My Unexpected Saturday!

The inspection for my car expires tomorrow, so I had blocked off the better part of the afternoon to take care of the inspection. In my experience, the inspection station in Southwest D.C. is one heck of a cluster. Typically, the line snakes for blocks before cars are funneled into a parking lot of lanes for inspection leading to the inspection bays. No joke, the past two years, I've had to wait for more than two hours. So, figuring that today is the last Saturday in February, I guessed that the back-up was going to be particularly bad. I steeled myself for a long wait and even brought a knitting project to keep me busy.

So imagine my surprise when I pulled up and there was no line at all! At first, I actually thought maybe the inspection station was closed because the place was so deserted. But, it was open, and I pulled right up to the inspection bay. Start to finish, the whole thing took 8 minutes. What a nice surprise!

Finding myself with a whole lot of extra time on my hands, I went to the Fish Market at the D.C. waterfront. I just love the waterfront area. To me, it's one of D.C.'s hidden gems. It's one of the few places in the city where you don't feel like you're in The Nation's Capital but rather in some little port town. The fact that many tourists don't find their way down there doesn't hurt either. So I got a cup of seafood chowder and some fried clams and sat in the sun and watched the sea gulls. It was a lovely way to spend my Saturday afternoon.

Much better than sitting in line waiting for my car to be inspected.