I was initially quite entertained to see this painting:It was presented to me as a cell phone picture taken by Boy at the National Gallery. I love me some National Gallery, but looking up the context of the painting prevented this from becoming my favorite part, because it takes the twinkle out of my eye. And these beautiful greens should always be atwinklin'. However, since I do love the NGA, it reminded me of my undisputed favorite thing there: the moving walkway in the basement connecting the two wings. Nothing brings out my inner six year old faster than skipping down that bouncy conveyor belt. It doesn't hurt that there's a delicious gelato and espresso stand at one end either. My most recent anecdote related to the NGA basement has to do with a killjoy guard. Apparently, he had little patience with 20-somethings acting like children, and yelled at Steven, Catherine, and me to stop skipping, because: "It's called a walkway, not a jumpway." Clearly, he'd seen this before, and had been waiting for a chance to use that line. I'm glad that we could grant him the satisfaction of displaying his creativity, because it has not deterred me from future interludes of skipping.

Thinking of my favorite part of the NGA also reminds me of my favorite part of the National Portrait Gallery. In a hallway off of one of the historical exhibitions, there is a large map of the US circa I don't know when, but probably the old west some time. Generally western artifacts or anything else having to do with cowboys, indians, and ghost towns will cause me to walk the other direction, but this particular map is special. As Steven and I were pointing out to each other the specific places in CA where we'd grown up I noticed something quite strange. Just west of Sacramento...what was that...? Davisville? Davisville?! It's unusual for present day maps of the US to feature Davis, but this one was clearly made long before it was an affluent town home to a large research university that had cornered the market on viticulture and enology just in time to capture a large share of the funds generated by the American food renaissance, and there it was clear as day. At the time of that map, it couldn't have been anything more than a couple of farms. So, National Portrait Gallery, with a breast full of Aggie pride, I solute you.