Seeing the sights in the nation's capitol

This was the most incredible and exhausting week i can remember. At 43, I am seeing the places I have read about and loved my entire life and getting to see them with and through the eyes of my son. I hope that he comes to love history as much as I do and that this trip helps give him context and connectivity as he studies and reads about US History.

We started the trip where it all Began at the Jamestown Settlement and Colonial Williamsburg.

In just a few days, we saw The White House, The Supreme Court. went to the top of the Washington Monument, Saw the original Senate Chamber in the Capitol, went to The Jefferson Memorial, The Lincoln Memorial, the FDR, Vietnam, Korean War, and WWW II Memorials and saw the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Also, we hit the Air and Space Museum, The National Archives and the Holocaust Museum. We ended the trip at Mt. Vernon.

I was really moved by the grave of Bobby Kennedy and Jefferson Memorial at night. I was awestruck by seeing the Declaration of Independence and standing on the steps of the Capitol.

Tony's School trip to Washinton DC: Day 1

This was a day of travel for the a group of 10 5th graders and 5 adults (including me). After an uneventful 5 hour flight, we boarded a bus for a two hour journey to Williamsburg Virginia for the first day of US history at a breakneck pace.

Our first meal stop was at at the Golden Coral Steakhouse and Buffet. The only historical connection was "1776," as in the average weight of the people eating at the Golden Coral Steakhouse and Buffet. If a raging alcoholic came stumbling into a happy hour, it would be illegal to keep serving them 99 cent cocktails, but these people have come into this $10 food fest tipping the scales at 400 and they can just eat their way to 450 if the want.

This being Virginia, they also smoke between each bite. This make for nice ambiance and surprisingly good mac and cheese.

For the half of the bus that was joining us from Bakersfield our "luxury coach" and all you can eat dining might seem pretty upscale, but for this city boy... it is going to be long week.

TED Day 3: "What Stirs Us?"

Day three was full of great moments. Amy Tan, the author of The Joy Luck Club was interesting, funny and inspiring. Yves Behar, the designer of the $100 laptop for the One Laptop Per Child Program was a great speaker and Robert Lang amazed the crowd with Origami.

Met David Blain in the lobby.

There are all kinds of ways to watch TED. You can sit in the main Hall or in these very cool simulcast lounges with couches, beds, beanbag chairs and work stations. Google provides snacks and a full blown coffee bar.

There is even a treadmill with a computer and a viewing screen so you can watch the show, surf the net and walk all at the same time.

At one point, I saw Sergey Brin walking on the treadmill and watching the speakers. I leaned to the person next to me and said that if he stopped walking the entire web would crash. A bit of nerd humor.

The creator of Guitar Hero had the audience in tears again when he brought to the stage a 32 year old man with severe Cerebral palsy who demonstrated software that lets him compose and perform music. There was an ocean explorer, a guy who is making fuel out of mushrooms, a futurist and a guy who figured out that crows are as smart as chimps and is planning to train them to clean up New York City.

Helen Fisher, and creator of Chemistry.com sucked the romance out of why we fall in love, a poet from Nigeria, the director of photography for National Geographic, another physicist and the day closed with Benjamin Zander, the conductor of the Boston Philharmonic who taught the audience to love classical music.

Rode in the elevator with Queen Noor from Jordan, Larry Billiant (the guy who wiped out small pox) and Paul Simon.

The day was capped off by a private party at the Monterey Aquarium. It was stunning and the food was great. Eating fish and looking at the them at the same time doesn't seem right though.

I share a ride back to the hotel with Meg Ryan and so ended my TED 2008 Adventure. Too much to capture here but life altering in so many ways.

A wild day

TED Day 2: What is Life?

The day begins at 8:15 with a presentation from Craig Ventner who is creating synthetic life!!! followed by a DNA expert that spoke for 18 min about folding DNA. I had no idea what he was saying but the session closed with an incredible presentation from Doris Kearns Goodwin the phenomenal biographer of Abraham Lincoln, JFK, LBJ and the Roosevelts. Clever to have a biographer close a session on "what is life?" She spoke beautifully about history, but won the audience over with her story about how she as a young girl would race home from school and listen to the Dodgers games on the radio keeping score and recording the game so that she could tell her father every detail of the game when he got home.

Thomas Krens, the Director of the Guggenheim Foundation talked about what is beautiful about art. An evolutionary psychologist spoke about why we find things beautiful. Another Physicist spoke about why gravity and matter is beautiful (not sure what he was saying either)

The afternoon was all about Evil.

A terrorism expert on how poorly prepared we are for an attack, a journalist who spoke about human rights and doing things differently who pitched for Obama too much and Philip Zimbardo who is conducted the now famous Stanford Prison Experiments that studied the psychology of evil and power. He showed horrific pictures from Abu Ghraib where the soldiers acted exactly as they had in his experiments from the 70s when he put a group of students in charge of a group of prisoners with no supervision. He at least ended with some hope that people can learn heroism the same way they learn evil.

The day ended with the TEDprize winners. Inspired.

At the after party, a very funny moment when John Hodgman from the Daily Show and the PC from the MAC commercials told me that he loves Netflix but cant stream movies because he only has a MAC.

Cool party- Matt Groening who created the Simpson was telling jokes and drawing autographs all night. (he is holding court in the picture above. Joy Luck Club author Amy Tan in yukking it up)