it magically delicious....it did not live up to the hype! Oh well, now I know!

The other thing on my list was I always wanted to bike ride around Central Park...

Bike rides are always good, but I am not sure what I was expecting, but the bike route is on a road on the outskirts of the actual park, so it was like a regular bike ride, but at least with a few cool things to stop and look at. Then we scurried it all the way down to hop on the ferry to go see our favorite lady! Now she did not disappoint!

Of course she never does! I upgraded to the pedestal tickets and then the good momma I am, refused to sit and wait in line for the elevator, so I made the boy take the stairs with me. Thankfully, the view was well worth it so I didn't have to hear any teenage sass! After Lady Liberty, we went home and got our fancy clothes on so we could go to Broadway. I gave Buddy a list of shows that were currently on Broadway, and this is what he picked!

I think he was a little uncertain, since it was a musical, but seriously, the main actor (Beetlejuice) had him hooked within the first 2 minutes! It was great!

Matter of fact, it was so great that Buddy rushed out during intermission so he could go hurry and buy a souvenir cup, jacket and beanie (I think he forgot he lives in Hawaii! We went straight back to our Airbnb so we could sleep for a few hours, wake up way too early and hop on another train....

This time to Washington, DC. Buddy and I both find it strange that even though they are kinda close, they are so very different. There isn't a build up of trash or an overwhelming smell of pee. Interesting how the people in charge of getting things done have a clean place to live....seems a little divergent self-serving, but what do we know. I wonder what would happen if the Congress and Senate had to rotate around what cities that had to live in while they served. Anyway, enough of my diatribe. I got us reservations to tour the Library of Congress. Sadly, I was relying on Buddy for photos since he was going to town on the picture taking....then his camera basically deleted every single photo from today! I am so sad (I know he really is too because he LOVES architecture and this place is amazing)! So here is the sole surviving picture from the Library of Congress!

We hurried up and then took a Lyft so we could make it in time to Arlington National Cemetery. We took the hop on and off tour and made sure to see the Changing of the Guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Errr....no pictures because of technical difficulties with Buddy's phone. It's most unfortunate though that the phone deleted everything because I thought it would be great to walk the 2 miles back to the Airbnb because we stopped at sooo many places for Buddy to get some cool pictures. Poor kid, he really likes his cool pictures, but I guess we'll find out if he wants to walk back tomorrow to do it again. 

We finally figured out his camera wasn't saving when I asked him to take a picture like this....

and it didn't save, then he looked back and nothing was there! Oh well, at least he got to take a picture of the world's very first meme...

Which I guess in teenage talk is really cool! When we got back to our Airbnb, we were starving! Thank goodness this place is on top of an Irish pub. Unfortunately, they didn't have any tables till 8 pm (it was 6). Fortunately, they do to-go orders!!!!

I got the corned beef and cabbage and it was soooooo gooood! Buddy loved his food too, so much so that he asked if we could eat breakfast there tomorrow. If we do, I'm making him order the Irish breakfast with bangers, baked beans, rashers (still not sure what that is), and black and white pudding! After we stuffed ourselves silly and rested our feet for a while, we decided to go bike National Mall to see the monuments at night! It did not disappoint!

Tomorrow we are going to try to hit up every Smithsonian we can before our ticket time to Ford Theater, then our timed tour of Capital Hill. Tomorrow night we have a very exclusive VIP tour....but I can't say where....at least quite yet, and Buddy has been jumping at the bit over this one! So all in all a super fantastic, but so very tired, day!