The Ritz-Carlton in Arlington, VA (a.k.a. Pentagon City) is where the wire-wearing Linda Tripp met with Monica Lewinsky to get her to dish about Bill Clinton. While FBI agents listened in from one of the suites upstairs, the ladies had a nice little drink and some girl talk in the very bar where I am now writing this, having sequestered a comfortable sofa and a glass of Mondavi Fume Blanc (me, that is, not Linda and Monica).

There is a well-lit humidor on the other side of the room, which would be enticing if I smoked cigars. A tuxedoed fellow is playing light cocktail lounge classics on the piano in the corner. The well appointed middle-aged ladies across from me are chattering about salons and spas and the trouble communicating with the immigrants in the service industries. Many patrons are taking high tea, served on fine china, with loose leaf tea in strainers. (Tea bags? Heaven forbid!) All accompanied by fresh strawberries and creme.

Upstairs, the maid has just performed the evening turn-down service on my room: The drapes are closed, the clock radio is tuned to quiet classical music station, one corner of my bedding has been folded over to facilitate entry, and two small chocolate wafers (one dark, one milk) have been placed on my bed stand.

In the morning I can have my choice of the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Washington Post, or any combination thereof sitting outside my door. The honor bar is full of gourmet snacks. There is a thick and soft -- possibly down -- mattress pad to make the bed extra comfy. The bathroom counter is made of marble and there is no little sign asking me to be environmentally conscious and re-use my towels.

You could hang here, is what I'm saying.

There is also a four story shopping mall attached, should you feel the need to sample the squalor of the real world, but you'll need your room key to get back in -- can't have the rabble traipsing through, now can we?

All hotels should be like this. Would anyone be against that? How cool would it be to be able to take High Tea at the Motel 6 out by the interstate? Seriously, if you ever get a chance to stay at the Ritz-Carlton in Pentagon City do not pass it up. To quote Ferris Beullar, "It is so choice."

And yet, there is still the petty bugaboo that plagues all the high-end hotels that I have ever stayed in. Specifically, the honor bar is criminally overpriced and there is really no other late-night option for a quick snack or a bottle of water. Why is it that the mid-levels like Sheraton or Hilton Garden Inn have this issue sorted out but the top properties don't? Makes no sense.

I have no data on the state of the honor bar when the FBI vacated their suite, but I'm betting they were reprimanded for the Godiva chocolate smears on the transcripts.

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This was to be an extended trip, sponsored primarily by my day job. A conference in DC one week followed by a conference in Chicago the subsequent week. No sense in going home in between, the net result being a free day or so in both cites.

Normally, when I am in the DC area I spend my time in the northern VA 'burbs with my Reston crew. Or I'm in Maryland with a rental car, bopping around Annapolis or the Baltimore Inner Harbor. In the absence of these two alternatives, I was limited to the city proper, or what was reachable by the DC Metro.

There are very few cities more poorly managed than my birthplace of Detroit, but DC is one of them. It remains, to my understanding, the only city to elect a crackhead as mayor, and then re-elect him with the full knowledge that he was a crackhead. The current administration (from the non-crackhead party), is like all previous ones in living memory: consummately corrupt from the mayor's office down to the cop on the beat. Between the local government employees hired via favoritism and the entrenched federal government union workers, there is a large cross-section of the workforce that has no incentive whatsoever to actually do any work at all, never mind provide good service to their customers. Most of the rank and file carries a contemptuous detachment and outright surly demeanor. The only relief you get is in the Asian run convenience stores and the finer hotels and restaurants.

You see this everywhere. The Metro is actually clean, efficient and safe, but the workers apparently have no knowledge of the words "please", "thank you" or even "excuse me". Questions are answered with a curt disdain, if you are lucky enough not to be ignored as they chat with their friends. Or, upon entering a museum or government building, if you don't immediately pause to allow security to inspect your bag -- and there is really no reason you should expect to have to do this -- instead of "Excuse me ma'am, I need to check your bag before you enter," you get "Check your bag! Check your bag!" barked at you. Understandable I suppose since a Smithsonian museum guard is in a position of terrifying responsibility and being polite to a mom trying to control her three kids who can't wait to see the dinosaurs would be a fatal sign of weakness to any terrorist who was watching.

I have an annoying tendency to go off topic, don't I? Anyway, DC is not really a walking city, so with only the Metro at your disposal, the best way to spend a single day is at The Mall. There are other places reachable by Metro, but The Mall has the highest concentration of stuff that can be done in a single day. Here follows a brief guide:

Technically, The Mall is the roughly 1 1/4 x 1/4 mile stretch between the Capitol in the East and Washington Monument in the West. Within that span are a number of museums, which I will get to in a moment. For the larger picture, if you consider the Washington Monument as the center of a cross, to the East as I said, is The Mall. To the North, there is a large lawn in the shape of an ellipse, called The Ellipse, immediately past which is a stately white house called, The White House. Clever, eh?

To the South is the Tidal Basin. Think of it as an oversized pond about a mile in circumference surrounded by a serene pathway that leads through the heart of cherry blossom country. The blooming of the cherry blossoms in the spring is a cause for a nice big festival. At the far end of the Tidal Basin stands the Jefferson Memorial.

To the West, at the opposite end of a large reflecting pool, called The Reflecting Pool, is the Lincoln Memorial. Surrounding The Reflecting Pool are The Vietnam Memorial, The Korean War Memorial, and the new World War II Memorial.

The area in its entirely is called The National Mall and Memorial Park and you do not want to try to cover all of this in a single day; maybe not even in a single weekend, depending on your stamina and the cushioning in your shoes, although for a price you can ride a sightseeing bus that trolls the area. If you wanted to cover everything in detail -- Capitol and White House tours, hit all the museums including IMAX movies, go to the top of the Washington Monument, guided tours of the National Gallery, and so forth, you may be looking at full work week. You would also have to reserve post trip time to have your head examined. The only people disturbed enough to do something like that are the inveterate type-As who go back for third and fourth puke-inducing helpings at some $9.95 all you can eat breakfast buffet so they can brag about what a deal they got; maybe even show slides.

The Reflecting Pool area and the Tidal Basin are really only for wandering. The memorials and the monuments in those areas are just that -- structures you see, contemplate briefly, take a snapshot to bore your friends with, then walk on. It is a lovely area to stroll around in, although you are best to avoid high summer heat and low winter freeze. Spring is ideal, if crowded, during Cherry Blossom time. Fall is very nice too. You can get food from one of the vendors and have yourself a little picnic.

If you have rugrats in tow, your options are probably more limited. You could try to drag them through the White House and the Capitol in the interest of civic education because, dammit, they'll thank you later. Bad idea. This is a vacation -- forcing that on your kids is just a short step from the aforementioned, deeply anal, breakfast buffet economics. There will be plenty of time for them to reflect on the nature and majesty of their government after they start filing tax returns.

For the sake of the children, it's best to stick to the big three on The Mall -- the Air and Space Museum, the American History Museum, and the Natural History Museum.

Air and Space is the one kids seem to get most excited about seeing. In truth, it's not all that. If your kids (or you) are aerospace geeks, you'll do fine. Actually, they do fine even if they're not. What they'll do is barrel through every exhibit at a breakneck pace, then beg to see IMAX, then beg for some overpriced, Apollo 13 branded crap from the gift shop, then beg for some double-priced junk food from McDonalds, then get bored and tired and start whining. Keep in mind: you're making memories.

You see, these museums aren't remotely what you would call "hands-on". In the case of Air and Space, that means you are left looking at planes, spaceships, mock-ups and such. Nothing really all that fascinating unless you have an abiding interest in that stuff.

The Natural History museum comes off a bit better. Lots of reconstructed imitation dinosaur bones -- actual size and so rather impressive. There is the Hope diamond and some interesting animated displays in the geology section. There is a live insect zoo. More IMAX. A good, if unsurprisingly overpriced cafe, making it a good place to be around lunch time. Oddly, during my visit there was a special exhibition called "Baseball as America", which was essentially the Ken Burns Baseball documentary done as static displays. What it had to do with Natural History I can't fathom. It would have fit better in the American History Museum.

Contrary to what may be popular impression, the American History Museum is probably the most vibrant of the three. They do a great job of not simply rehashing dry tales of the Founding Fathers, the Civil War. They have a good grip on pop culture -- now that pop culture is old enough to have a history -- Dorothy's ruby slippers, Indiana Jones' jacket and hat, and so forth. It will probably be the most relatable one for your kids.

There is no admission cost for any Smithsonian museum. IMAX cost extra. Get maps, locate the displays of importance, and don't try to see any museum in its entirety. Target your points of interest, get to them, and then move on. Don't underestimate the wear and tear on your soles. If you are driving in, don't try to save a few dollars by parking far away.

Since the key activity on The Mall is wandering through stately buildings and looking at things, if you have no scaled-down humanoids with you, you may as well look at stuff that is pleasing to see. My interest in politics is approximately zero, but if you are all about Hardball and How A Bill Becomes A Law, tours of the White House or the Capitol and a visit to the nearby National Archives might be right for you. For my money (which is nothing since all this is free, at least to the extent that any partially taxpayer financed enterprise is), the very best place on The Mall is the National Gallery of Art.

Even if you have only a passing familiarity with great art, you will see pieces you recognize in the National Gallery. You will probably come across a Monet or Renoir or Van Gogh that you have a print of on your wall at home or in the office. You will almost certainly discover something new and interesting to you. There are works from the Italian Renaissance that seem almost photorealistic in their use of perspective. There is a terrific set of early twentieth century American painting by George Bellows that portray a noir-ish New York City that show how little some things have changed. Also, there is a good cafe, making it another good place to be at lunch time.

Across from the National Gallery is the Hirshhorn Museum of Modern Art. With any "modern" art museum, you can count on running into a good bit of rubbish -- conceptual stuff about which the best that can be said is that it is inaccessible. Fortunately, the Hirshhorn is light on that kind of stuff. Unfortunately, it's light on a lot of stuff given that the are refurbishing at the moment. Still there are some excellent sculptures; in fact, the most interesting one is on a small lawn outside the building near the entrance. A set of life sized people, seemingly involved in some sort of gossip, whose lower halves are shaped like those bean bag toys you had when you were a kid -- you know, knock'em over and they come right back up. It's really a very fascinating thing to see, very comical. You can wander in between them and see it from different angles. For the first time; I wished I had my camera. In contrast to the other stuff, trolling the art museums can actually be relaxing.

Thus ends my discussion of The Mall. There is a lot more to see in DC, much of which is inconveniently located, but the Mall makes a very good target for some weekend tourism. Still, nobody will ever go out of their way celebrate a special event in their lives with a trip to DC. Nobody will ever visit just for an escape; there will have to be thoughtful purpose to it. DC will never be an inspiration for a song or a backdrop for a romantic comedy. It just isn't that kind of place.

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Next up was Chicago, which certainly is that kind of place. But first, that means flying through O'Hare. Apart from being the busiest airport in the world (or at least it was at one time), it's pretty friggin' far from downtown, so you get the typical big city $40+ cab ride to your hotel. And there is really nothing but a 24/7 traffic jam happening on the freeways, so don't be in too much of a hurry. To draw a contrast, the DC Metro ride from Reagan National to the Ritz was $2.25 and took about 10 minutes.

My hotel was the Palmer House Hilton, a restored luxury gem with a lobby that is utterly mind-blowing. You'd think you were in a cathedral, considering the sheer scope of the place and the beautifully painted ceilings. Definitely old school luxury. And excellent service. In my couple of visits to the concierge I got prompt and helpful responses, and as a member of the Hilton Honors program check-in took all of a three minutes.

There are two full service restaurants, a lounge and a small cafe on the premises. One of the restaurants is Trader Vic's, one of the remaining few of the legendary chain of tiki themed restaurants from the 50s/60s. As a rule, I am in favor of tiki bars, Mai Tais, Aloha shirts and campy stuff like that, but I can't recommend Trader Vic's in Chicago, though. It is dark, very dark, depressingly dark. You can't read the menu it is so dark. I had to guess where the bartender was from the sound of his voice. I did order the legendary Trader Vic's Mai Tai. When it emerged from the darkness it turned out to be nothing special and, of course, wildly overpriced. The food was sub-standard Polynesian style stuff -- basically Chinese appetizers covered with a pineapple or citrus glaze. Yuck. Maybe it would have been palatable if I committed myself to a full dinner instead of just snacks, but I don't think so. There's a reason this franchise is slowly fading away. (Now there's a great business idea: Nouveau Tiki -- it could be a fad, or dare I say it, a trend...on the other hand -- no.)

The other main restaurant is called Old Chicago, which purports to try to recreate an old time Chicago bar feel. Well, I doubt they actually succeed in that. The decor seems about as genuine as the nautical memorabilia at Red Lobster. But they must be doing something right, I stopped by twice and the place was packed each time, I couldn't even get a seat at the bar, so I can't really tell you how the food is.

The real gem is Windsor's Lounge in the lobby. This is the kind of spot I inevitably zero in on when I'm traveling. A low-key, relatively quiet lounge with those big comfy chairs and an absence of gimmickry. The kind of place where you can get a drink, some bar food, sit comfortably and write or watch TV. Every hotel of a certain size should have at least one bar like this. It is absolutely called for after a day of traveling, especially in and out of the virtually inaccessible O'Hare. Can someone please make this a legislative initiative?

That's not to say everything is peachy and perfect. The rooms are reasonably furnished but very small and not particularly luxurious. If you are big on hanging out in your room, the Palmer House Hilton probably isn't for you.

My worst experience occurred almost immediately after I arrived. It was a Sunday, and that evening was to be the season finale of The Sopranos. Fine, I figured, every hotel in the world has HBO, I can just hang out in my room and watch. No go. The Palmer House does not have HBO. I panicked. I hadn't set my VCR under the assumption that I would be able to catch it on the road. Luckily the concierge was able to direct me to a bar/Jewish deli about a block away where it was shown on the bar TV every week as an attraction (which is probably illegal and possibly not even kosher). So I watched the Sopranos while having a Goose Island Honker's Ale (local beer) and a corned beef sandwich on potato pancake bread. Beat being slumped down on my couch at home with a Snapple and leftover Thai.

There's something great about Chicago. You can spend a day and walking through the city and not only enjoy it, but be impressed by it. On a previous visit I walked from the Grant Park area a mile or two north along Michigan Ave. (the famous Miracle Mile) all the way up to round about 900 N. Michigan Ave. It was a cold January day, but it was a great walk -- I stopped in a couple of shops, had lunch at some coffee shop. There was a brightness and vibrancy to the buildings and architecture. There was also the promise of things to do and see everywhere, whether it was galleries or blues clubs or restaurants or hotels; the whole city seemed full of possibilities.

I did a smaller version of my walkabout this time and ended up at the garment district where I paused at an ultra-luxurious health club called the East Bank Club for a workout, and followed it up with about the juiciest hamburger I've ever had at this little, blue-collar corner bar on the way back. It was total yin-yang kind of thing.

Now, I wouldn't make walking my primary mode of transport in Chicago -- it's just too big. To cover healthy swaths of territory, you're best off to save your soles and get comfortable with the 'El'. (Another great thing about Palmer House Hilton is its location. You are in the mid-loop area, about one block away from the Art Institute and Grant Park. Whatever shops and restaurants you need are within a five minute walk and the 'El' pretty much stops outside your door. ) The 'El' is a fairly easy to use foot-saver, and cheap too -- $1.75 gets you to most places. It's similar to the DC Metro in that you buy a little fare card that you can load with money as needed. It is nowhere near as well-maintained as the DC Metro, but the workers are actually helpful at answering questions for visitors or helping little old ladies buy their tickets and such.

The 'El' will get you anywhere from the South Loop area where there are some of the more gritty blues clubs, up north to Lincoln Park. My first trip on the 'El' was to Wrigley Field to see a Cubs game. Naturally, the 'El' was packed. Also naturally, we were about 20 yards from the station when they experienced "technical difficulties" so we sat on the track for a good fifteen minutes. Even with the delay it was only about a 45 minute ride, so figure round about a half-hour on a typical day. The 'El' stop is pretty much right at the stadium. Great way to get to the park. (Note: by hopping the 'El' in the opposite direction -- South -- you can get to a White Sox game.)

Wrigley Field is the sort of place traditional minded baseball fans worship. They love wallowing in the history, from the ivy growing on the outfield wall to the image of Steve Bartman sheepishly fearing for his life. Perhaps it's some form of psychological compensation for a near century without a championship. I can understand people having an emotional attachment to a place because of fond memories (not that the Cubs generate very many fond memories) -- kind of like what you might feel towards a childhood home. But having been to a couple of the newer stadiums, like the beautiful PNC Park in Pittsburgh, or even Jacobs Field in Cleveland, I just can't work up a lot of enthusiasm for dark, worn down stadiums with lots of obstructed view seats, no matter how "storied" they are. I am happy to sacrifice historic purity for things like luxury boxes and concession choices and comfortable seats and plenty of bathrooms. With all due respect, and with the full knowledge that I may be asking Steve Bartman for a good escape strategy, Wrigley should go.

You can keep the famous sign on the outside. You can transplant ivy on the outfield walls. And the new shiny stadium can, and should, be built on the exact same spot because the neighborhood around the stadium in is a lot of fun. It's loaded down with bars and stands and shops and is generally a very cool place to be. It might be as much fun to be in a bar across the street from the stadium as it is in the stadium itself. But you need a new building, it's hard to deny.

By the way, the Cubs won.

Chicago also has a full slew of museums. There is what is known as "the museum campus" which includes the Adler Planetarium, the Science Museum, the Aquarium, and the Field Museum. There are free trolleys that you can ride from downtown out to, and around, the museum campus, but they are fairly unreliable and crowded. Other things equal, you're probably better off grabbing a cab. You can compare these museums to the Smithsonians on the DC Mall, only they aren't free. That is to say, lots of kids and noise -- not much of a chance for a quiet moment to appreciate anything. Of these museums the one I prefer is the Field Museum.

It is fairly easy to see that at one point the Field Museum was a hot bed of research into the natural world, at least in the vein of a Teddy Roosevelt shoot-something-and-stuff-it-for-the-sake-of-science kind of way. It features the stuffed carcasses of the famed Man-Eaters of Tsavo, around which the blasphemously bad movie The Ghost and the Darkness was based. (