day .5, the Great America Race.

We haven't even started racing, and we're already a bit punchy. Mind, part of this is a result of travel to the start destination. Anji picked me up in Baltimore today. Traffic wasn't particularly bad, but we started getting goofy before we even hit Washington city limits.

Driving through the city of Washington is always a little weird. Entering from Baltimore, you see the sad decrepitude of most of the city; then there's the old '30s Hecht Company warehouse and the Arena--things that are an integral part of Old Washington but which mean absolutely nothing to the vast number of the town's modern inhabitants, 98% of whom were born somewhere else. Before long, we encountered the traffic hell that was created back in the '50s when some brainchild decided to route some of the major city streets under the big circles. Before we landed in the weird little hotel--apparently built as an apartment house in the '50s and refaced as a hotel in the '90s--we had:
1) annoyed, but not surprised, Washingtonians by cutting halfway across Thomas Circle;
2) flung a cigarette butt at a terrorized touron family;
3) gotten sidetracked by K street's insistent path under Washington Circle; and
4) broken several traffic laws in one fell swoop accompanied by Anji's declaration "Watch THIS!!!"

Now: This comes after the last week of hideous preparation. Alex managed to drive himself into blithering oblivion, but solved the Evil Clue of Death. I, on the other hand, was reduced to wandering about the house, drooling and walking into walls (to the great consternation of my cats) but couldn't solve it.

We now have the start location (which I will not yet disclose) and have been bopping about the hotel room like tipsy banshees. I am hoping that we don't have to spend too much time in Washington tomorrow, because I want to solve clues in Richmond, and have a drink at the Jefferson.

--this post courtesy of Dan.