Museums...

Yesterday was my 3rd time to Graceland and it gets better every time. Of course, the older I get, the more appreciative I am... but those tricky marketers really know how to entice you. Since I was here last, they've added the Private Presley museum and re-packaged everything to look just a bit better than before. Fortunately we are visiting the area in the off season so the lines were non-existent and we walked through the mansion pretty much by ourselves.

Ethan's favorite room was the den, aka "the jungle room". Back in the day Elvis turned this room into a temporary recording studio, turns out that the green shag carpet on the floor and ceiling made for really good acoustics.

My favorite is still the TV lounge in the basement. Something about the bright colors and the freaky monkey on the coffee table has always attracted me.

Today we visited the Private Presley and the National Civil Rights museums. The Private Presley museum was a small room filled with displays of the King's service uniforms. It took about 15 minutes to look at everything and watch the video of the press release that was recorded the day of his return to the Memphis. The National Civil Rights Museum was much more interesting. The museum was built around the Lorraine Motel, where Dr. MLK was assassinated in the late '60s. The museum is a good place to be reminded of the past and be thankful of today. We even came face-to-face with Jackie Smith, 21-year-plus protester of the energy and money spent on the museum.

Tomorrow: we celebrate.