I failed at being a spy. No seriously, I actually failed. Wake Forest would not be proud of me.

This past weekend, a few of my friends and I decided to check out the International Spy Museum over on the Chinatown Metro stop. Although the tickets were pricey (18 bucks!!!!), the museum is well worth the price. Upon entering the museum we had to assume a given identity- I was Greta Something from some part of Germany who was traveling to London on some sort of business. And now you see why I failed at being a spy, because I simply couldn’t even remember my cover story.

Anyways, as we continued through the museum with our individual undercover spy names, we saw room after room of spy gadgets. Even James Bond would be impressed with this museum. There were shoes with knives in the heel, microdots to transmit messages, wigs of different colors, cars with stowaway seats, and more! Propaganda lined the hallways about how “the walls have ears” and “silence keeps secrets.” To a certain extent, the museum was a sensory overload.

After spending about 2 hours inside I of course wanted to become a spy (just as how I always want to be a fighter pilot at the end of Top Gun). Unfortunately, we have to test our identities before leaving the museum, and I failed. It was a epic fail. The computer asked me who I was and to define my mission and all I could remember is that I was Greta and that I was 33 years old. Alot of good that did, so the computer told me that because I failed my mission I was tortured and killed. Oh joy.

On a different note, Wake Forest would have been proud of me for my nerdy adventure this weekend. Anne and I were interested in visiting the National Archives, and since this museum is a government related building it was free which made my wallet happy.

Picture courtesy of archives.gov

There, located in one extremely dark rotunda (kept dark to protect the documents) were the Magna Carta, Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. The documents themselves were only moderately legible given the amount of abuse they had taken over the years, but they were still impressive. It was weird to think that those were the very documents that the founding fathers signed! Like I said, it was a nerdy adventure.

To add to our busy weekend, Anne and I also went to the Vagina Monologues at UMD College Park with my coworker, Christine, and a friend of hers. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to the Vagina Monologues, but it might be worth going if not just for the overwhelming experience of hearing women talk about usually unapproachable topics. If anything, I got the opportunity to see yet another ACC school. Their facilities were nice and the redbrick and columns around the campus had a homey feel to it. My only critique concerns their mascot.

I mean, really, who can actually fear a Turtle?

Que Sera Sera.