And the useless back:
Let me run down the day:
6:30am- D and I plan to get up.
6:45am- We oversleep and wake up then.
7am- Leave D's house in NE for bus stop.
7:20am- Give up on our bus and take another as close a we can get.
8am- After fighting the crazed crowds and cold, we arrive at Silver Gate, which does not open until 9am.
8:45am- We find the end of the Silver Gate line. This line then winds all the way around the block, overlapping. Yeah, I am impressed with the hippies.
9am- Gate opens and we start to move. We meet very nice people in line. They had a worse time than us being that the maps on the back of their tickets did not have the "Use Enclosed Map" sticker (or map for that matter)... so they had tried to get in the non-existent entrance on the NW side of the Mall. Totally sucky.
9:15am- The line disintegrates when "officials" direct us to Maryland Avenue. The 6 person-wide line then turns into a 30 person-wide stampede for the gate.
9:16am- People get jammed up and cannot get to the gate. The problem is that people thought that it wouldn't matter that they didn't have tickets and they would just follow the crowds and get as close as possible. They are clogging out way so D and I have to go old school and elbow our way through. Yes, little children and old people were probably hurt in the process but whatever!
9:25am- D and I enter security check point. There was no line. No one checked our tickets. No one asked me what was in my pockets. All the clogging people could have just walked in and stopped screwing up the flow of foot traffic.
9:30am- D and I eat our snacks and watch all the stupid around us. I inform him that I will be clapping for W. when he comes out and my feelings would not be hurt if he didn't want to stand next to me!!
11am- They begin introducing everyone and their mother. Kid next to me is "videoing the highlights for YouTube- when Bush is out and Obama is in." And he holds the camera over his head and pans around, saying, "There is an estimated 4 million people here on the Mall today!" I turn to him and say, "That's just a lie. And impossible." D agrees that there is no way the laws of physics would allow 4 million people to fit on the National Mall. Kid next to me tries to get away from us.
(If anyone can find his sad, little video, I would love to post it!!!)
11:30am- Ceremony has started. Kid next to me officially hates me after all my cheering for Bush. No one was happy with the speakers... my favorite part was the Skittle Speech... "When white will embrace what is right"- Dr. Joseph Lowery.
12 noon- Biden is sworn in and is President for 5 minutes.
12:05pm- Obama sworn in. D and I have watched the entire thing on a portable TV brought by the people in front of us. Speech was lame so I started texting my warm hippie friends, who were smart enough to stay inside.
12:30pm- Speech wraps up. We have no interest in the poem. Apparently, she started her reading with, "I worked really hard on this." Ummm, yeah, I hope so.
1pm- We have finally got past the Jersey barriers but cannot cut through the mass of people. We cannot even see the Metro Station. We fight our way onto the highway. Seriously.
2pm- Finally get back to D's house. I am elated. On the walk back, a woman stopped us and thanked us for coming out to support President Obama. D said "You're Welcome." I wanted to call her racist but I was too cold to react.Overall.... overrated. However, the event is normally overrated. I enjoyed the last one more because we got better tickets and Republicans are pretty organized. Considering the Democrats haven't had one of these in awhile, they are rusty. This one was big and I am glad that no matter who won this election, we are making steps to break down barriers in our political culture. Now, if only that would apply to industry and other roles in general.... then, maybe, there could be some real change.
Have a Happy Celebration of Another Bloodless Transfer of Power!
