Thursday: field trip

Today was the big field trip day!  They were unable to get a bus driver, so parents were driving.  That was probably the part that made me the most nervous.

And rightly so!  Google maps told me several times to take an exit that was very clearly closed.  Very closed.  It obviously rerouted me right away, but I couldn't tell if it was just sending me in a circle to go to the closed exit again or it it was properly rerouting me.  I took a quick detour to a parking lot to assess the situation, realized it had properly rerouted me, and we were back in business.  The other issue was the that parking lot had changed so that you had to pay to enter, using a credit card, with a crazy complicated machine that you couldn't see the screen because of the sun and the enter key ink had been rubbed off so it was hard to tell which one it was.  If things went well it took about a minute.  If things went poorly it was taking about three minutes.  There were at least twenty cars.  Needless to say, we were a bit late for our Capitol Tour because of it.

But after those fiascos the day went very well.

This was a class picture, but I zoomed in on a small part.

The tour guide did a great job giving details, information, and answering questions.  The Senate was in session and it seems like every tour group guide gives their senator a card so that they can be welcomed by the entire senate.  The senate did a great job clapping and welcoming us, even though they probably need to do it at least three times an hour whenever they're in session.  That would get so annoying.

After lunch we went to the Michigan history museum.  It was also pretty cool.  We had a docent guide us through the first floor and it was so much more fun to listen to him than try and read the signs.  The signs were good, but he added the details that you might not otherwise pick up.  We had to do the upper floors by ourselves and we went through them pretty quickly, but it was still very interesting.

The drive home was uneventful.  We listened to a Brains On! podcast about elevators, which I also found interesting.  I wish I could remember things better, because in a few weeks I probably won't be able to tell you much of the history behind elevators.