The area of Arlington, VA I live in is called Pentagon City. I’m sure you can guess what is nearby. It’s really a great area, there are tons of things nearby and I rarely get in the car, except of course for my many trips to the ever popular Container Store.

Its really kind of funny for me, not really being around alot of military installations in my life. There was an Air Force base in Myrtle Beach when I was growing up, but I don’t really ever remember seeing alot of people walking around in uniform, unless I was visiting friends who lived on the base. But here you see people getting on the subway, ahem Metro, dressed in fatigues all the time. Even their computer bags are military fatigue. In NYC after 9/11, you saw bunches of military people wandering around, but they were there for the safety of the city and were carrying their rifles etc. Whether they made you feel safe or rather disturb by their presence, was up for discussion, but they were around. But not just hanging out riding the metro, walking through the mall, or out for lunch. Its just kinda weird for me.

What I really find interesting though, are the advertisements in the metro and to some small degree in the neighborhood. “Our new JLTVs are on the ground” Lockheed Martin (JLTV is Joint Light Tactical Vehicles – I read the ad); “What has MOAA done at the Pentagon lately?”  (MOAA – Military Officers Association of America); Ads about Lasers and Tracking systems, new super cool jets by Boeing, you get the picture. I never thought about defense contractors doing billboards – but if you were going to do them somewhere, I guess near the Pentagon WOULD be the place to do it.

Below is a few pictures off of my balcony so you can see my view—I labeled a few things, anything else is a miscellaneous building as far as I know. Or the super secret new headquarters for some new super secret branch of the gov’t – who knows – LOL  

And no, I didn’t tile the photos together into one – too much work.

 

The view from my balcony