CHEERS!

COOLEST THING I SAW TODAY: a bit of sunburn on my knees after sitting outside just long enough to eat a sandwich.

Washington is a really friendly city. I don't know if it's because I'm more receptive to it, and perhaps if I was looking for random friends, I'd find them just as easily in London, but it seems everyone's just really happy to chat, if you want to. Our concierges engage us in conversation when we're dashing for the lift, a lady in Gap yesterday admired my only-too-familiar dress and we chatted about her trip home to New Zealand next week and even people who aren't paid to be nice are friendly. There's my new friend Danielle that I met in the nail bar, the owner of Minnie the dog, who I had a chat with in Georgetown, a random Australian man we met on the Metro and the owner of the cutest puppy I've eeeeever seen, who we met coming out of our building and who seemed very keen to be pals (I kicked myself, because she's a photographer and seemed lovely, but I always had it in my head that we'd be leaving this building next week, so there's no point making friends. Dur).

As the above list of friendly encounters suggests, DC is also a very doggy city, by all accounts. There are soooo many dogs here, all of whom seem very preened and loved - no raggedy mongrel types here. And, as eagle-eyed Maxy pointed out, the streets are entirely clear of poop. It's nearly enough to turn this lifelong cat fan to the yappy side of the pet-owning street. But not quite.

The things that catch my eye on the pavements the most are the millions of scooters. *sigh* I miss my scooter. I didn't think there'd be any here, so I put mine to hibernate at Max's folks' house while we're away. But the city is crawling with vespas and sporty peugeot bikes and I'm longing for mine. There aren't even any pesky parking restrictions, unlike in London - here, you just park up on the street like you're riding a bicycle. It's the promised land of scooting! But I still maintain that the best thing about having a scooter is getting out of the city at the weekends and I'm sure a car would be better for that here, as I don't think America does little A-roads like the UK and I don't much fancy heading to Maryland on my scooter on a vast freeway... So I must just get a pushbike for pootling around DC and we'll hire cars at the weekend for out-of-town adventures.

So today was the last day of Max shadowing Laura - the outgoing reporter he's replacing at the Bureau - and tonight was her leaving do, as well as a kind of welcome do for Maxy. As daunting as I'm sure socialising with his bosses was for Max, I found myself in a far greater dilemma. It's been extreeemely hot today and was still very warm this evening. What do you wear to casual after-work drinks in the heat? And is that outfit likely to be at the top of any of my nine suitcases? I managed to throw something together, but I'm still not convinced, and it involved me putting tights on under my dress whilst standing on the street outside the store in which I bought them. Classy.

The party was extremely excellent and provided a big leap towards us feeling

 settled here in DC. Firstly, it was at possibly the coolest bar I've ever been to, which was exactly how I would design a bar if I were to own one. Like all the best cool bars, there's no indication at street level that it exists - you have to know which door to go through. Then you go up some stairs to a two-storey bar that's extremely well decorated and dark and cool, then out onto the deck at the back where there are tealights all over the place and chandeliers hanging from thin air (erm, or thin wires). It's owned by the Thievery Corporation and had a very cosmopolitan, cool kind of block party feel to it. I shall go there a lot.

Unfortunately the bar is too cool for food and by the time we got hungry, it was only 10mins until the bar started charging a $10 entry fee, so we nipped across the road to Julia's Empanadas and got a couple of things that looked a lot like Cornish pasties but were apparently Mexican, and smuggled them back up to the deck. I'm sure the whiff of refried beans and chorizo probably put some of the smarter drinkers off their mojitos, but what can you do?

Max's colleagues are all incredibly nice and very much fun - we had a really great relaxed evening. It was nice to engage in some British banter, and I also soaked up a million tips for getting out of the city, getting cheap flights around the States, good restaurants in what will be our neighbourhood and the best place in DC to see live bands. These conversations opened up Washington for me, beyond my limited discoveries of Georgetown and the chain of Cosis, and I started to get really excited about the year ahead. 

We spent most of the time talking to Geoff and Sarah. Or, as they shall henceforth be known, Fun Geoff & Sarah. Sarah's the deputy Bureau chief, but not at all a scary boss person. She's really fun and caustic and seems convinced her newly engaged Geoff is actually gay. What's more, not only are they fun, but they've just hired a piano, so Max is looking forward to going over and playing it. Meanwhile, Geoff was foolish enough to mention that they're replacing their current TiVo, which works perfectly well and is currently loaded with season 5 of 'The Wire'. Poor fellow, he didn't stand a chance. He's coming over to hook it up in our apartment soon. Geoff can also sort us out with sports tickets, because he works in software at stadiums and stuff (I think), so we're hoping to catch a basketball game at some point. Woo!

As I mentioned, it was a really hot evening - to the point of mugginess - and Max's colleagues could only warn me that summers here are twice as hot and eight times as humid. Aye carumba! What a good thing I no longer have long hair and that the apartment we'll be in has A/C. So it was a welcome relief when some big sploshy drops of rain started to fall late in the evening. We all went inside and watched as an almighty rainstorm poured down on where we'd just been standing. Salsa music started to play and no-one seemed bothered by the turn in the weather. It reminded me of that advert from the 80s set during a storm in New Orleans and everyone just stays in a bar, drinking whatever booze it is that's being advertised (aargh - what was it?).

I was quite sure that we were both too awake (or maaaybe drunk) to miss the talkshows (Max did not do us proud last night), but yet again Leno's opening monologue proved as effective as a thimblefull of NyQuil cough mixture and we were both out like a light at the words, 'good evening and welcome to the show'.