Alexandria "marathon date"

I don't remember the number of hours, but whatever the quantity, my first date with Mark was long--we did lunch, then ice-skating, then ice cream. Obviously it went well enough that we both stuck around to get married less than a year later.

Now that we're married, sans kids, I am not sure if a "marathon date" should technically be called a "day trip." Regardless of its title, the fact is we went somewhere else for half the day yesterday, and were suitably happy about it.

The entire trip was planned around a single fact: we had a gift card for a fancy restaurant line. There is, actually, one of their restaurants in DC, but we weren't feeling sushi, so we chose their alternate cuisine at the restaurant in Alexandria. And of course, if we make the trip to Alexandria, we may as well do things in Alexandria that we couldn't otherwise enjoy in DC.

So before dinner, Mark took me to Fort Ward where the volunteers with the National Park were giving a Christmas-themed re-enactment. From what I could tell, it meant the volunteers--in period dress--got a

big Christmas lunch of foods typical to that era, and then they caroled. The food, unfortunately, wasn't for visitors, but I did get some apple cider from a guy just by looking cold [very easy for me to do, because it's true].

We then went to downtown Alexandria, popped into an Apothecary Museum long enough to know that we didn't have the time for it, and went to a cupcakery instead [don't worry, mother, we didn't eat the cupcakes until after dinner].

After briefly listening to a very talkative street dulcimer performer, we went to the Fancy-with-a-capital-f restaurant to enjoy savory Parkerhouse rolls, rib meat with perogies, and a horseradish hamburger. [Review: very tasty and soft bread, melt-in-your-mouth-tender rib meat, everything else was delicious but not knock-your-socks-off]. After we had finished eating, the light above our table went off, and I remarked that we must have overstayed our welcome--to which our waiter reassured us that, no, someone just accidently hit that light button...but I'm still suspicious.

Stuffed with rich [in more ways than one] food, we headed over to a local theatre and got rush tickets to see Into The Woods. It was our first time to see the story in any modality, so I can't tell you how it compared to the movie, but compared to not-seeing-anything, it was great! Funny, witty, catchy, the singers/actors were magnificent, the costumes were fabulous, the orchestra on-point.

I was exhausted by the time we got home [so maybe the date is accurately called a marathon...], as evidenced by my sleeping until 7:40am the next morning--yes, that's sleeping in for me. Ah, Adulthood.