Cramming

Two weeks to go! Things are strangely seeming to slow down, which is completely different than what I am used to. Normally, during this time of the spring college students are frantically trying to finish all of their course work, but this spring has been smooth sailing... so far

Monday was a really quiet day at work; President Obama scheduled a Nuclear Summit conference in DC the past two days, so a lot of people worked from home the beginning of this week. This meant that I was scrambling around picking up all the little loose ends in the office! No matter though, it kept me very busy, and is one of the many things all interns get to do at some point! I started on making a database on some of the video conference documents used by the Education staff. I will be no means complete this in the next week and a half, but at least it's a start for the next person to come along and finish. This is also the last week that some of the education staff will be around, so it seems like I am saying goodbye already.

This was the case on Tuesday out at Archives II, as it was my last "normal" day out there. I worked on preservation projects all day, both in the stacks and back in the preservation room. Amongst all of the WWI records I came across a letter sent overseas in the Argonne region of France explaining the new technology of Daylight Savings Time! It was comical to read how strange and serious they were about it! I also had a a file on baseball equipment in the camps in France. There was one company who was so generous as to donate baseball equipment to the troops for their free time and enjoyment while overseas. I can only think that this was a small comfort to those who were fighting so far from home. I also found some interesting documents back in the stacks. It was my last day back amongst all the boxes, which was a little sad. I did come across some interesting Soviet and Cold War records from Bulgaria...

Today's field trip after class was a choice- I decided to go to the National Zoo. It was so nice out to go to the zoo (both the warm weather and small crowd) and many of the animals were out. Sadly, my camera's battery died part way through, so I was not able to get many pictures. They have a wonderful panda exhibit, but only one of their pandas was out, as they other one is currently on pregnancy bedrest. I also watched an octopus each lunch, which was one of the strangest things I have ever seen! I have added the few pictures that I was able to get below. The rest of the week is going to be crazy with 3 labs in 2 days, but I guess that's what happens when you try to cram a bunch in in a short amount of time.