My mind was thrown off by our president and vice president,  who preplanned and purposely made public today’s event with President Zelensky. They proved three things: One, they are mentally adolescent bullies who do not belong anywhere in public life. Two, they have no idea how to conduct diplomacy. And three, they have no idea how to treat a guest. Shame, shame, shame. So I don’t think that I will even mention them today.

I didn’t think of them when we started our dsy in Virginia Beach, which probably has more street art per block than anywhere else.  A few pieces of outside art we saw today.

Our night at the Capes resort was fine, but ventured out for breakfast and wound up at a dingy place called Waffles & Co., a place which for its own sake, I hope has seen better days. It seems to be run by three men, probably in their 70s. My guess is that, after they retired from their careers, their wives got together and bought this place for them to get them out of the house.

We drove south, spent a little time driving through beautiful Edenton NC and had lunch in Washington NC, known as the Original Washington, because it was given its name in 1776. The first city named for George. It is a nice town of about 10,000, with pleasure boating and fishing on the Pamlico River, and is the home of the North Carolina Estuarium (look it up). More importantly,  it is the home town of Ryan Zimmerman.

We had a wonderful light lunch at 1906 Bistro and Bourbon. Here is the wall behind the bar:

Its building was constructed in 1906 for a bank. There was a small hotel on the site before that, which served as the  location of the meetings of the local temperance society.

After lunch, a brief stroll, a stop at the Pamlico Book Store, and coffee (very good coffee) from the Washington Cafe.

A nice ride further south to Wilmington, a charming city. We explored downtown, but decided not to stay in a downtown hotel, as we were just passing through, so we stayed on Wilmington’s version of Rockville Pike. We had supper at a Bonefish Grill across the street in Wikmington’s version of Congressional Plaza. Edie’s salmon was quite good. I had “soy infused, blackened tuna”, which, I am sure was soy infused, but was horseradish infested, overriding any real taste of the tuna. Madison, our server, was certain there was no horseradish in the mix. I told her to try a little when she went back to the kitchen. “No”, she said smiling, “I am a very picky eater.” She came back to the table a few minutes later after checking the “prep sheet”. Horseradish.