Our adventures in Ft. Meade/Washington, D.C. this week

Of course, D.I. has been on military bases before, but it was my first time on a real army base (Ft. Meade).

I got to shake hands with a two-star general, who also happens to be a woman. That's pretty cool.

Talked with a bunch of retired army colonels (most of which still work for the army as contractors).

Watched one of our dear friends and associates, who also happens to be a colonel in the army, accept command of the newly christened AOG - Army Operations Group (formerly known as the AOA -army Operations Activity), in a formal ceremony in which he was presented with the colors, speeches were given, &etc. From what I gather, AOG is a very specialized group that conducts human intelligence operations. Yeah, that's who we roll with.

Looked at airplanes and stuff at the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum. Prolly the coolest thing in there, besides the vehicles that actually went into space and came back, is the scale model of the USS Enterprise aircraft carrier. The model builder put 1000+ hours into it.

Looked at a lot of military uniforms in the military history section. I took some photos, but will post those up later.

Also saw THE Star Spangled Banner - the original flag that inspired the words to the song. It's huge, kept in a dark room (for preservation purposes), and awe-inspiring. The flag-maker, Mary Pickersgill, was paid $405.90 - more than most people made in a year at the time - a good living for a seamstress. Good story on: How the Star-Spangled Banner was Made>.

A fun-filled 24 hours, and it couldn't have been a more beautiful day to walk around our nations capital.