DC2

My parents got up around 8:30am Saturday, and I got up at 8:45. Normally, I wouldn’t get up that early, but I was finally going to meet my friend Adrian, live and in person. Thus far, I had only talked to him over the phone, since the few times I was in Washington one thing or another led to us never actually meeting. That was finally about to change at 9:30 in the lobby.

My parents and I went down to the lobby at 9:15 or so, and I waited in the seating area facing the doors. In the meantime, they went to the 10th floor to check out the breakfast offerings at the VIP. They have a free continental breakfast, and we got free tickets to it because the room wasn’t ready. I was in the lobby and Adrian called just to confirm the address. I think it was 9:40 or 9:50 when he showed up, but the point is I got to meet him.

Adrian is visually-impaired himself, but at least one of his eyes is 20/100. My eyes are 20/200, so meeting Adrian showed me how much difference there is between 20/200 and 20/100. He was able to get through all the years of school and college without assistive technology. He uses some assistive technology now for law school. I’m positive that with my vision I wouldn’t have been able to constantly read regular print books and school papers. I can read regular print if it’s not too small, but I would’ve gone blind if I did it day in and day out.

He arrived and it was good to finally see him live and in person after only talking to him on the phone for so long. He introduced himself and we shook hands. We sat down at the table I was sitting at waiting for him. We talked of this and that for about an hour, and my parents and Mark came by. I introduced them to Adrian; then we decided to go to Potbelly. We were going to go to Founding Farmers for lunch, but apparently Mark couldn’t get reservations. We asked Adrian if he wanted to come along, and he said yes. All of us walked down to lunch then.

I must say the food was very good at Potbelly, but the ordering system is kind of weird. I suppose if you’ve lived in DC and gone there often enough it isn’t so weird. You give your order at one place, and then give it again later. That’s where they make the actual sandwich or salad or whatever you get. I got a T-Rex (actually a Wreck, but T-Rex sounds better) salad, which is basically an Italian hoagie in salad from. The Wreck was very good, and I was able to have apple juice with it. Apple juice is my all-time favorite drink. I think we had to go back to the hotel at that point and get dressed for the afternoon awards ceremony.