A Day with my Niece

I spent Friday with my niece, and we went to the Botanic Garden and to the Hirshhorn.

I chose the Botanic Garden because they have three corpse flowers that are ready to bloom.  See the picture in the bottom left for a look at the most advanced of the specimens.  It hadn't actually started blooming when we went to see it, and I'm not sure if I'm glad or disappointed.  It was pretty impressive, even with no odor, but I feel as if we didn't really get the "full Monty."  Of course, we also didn't have to experience the stench, and on a hot day like Friday, that was probably a good thing.  And we didn't have to wait in line for hours to get in either, so all in all, I'm think I'm going to go with glad.

We walked around the whole garden, at least the inside part, and I realized I hadn't visited since 2010.  They've made some improvements since the last time I was there, and I was reminded of what a lovely venue it is.  One of those places that lowers my blood pressure as soon as I walk in the door. Although I love my office location, as it allows me to walk to the Mall on my lunch hour, I do wish the Botanic Garden were closer.

After lunch, we went to the Hirshhorn.  "That's an odd choice," those of you who read the blog regularly might be thinking, since I usually miss no opportunity to bash the concrete donut.  In this instance, we went to see the Ai Weiwei show, which I recommend.  He's created portraits of dissidents from around the world, done in Legos.  What I didn't realize until we went, was that this is the same show he put on in Alcatraz.  I was sorry to miss that, so very glad to see it here.  I think I would have gotten more out of it, if I had known more of the people portrayed (I knew Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King), but that's my fault, not Ai's.

We also saw the Yoko Ono pieces about mothers (in the main lobby) - people put up comments about their mothers on a big wall, and her Wish Tree in the sculpture garden.  We put up our own wishes (mine was for civility in political discourse - good luck to me with that), which was fun.

All in all, a great day, despite the heat.