Me and Gere!

Some new pictures:

• Abraham Lincoln's Repeating Rifle from the Museum of American History
• The Capitol Building
• The Washington Monument
• Pictures from afar of Richard Gere and Nancy Pelosi
• Pictures of Richard Gere and a musical artist called "Evolve" who is trying to get Gere to read a binder full of ideas for a peace walk thing
• A pic of me and Gere (well, a pic of Gere and a bunch of people that I stuck my fat head into)
  

Pretty Woman/Lobbiest

Tonight I'll be going to a reception hosted by Richard Gere about the "Free Tibet" movement.

This is pretty cool, because if they're giving Tibet away for free, I'll totally take one.
It would make a nifty souvenir.
Or maybe I'll sell it to China.
For all their tea.

Museum Trip

This morning, I got up at the crack of 10:30 and went to go see some of the museums D.C. has a offer. I started with the Air and Space Museum, which has a great exhibit on WWI fighter pilots and some disabled ICBM rockets from both the USA and USSR on display. Next, I headed off to the American History Museum. There, I saw Abraham Lincoln's hat, suit and repeating rifle. There was also a neat exhibit on the production process of penicillin, and I was probably more excited to learn about that then 99.9% of the other people there. I might go see some more museums tomorrow, but I'll play it by ear.

Huge Picture Post!

Hey everyone!

I have a huge picture post today at http://photobucket.com/peterman99, which includes:

• Pictures of my trip to the village in Alaska
• Pictures of our (Rose and I) trip to Savannah for Valentine's Day
• Pictures of Washington D.C.
• A picture of a military reception entitled "Expeditionary Warfare Update Pizza Briefing". What's next? "Navy SEAL ice cream social"?
  
• A picture of me with the Ambassador of Liechtenstein!

Up on The Hill

So I arrived up here in Washington D.C. on Sunday, and am completing a congressional legislative rotation. I am working in the office of Bob Etheridge (D-NC) as an intern with all the responsibilities that go with it. So far, most of what I've done has been stuffing envelopes and answering phone calls, but if I can spend about 50% of the time doing real work I figure the experience will be worth it.

Yesterday I went to my first Congressional Hearing, and heard this discussion on upcoming Veterans Affairs mental health legislation. At the hearing, one of the witnesses who is a former Marine said the best way to evaluate the levels of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is to make pre-and-post-deployment screenings mandatory. He said that currently, the military does the same mandatory pre-and-post screenings for dental care and said, "I don't have the best grill, but it gets the job done". Watching a former Marine refer to his "grill" before members of Congress was absolutely fantastic.

Afterwards, I went back to the office and spent about two hours doing research on the proposed legislation and writing a summary memo for the Legislative Director of Healthcare for the Congressman. It might be read.

After work, the other pharmacy student here from Wingate and myself met one of our professors who is up here on a lobbying expedition for Pharmacy Managed Care for a drink and then headed off to a Clean Energy reception. "Reception" is code for "open bar and buffet".

Today I'll be attending another Veterans Affairs hearing, to take notes and write memos.

Next week, I'll go to training to learn how to give Capitol tours to VIPs, which will be neat because I'll get to learn the history of the place. I've been taking a few pictures here and there, but because there is no internet access at the house I'm staying at it might be awhile before I get them up.

Miss you all!

Last Day!

Well, it's my last day in Bethel and I leave tomorrow afternoon barring volcano explosions. Here are some of the memorable things that have happened in the past few days:

1. Drove on a frozen river out to a village (about a 45 minute trip) and helped to some pharmacy stuff out there. I got a picture of the clinic and a car that had sunk and froze halfway into the river, which I'll upload later. I didn't get anymore pictures of the village, because the buildings looked about the same as in Bethel, except for the carefully-labeled "waste buckets" outside of all the homes.

2. Went to a party last night and saw a Greek policeman stick someone's camera down his pants and take a picture. To prevent being nightsticked and arrested, I refrained from any "telephoto lens" comments.

3. Prevented a huge medication error this afternoon.

All said and done, a good trip with interesting experiences, but I'll be glad to get back!

Erik and the Volcano

Here's the story:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,486532,00.html

Basically, there's a big volcano getting ready to blow in the next few days-to-weeks. Hopefully, it'll hold on until after Saturday to go off so I won't be stuck in the Tundra for who knows how long.

Wish me luck and pray to Pele for me.