Oohhh look - I am actually writing something after I have done it!!! New Years Resolution in effect!!! Hahaha. So to commemorate this occasion, and to go with the theme of the Crime and Punishment Museum, here is a wonderful song for you:
get those hips swivelling
First up is our trip to the Crime and Punishment Museum. Sadly, this is a museum that you actually have to pay for (all the other ones I have gone to and will go are free) but we got our tickets through Groupon so they were cheaper than usual, which rocks. This was probably by far one of my favorite museums so far as it just rocked. The exhibits, the information, the hands on things, so much fun. And I mean, its crime and punishment - how much more fascinating can you get. Especially when one makes a fool out of themselves like I did. Surprise surprise there hahaha. So when you first get to the museum, there is this really creepy looking wax figurine of a guy being held up by shackles and whatnot. Now, if you know me, my imagination goes bonkers, especially around things like this because I imagine a hand moving, a head turning, something on that wax figurine moving and scaring the living bejesus outta me.
Thankfully, this wax dude did not move, but it still played on my mind. The first part of the museum is old school punishment, like the Shrew's Violin, Finger screws, head cage, things like that. I would not have lasted back in those days oh my goodness. There was one sign that said "in most colonies it was against the law to swear, be caught in a state of public drunkenness, not attend church services, inappropriate behavior on the Sabbath, and unacceptable conduct between members of the opposite sex". Well I am fucked. Hahaha. And you did not want a person who had no concept of paying attention dishing out some of the punishments with things like the Baker's Baptism, which happened when the baker's bread did not weigh enough - the baker would be dunked in the central fountain in a cage-type device until the punishment administer thought that the baker was out of breath. There was no standard amount of time - it was left up to the person operating the device. That sucks. I wonder if they could interview potential punishment administers......
So then after the old school punishment, we move onto the Wild West. Things like Jesse James, Billy the Kid, Wyatt Earp, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. The good stuff. Lots of guns. Oh, watching Riya and Kalyn shoot the guns at the old west saloon was pretty funny - they need to come out to the farm and practice on some gophers hahaha. There was a picture of a real hanging where the guy's head like snapped off from the force of the hanging - how cool is that??? I just kept thinking back to the movies like Tombstone, Young Guns, American Outlaws. I still think I was born in the wrong era - to be one of the saloon girls would have been a kick ass job - I wouldn't have minded wearing the dresses they wore as they were quite sexy and purty. And then when they break out into an occasional song and dance number, how can that be topped (ie The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas style). If you don't know what I am talking about, check out this clip:
how could life get any better than this?? I think this is where I make a fool out of myself (no, not by showing you that clip, but at the museum). So we are standing around, looking at things from the era of Bonnie and Clyde, Pretty Boy Floyd, Ma Barker, the likes of them folks, and we are talking about the show The Following, telling Riya how much it was pretty good and that it didn't scare me so she should be able to watch it. Well, at that moment, I just turn to look beside me and there is this guy standing there, reading something, but looking awfully still, like wax figurine still, and he seemed to appear out of nowhere. What do I do? I scream and jump. Have a heart attack. Laugh till I cry. Those types of things.
I don't know what it was that made me so scared of seeing him but I just thought he was fake and came outta nowhere. The funny thing is that he didn't even acknowledge it so I wonder if it happens to him a lot.........Riya and Kalyn were laughing their heads off about it every time they saw the guy though. Glad I can amuse them. It would have also been pretty cool to live back in the era with Bugsy Siegal and the Flapper Girls. I would have made a kick ass flapper girl, except they were so classy looking. I don't have that classy look to me. More saloon type of a look for me I think. I don't think flapper girls were as chesty as I am.
Then we get to the good part - the serial killers part, the assassinations, things like that. The likes of Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy, Jeffrey Dahmer, The Unibomber. Sadly, that part of the museum wasn't as big as the other exhibits, but it was still exciting to see. I would have loved to be one of the people who were around us when we were in that part of the museum as we would talk about the different killing methods or what each person did, their signature, etc etc. I can tell you this though - John Wayne Gacy's fascination with clowns, that should have been an indicator right then and there for people. Clowns are creepy, end of discussion.
We get to the booking process part of the museum and now that I think about it, I shouldn't have been "booked" for criminal mischief as it was probably a ploy on the governments part to get our fingerprint (you scan a fingerprint and it prints off a "fingerprint record" of what one supposably gets booked for). I scanned as criminal mischief. Riya got prostitution. Kalyn got kidnapper. I got the boring one. But I will say this - the mug shot of Frank Sinatra.....ohhhh weeee he was a looker. Even in his mug shot. Saw a representation of Al Capone's jail cell - that guy lived in style, both in and out of prison. And, if anybody wants to know, I got the procedures on how to properly hang a person, participate in a firing squad, pull the switch on the electric chair, subject someone to the gas chamber and lethally inject a person. Oh the knowledge one gains from the museum!!!! Learnt that I cannot make the police force as I cannot do 2 pullups (pathetic, I know, but I blame the weight of the boobs). But Riya and I did participate in a swat training exercise - I took down two perps (thats the short term for perpetrators in case you didn't know).
The CSI lab was pretty cool but it was almost too sciency for my likings, but I kicked ass at fingerprint analysis, comparing bullets as well as dental comparisons. The final part was the set of America's Most Wanted and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which I learnt that none of us were part of. Which is a good thing since a) I never grew up in the States so I shouldn't have been there and b) if I was in that database, one would have thought that going through customs something should have showed up, saying I was missing or exploited......but no, they were more worried about me going to school down here.....hahaha. Overall, the museum was kick ass. I would definitely go back in a heartbeat as there is so much stuff to read and take in for everything that is there.
After the Museum, we headed off to a Washington Wizards v. Chicago Bulls game:
Michael Jordan's acting debut....... None of us who went were hardcore basketball fans; I had a very short lived basketball career - I hated the unfair calls and kept getting fouled out and whatnot but watching the game made me remember playing it and hating it hahaha. I am pretty sure my teammates liked it when I decided to quit halfway through the season (more like the coach basically said that the sport was not for me). Who knew I disliked unfair calls and had a predisposition of getting back at people...... If it rained, we would have been the first to know as our backs were against the wall and our heads were hitting the roof. They were still pretty decent seats though in the long run. And cheap. Even better. Riya was hilarious as the only thing she could think of was Harry Potter, seeing as he was a wizard, the Washington team is called the Wizards....you see the connection. So every time something exciting happened (which, in basketball means really nothing), she would shout out a characters name from Harry Potter. The one time she yelled out Hermonie Granger......I told her that calling the players a girls name, not a good thing hahaha.
During halftime we got to watch the chinese version of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. The sad thing is that Kalyn and I were singing along with the theme song.....The Wizards ended up winning the game (woohoo) but I don't know what that means in the grand scheme of things for them hahaha. I can now knock off going to an NBA game off the to-do list, although I don't think it was ever really on the list to begin with. Not sure what is next on the to-see list, but stay tuned for it.
First up is our trip to the Crime and Punishment Museum. Sadly, this is a museum that you actually have to pay for (all the other ones I have gone to and will go are free) but we got our tickets through Groupon so they were cheaper than usual, which rocks. This was probably by far one of my favorite museums so far as it just rocked. The exhibits, the information, the hands on things, so much fun. And I mean, its crime and punishment - how much more fascinating can you get. Especially when one makes a fool out of themselves like I did. Surprise surprise there hahaha. So when you first get to the museum, there is this really creepy looking wax figurine of a guy being held up by shackles and whatnot. Now, if you know me, my imagination goes bonkers, especially around things like this because I imagine a hand moving, a head turning, something on that wax figurine moving and scaring the living bejesus outta me. 
Thankfully, this wax dude did not move, but it still played on my mind. The first part of the museum is old school punishment, like the Shrew's Violin, Finger screws, head cage, things like that. I would not have lasted back in those days oh my goodness. There was one sign that said "in most colonies it was against the law to swear, be caught in a state of public drunkenness, not attend church services, inappropriate behavior on the Sabbath, and unacceptable conduct between members of the opposite sex". Well I am fucked. Hahaha. And you did not want a person who had no concept of paying attention dishing out some of the punishments with things like the Baker's Baptism, which happened when the baker's bread did not weigh enough - the baker would be dunked in the central fountain in a cage-type device until the punishment administer thought that the baker was out of breath. There was no standard amount of time - it was left up to the person operating the device. That sucks. I wonder if they could interview potential punishment administers...... 
So then after the old school punishment, we move onto the Wild West. Things like Jesse James, Billy the Kid, Wyatt Earp, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. The good stuff. Lots of guns. Oh, watching Riya and Kalyn shoot the guns at the old west saloon was pretty funny - they need to come out to the farm and practice on some gophers hahaha. There was a picture of a real hanging where the guy's head like snapped off from the force of the hanging - how cool is that??? I just kept thinking back to the movies like Tombstone, Young Guns, American Outlaws. I still think I was born in the wrong era - to be one of the saloon girls would have been a kick ass job - I wouldn't have minded wearing the dresses they wore as they were quite sexy and purty. And then when they break out into an occasional song and dance number, how can that be topped (ie The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas style). If you don't know what I am talking about, check out this clip: how could life get any better than this?? I think this is where I make a fool out of myself (no, not by showing you that clip, but at the museum). So we are standing around, looking at things from the era of Bonnie and Clyde, Pretty Boy Floyd, Ma Barker, the likes of them folks, and we are talking about the show The Following, telling Riya how much it was pretty good and that it didn't scare me so she should be able to watch it. Well, at that moment, I just turn to look beside me and there is this guy standing there, reading something, but looking awfully still, like wax figurine still, and he seemed to appear out of nowhere. What do I do? I scream and jump. Have a heart attack. Laugh till I cry. Those types of things. 
I don't know what it was that made me so scared of seeing him but I just thought he was fake and came outta nowhere. The funny thing is that he didn't even acknowledge it so I wonder if it happens to him a lot.........Riya and Kalyn were laughing their heads off about it every time they saw the guy though. Glad I can amuse them. It would have also been pretty cool to live back in the era with Bugsy Siegal and the Flapper Girls. I would have made a kick ass flapper girl, except they were so classy looking. I don't have that classy look to me. More saloon type of a look for me I think. I don't think flapper girls were as chesty as I am. 
Then we get to the good part - the serial killers part, the assassinations, things like that. The likes of Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy, Jeffrey Dahmer, The Unibomber. Sadly, that part of the museum wasn't as big as the other exhibits, but it was still exciting to see. I would have loved to be one of the people who were around us when we were in that part of the museum as we would talk about the different killing methods or what each person did, their signature, etc etc. I can tell you this though - John Wayne Gacy's fascination with clowns, that should have been an indicator right then and there for people. Clowns are creepy, end of discussion. 
We get to the booking process part of the museum and now that I think about it, I shouldn't have been "booked" for criminal mischief as it was probably a ploy on the governments part to get our fingerprint (you scan a fingerprint and it prints off a "fingerprint record" of what one supposably gets booked for). I scanned as criminal mischief. Riya got prostitution. Kalyn got kidnapper. I got the boring one. But I will say this - the mug shot of Frank Sinatra.....ohhhh weeee he was a looker. Even in his mug shot. Saw a representation of Al Capone's jail cell - that guy lived in style, both in and out of prison. And, if anybody wants to know, I got the procedures on how to properly hang a person, participate in a firing squad, pull the switch on the electric chair, subject someone to the gas chamber and lethally inject a person. Oh the knowledge one gains from the museum!!!! Learnt that I cannot make the police force as I cannot do 2 pullups (pathetic, I know, but I blame the weight of the boobs). But Riya and I did participate in a swat training exercise - I took down two perps (thats the short term for perpetrators in case you didn't know). 
The CSI lab was pretty cool but it was almost too sciency for my likings, but I kicked ass at fingerprint analysis, comparing bullets as well as dental comparisons. The final part was the set of America's Most Wanted and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which I learnt that none of us were part of. Which is a good thing since a) I never grew up in the States so I shouldn't have been there and b) if I was in that database, one would have thought that going through customs something should have showed up, saying I was missing or exploited......but no, they were more worried about me going to school down here.....hahaha. Overall, the museum was kick ass. I would definitely go back in a heartbeat as there is so much stuff to read and take in for everything that is there. 
After the Museum, we headed off to a Washington Wizards v. Chicago Bulls game: Michael Jordan's acting debut....... None of us who went were hardcore basketball fans; I had a very short lived basketball career - I hated the unfair calls and kept getting fouled out and whatnot but watching the game made me remember playing it and hating it hahaha. I am pretty sure my teammates liked it when I decided to quit halfway through the season (more like the coach basically said that the sport was not for me). Who knew I disliked unfair calls and had a predisposition of getting back at people...... If it rained, we would have been the first to know as our backs were against the wall and our heads were hitting the roof. They were still pretty decent seats though in the long run. And cheap. Even better. Riya was hilarious as the only thing she could think of was Harry Potter, seeing as he was a wizard, the Washington team is called the Wizards....you see the connection. So every time something exciting happened (which, in basketball means really nothing), she would shout out a characters name from Harry Potter. The one time she yelled out Hermonie Granger......I told her that calling the players a girls name, not a good thing hahaha. 
During halftime we got to watch the chinese version of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. The sad thing is that Kalyn and I were singing along with the theme song.....The Wizards ended up winning the game (woohoo) but I don't know what that means in the grand scheme of things for them hahaha. I can now knock off going to an NBA game off the to-do list, although I don't think it was ever really on the list to begin with. Not sure what is next on the to-see list, but stay tuned for it. 
Nice. A visit to a museum that caters to several of your favorite interests. Have to smile at the vision of you playing basketball. I think that sport is not quite suited to you! Can't wait for the next adventure. :)
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