lady, posting under my real identity (so much as one can have such things on the Internet. ha) to say: IF YOU ARE GOING TO DC I AM GOING WITH YOU. I don't quite know how I'll swing it on this end -- I floated the idea of the husband going up for work and us taking his mom to watch the kids and making a family trip out of it -- but midweek it may be easier for me to just go on my own. I am justifying the cost by pointing to all the work I'm doing to help clear out my dad's house, which he would have to pay a significant amount of money to movers/packers. Or something. There's logic there somewhere.

Re dancing: I would suggest contra, but I think that would make you too self-conscious? (Contra, from my experience of it, is fairly forgiving, especially of newbies; what your feet do doesn't matter much so long as you get them from point A to point B at the right time. As opposed to Scottish country dancing, where your teachers will also care about pointy toes and jump style.) So I will say that Dance Dance Revolution was my primary form of exercise for several years. Every version I've played has a Training Mode and a no-fail Workout Mode, where you can program it to throw songs at you for a certain number of minutes. (Also re private tutors: maybe find classes you would be interested in, if you were interested in classes, and contact the teacher directly?)

also: HOORAY NOVEL IDEA!