May 28-30, 2009
- Brad flew into Philadelphia early Thursday for work and Nick came in on Thursday evening. After arriving around 9 PM, he met Brad at the Embassy Suites hotel, which was located at Ben Franklin Parkway and 18th St.
- Brad had to work Friday morning, so Nick explored the area, walking from the hotel down to City Hall.
view of City Hall from hotel
- From there took Market St to the National Constitution Center at 6th and Arch. The experience was a bit frightening - hundreds of school kids, screaming and running around the place. The Center itself was really interesting - a very detailed look at how the US Constitution was created, its purpose and how it has functioned from the creation of the United States to the current day.
Visitors start with a presentation from an actor about the history of the Constitution and how the definition of "We the People" has changed over time. From Wikipedia: The main exhibit hall is circular and presents three concentric rings of exhibits: the outermost a chronology of Constitutional history featuring artifacts and original documents, the second ring of interactive exhibits based on the preamble to the Constitution, and the inner ring featuring "talk backs" and ways to participate in the Constitutional dialogue. - After touring the NCC, Nick met up with Brad at Independence Mall State Park, just down the block.
After touring the Liberty Bell Center, we walked to Christ Church Cemetery, where Benjamin Franklin is buried. We then went through Christ Church, which was built between the 1720s and 1740s, and was the tallest building in North America. 
- After touring the church, we went to a bar in the Old City district and had lunch and a couple beers, where we experienced a sighting of Danny Bonaduce and a skanky lady friend. Life: complete.
- After having a couple drinks (and lunch) we headed back to the hotel and got ready for a Phillies baseball game. First we got in touch with Nick's friend McKenzie and she came downtown to pick us up in the pouring rain. We went to her place and had a couple beers and hung out with her and her boyfriend. It was still raining on and off, so the game was starting to look questionable. After a while, though, it cleared up so we took the subway to Citizen's Bank Park.
It ended up being a great game. After that, we were going to take a cab back to McKenzie's but no cabbies seemed to know that we were actually speaking English when describing the area of the city in which she lived. So we hopped back on the subway and hit up a bar next to the hotel, where McKenzie and John met up with us for a drink. - On Saturday, we got up in the morning and went downstairs to the hotel restaurant (a TGI Friday's) where whilst eating, Nick noticed a hair in the eggs and a wood chip in the potatoes. Yum.
- After that delicious breakfast, we walked to the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Nick ran up the stairs (you know, like in the movie Rocky) while Brad worked hard at making a video of the event (video may be linked here soon if we find it - it truly is spectacular). The museum is fairly large, and we got 'misplaced' a couple times. When we left, we walked down Ben Franklin Parkway to the Academy of Natural Sciences to check out a gecko exhibit that we noticed. After walking through the first 3 floors, Brad started getting anxious, because up until then, it was essentially an elementary school field trip - dinosaur exhibits, cheesy stuffed animals in glass cases, etc. Finally we found a door that was for the gecko exhibit and we were relieved to see that there were LOTS of different kinds of geckos that we could stare at and learn about.
- Back to hotel, packed, and walked down the street to a restaurant called the Mexican Post for lunch - where Brad was promptly shit on by a bird immediately after sitting down at the table on the patio. Luckily he had his bag with him, as we were on the way to the airport, so he was able to change.
- On to the airport, and back to Memphis!
