Washington DC at last

I was fortunate enough to travel to Washington DC for a conference this past week. The conference is called RSA or "Research Society on Alcoholism".

It is my favorite yearly conference because this is the one that is solely focused on alcohol research. All the talks and presentations apply directly to my research in some way. It is very different from the larger conferences where there are only a few talks that seem interesting. Everyone reunites once a year, and it is like seeing family. And it is inspiring to see how many people share the common goal of researching about alcohol. I presented some data, too, and that seemed to go over well. :)

I hadn't been to DC since I was 7 or 8 years old, so I didn't remember very much about the city. I fell in love with it over this week. We stayed downtown, so we could walk to a lot of fun sights, restaurants, and shops, and the metro got us anywhere else we needed to go. I've never lived in a city that had such good public transportation, and now that I know how great it is, that will be a factor in the next place I move.

There wasn't time for much else besides the conference, but I was able to squeeze in an afternoon with Alfia! It was great to finally meet her. She was kind enough to show me around the lab at the NIH and then took me to Great Falls state park. (Which is absolutely beautiful, I highly recommend it, apparently really good for rock climbing, too). Aflia is such a lovely person with a huge heart. She teaches free classes at the NIH for her co-workers! Even though we had only met this one time, she took the afternoon off to show me around. We spent time talking about science and yoga, and she showed me some nifty tricks to open up the hips for Supta Kurmasana. :) Can't wait til the next neuroscience conference in DC this november!

Next time I am in DC I am going to make it a goal to go to "Georgetown Yoga" and "Ashtanga Yoga Center". And I'm sure I'll write about it here.