You know, if you're not going to pay attention in the session, maybe you shouldn't have come.

I guess Drupal conferences are where Northrop Grumman employees go to relax.

As I boarded the Metro this morning on my way to the Drupal Conference, I couldn't help but notice I was the only white person in the car I had boarded. I can't say I was pleased about this realization, but my displeasure was most likely not for the reasons you may think.

I was annoyed by this realization because I realized that as soon as I walked out of the train, up the escalator and into the convention center, I was going to move from a spot where 100 people were black and I was the only white person, to where 1000 people were white, and more than 90% of them male.

The contrast of the two locations was the source of my annoyance: the large difference between the "haves" and the "have nots," between those who grew up with technology for whom this tech stuff is second nature, and those who flinch when a petite white woman talks to them on a train (which is what happened when I talked to the large black man sitting next to me on the train yesterday).

I don't know how to address this annoyance, other than to comment about it, and continue to break the commuter taboo and talk to the people on the train.

As has become our daily ritual, a daily ritual of one day, I might add, Jessica and I met up at the hotel to head out for dinner somewhere in DC. Jess hasn't really explored the city yet, and, well, being my first time, neither had I. We hemmed and hawwed, trying to figure out where to go, with my suggesting the boring (do what we did last night), when she suggested CoCo Sala.

CoCo Sala is a restaurant bar with a chocolate theme. The Yelp reviews were all positive for the food, all with caveat that the noise in the place was, well, uncontrollable. The portions were listed as small, but I'd been overeating a lot on this trip so the smaller portions didn't really bother me, I stopped listening when Jessica said "chocolate."

So, off we went, on the Metro. Jessica stays at hotels close enough to her work that she doesn't need to take the Metro, so my back and forth jaunts to the conference made me the "experienced" one on the Metro. Off we went, to a new station, one that dumped everyone heading into downtown to see the Capitals play. Quite the adventure, I'm not sure how we surived with the mass throngs of Captials fans.

Once we arrived, I pulled out my camera and started taking pictures of the area.

"You look like a tourist," Jessica commented.

I embraced my touristism (much to Jessica's embarrassment, I think), inflicting it on Jessica.

The restaurange was as advertised. LOUD. It was painfully loud.

Since it was so loud, when I sat down, I sat in the chair 90° from where Jessica was sitting in the booth, instead of opposite her. Knowing I don't do well in loud, sitting next to Jessica worked perfectly. We were able to talk over the loud noises, ooooohing and aaaaaahing over the various courses. The first course was AMAZING.

It went downhill from there.

The next tastiness of the next courses weren't as great as the first course. The chocolate souffle had cayenne in it, which wasn't exactly tasty to me. The third course had maybe one tasty item in it.

The kicker came, however, when the hostess came up and asked me to move away from my seat. She wanted me to move 90° so that I was sitting opposite Jessica. That way, she could seat another person in the space I vacated, turned the opposite way, sitting at the table next to us.

Now, I hate being unreasonable. I dislike the ugly American. I can't stand when I'm high maintenance. In this case, however, I believe my anger was justified.

I went from enjoying the conversation in the difficult environment to sitting in front of not so good food, unable to hear Jessica talk, much less yell at me from across the table, so that someone else could be seated at the next table.

I could not wait to leave the restaurant. The dinner was spoiled.

Jessica was much more level headed about the dinner disruption. She talked to the manager. I didn't hear any of the conversation, unfortunately (see the part above about the noise level). He didn't seem to be agreeing with anything she said, by his body language, yet our bill had a hefty 50% discount on it. She must have been somewhat persuasive.

Exiting the restaurant was a walk into relief. I wouldn't have thought that street level noises would be pleasant, but after the noise of the restaurant, phew!

We took the Metro back, which was yet another first for both of us: riding the Metro after 9PM.

And, hey, look! We made it back in one piece! We rock!