So I really think this title just takes the cake. Say it fast a few times and you will know what I mean…
Anyway I really wanted to write about the whole trip and what not. I had hoped to do this much earlier but I got caught up messing around with the picasa module for Drupal. The module author made a lot of improvements and it is really useful but there is still work to be done so I spent some time figuring out how to get images in posts. It isn’t perfect but does the trick and the really cool thing is that none of the images actually exist on my server! Woo Hoo!
So Chris and I left at like 8am Monday morning headed for D.C. I had all of my stuff ready to go and we got a bit of a late start because of the freshly fallen snow. It was really funny because we weren’t on the Pike for five minutes when I was like “Uhh dude you gotta slow down. It isn’t safe to be driving this fast under these road conditions.” He acquiesced and my stomach relaxed a bit.
It was pretty funny because I haven’t felt like that driving with anyone for awhile but when people drive aggressively it sort of pisses me off. I don’t know maybe it is because I care about myself and don’t want to get into an accident and then have to recover from a roll-over.
After an hour or so we pulled over to grab a snack and hit the head. When we were back in the car I noticed the following license plate
We both laughed because it happened to be MLK day. We kept it moving and it just seemed like we got into CT really quickly. Chris called up a friend of his and we met here in Brooklyn for lunch.
We ate at this cool Indian restaurant
The food was great and the conversation was too. Chris’ friend Allison was really cool and a great host. The owner of the Indian restaurant made us feel very welcome and talked to us for awhile. I was full and that is always a good thing…
Back on the road. More conversation and a bit of napping and of course a bridge…
We finally got to Maryland at around 10pm. We met up with Chris’s family and had some more Indian food :). It was good but what was to follow wasn’t so good.
I was pretty tired and wanted to sleep so once we got to where we were staying for the night I went straight to bed. For some reason I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t sleep where I was sleeping so I went upstairs to sleep on the floor (I was in the basement). I couldn’t sleep on the floor so I tried the couch and finally fell asleep. When I woke up an hour or so later I went back to the floor and woke up when my alarm went off at 5am.
Four shitty hours of shitty sleep. Wishing I was in my bed wondering why the hell I was there to begin with…Fucking history…whatever.
I got up and woke up Chris took a shower and we headed to the train. It was cold. Standing there on the platform I started wondering where the hell we were going to. As an aside the trains were really nice and it seemed like they really flew down the tracks. The stations were really new and so were the trains so I would guess the train got up to 60 mph.
The Shady Grove line
Twinbrook –> Metro Center
“Have your passes ready” The Metro people were saying as they let us pass through an open gate. I said aloud after some thinking “Why the hell don’t they just make the T free for today?” Then they wouldn’t have needed hundreds of city workers present looking at peoples stupid passes. I wonder if the overtime pay and what they actually made will balance out.
Suit-up, escalators, street level. Which way now? I pull out my GPS and Chris goes right up to a cop to ask him. This act sort of pisses me off but I go with the flow. The cop rambles something and we start following all of the other people. It was just a sea of people moving to meet at similar spots. All along the way the street were littered with MERCHANDISING! Obama flags, pins, t-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, and posters. Tons of people finding a way to make money off of an odd duration. This almost always makes me sick, but whatever I am a pansy.
Stuck at Starbucks…We want to get a coffee but there is no way for us to get in the door. Out comes the GPS-Google Maps and a search for Starbucks…11th St off we go…
We were close to the Starbucks when Chris notices some people with Starbucks coffee cups and then asks them where they got there coffee. I totally got pissed since we already looked at the GPS and were going to 11th St. I let out my frustration and well we got to the Starbucks…
Argh writing about this is actually pissing me off. Oh I forgot about one of the best parts already: When we were by the first Starbucks and walking toward the other Starbucks I turned around and noticed a guy on his cell phone. It was Val Kilmer! I tried to get my camera out but he was long gone.
Starbucks. Coffee. Back in the cold. Back to the first Starbucks. Garbage can filled to the brim with mine coffee cup on the top
More walking. Masses of people. I was trying to get a better perspective. Argh. Actually it was around this time that my friend Jay called me and we talked for a bit. Chris asked a beautiful woman to take our picture and she did. I noticed that she had a purple scarf on and I thought about how the color was unique enough for it to be used as a way to spot her should she get separated from her group. The funny thing is she was standing there all alone…
Yep just like a meat grinder all of us were trying to get into that small hole off into the distance
It didn’t take all that long for us to get to the gates. Once we did they processed us: looked in bags and whatnot. Chris was in and I was at the final guard and he looks at me, smiles, and says “No Backpacks.” I said something stupid I’m sure and then he looked at his partner and said something. His partner said “No Backpacks unless it is absolutely essential. Not just for convenience.”
All I could think of was some stupid remark about his stupid comment about convenience. Why Sir actually my backpack is where I keep my iron lung. Denied. Turned away. Not willing to fight. I looked at Chris told him I couldn’t get in and thought about how when we were in the car he said to me “What do you need your backpack for?” Personally I just wanted it and probably would have taken it regardless…I walked off and was promptly let back out into the sea of people…It felt like I was free and imprisoned at the same time, or maybe I mean banished. Whatever its all the same difference.
I started walking back towards this Hotel that Chris and I said we would meet at should we get separated. It was really cold and I needed to either keep walking or get to some heat soon. I walked over toward another gate…every area of this place was blocked off by fences that would be easily climbable but you would have probably gotten shot.
The area that I was in was swarming with snipers (I am sure all areas had snipers). I looked up and then could see the whole world of government killers flying about on roof tops.
I guess I got bored…some people were talking about how they were going to get in and I told them they needed to go to third street. One of the guys actually said “Who gave us the intel on where to get in?” He asked me why I didn’t go in, you know, to question my information. I simply rotated my hips a bit showing off my backpack and they all smiled.
They must have been friends with that guard. Maybe they were killed on their way to the gate.
So I made my way to the hotel and at this point I was pretty despondent. Once again alone feeling somewhat sorry for myself. I thought about going to a meeting as a subsequent fist waving to all of the festivities and goings on, but it was only 10:30 or so.
I called some friends but no one was around…left messages…
The concierge made me aware of a tent across the street which had heat and a big TV broadcasting The Wall. Access to the tent came at a cost for the heat and ten bucks was worth it for my share of the heat. Still I argued because I had a 2 dollar off coupon from the hotel (which I wasn’t staying at). She gave me some crap about how they lowered the price and that the coupon would give me 2 dollars off of the original price and not the newly discounted price. She did give me the option of paying more than 10 dollars in which case she would have taken the coupon. I let her know that I didn’t know what she was talking about and that I didn’t have anything to do with any of that nonsense. I was just giving her what was given to me and that I had no knowledge of any of it.
I didn’t give her any lip. I just stood there and let her go on and on about how the price changed. I honestly think she felt bad about charging people money to enter. I did make it clear that my lack of choice made her dialogue pretty useless. This is the type of country we live in: let the people think they actually have a choice and they will feel like they have power and therefore be civil.
I don’t know maybe I am wrong here…Maybe it is me who is the racist when I was sitting there thinking why the fuck does this have to be about color? Why can’t it just be about the best PERSON for the job? Obama appears to be the best PERSON for the job. I suppose the only reason I think that is because I am a white boy from the gated community of New Bedford. A place where racism doesn’t exist and inter-class hatred is burning brighter than Farah Faucetts bed.
It isn’t easy being a racist. Especially one that has been discriminated against fairly and equally by HIS own people. Put that in your pipe and stick it up your ass. We always talk about how one group is affecting the other. We focus on our differences rather than our similarities, but we never talk about what is going on in each of our groups. How we are killing each other off and we don’t even need to leave our gated communities.
I think the funniest thing about all of it is that we are not freaking separate. Yes I know each of us has our challenges but we are in this together whether we like it or not. I really don’t give a shit if you are black, an alien life form, white anglo saxon protestant. Do you need a hand? Can you spare me a hand? How the FUCK can I help you get to the next step of whatever we call life?
I grew up in New Bedford. I really don’t know if it was diverse. It was what it was. I do know that I felt put off by my peers and I just about never felt welcome ANYWHERE. I have come to realize that some of that stuff was true and some of that stuff wasn’t. Once thing that is absolute is that I mustn’t give up and I cannot let anyone tell me where I belong. I am the master of my destiny no matter how hard the course. And yes that course has been easy in some areas and much more difficult in others. Your mileage may vary…
I can see the hope offered by this man and his cabinet. I can see that it is exactly what this country needs to move past whatever it was that the current Bush installation has done. I think it is great, as Obama himself said, he could be elected to govern a country regardless of the color of his skin. And to be able to do that in the time frame of a generation. Maybe this is exactly what we all need so that we can once and for all realize that we are all in this together whether we like it or not.
Shallow words from a white boy coming up in the gated communities of good old New Bedford Mass. By the way what part of someone saying to me that my life was easy because I am white isn’t racist? I usually laugh when someone presents that argument because clearly they clearly haven’t lived my life and don’t know what it is like to have been me. Conversely I don’t know what it is like to be black or any other color than white and when someone runs that play on me I can only assume their life must have really sucked because mine was no bed of roses.
Well I’m glad I got that off of my chest and have really no idea where it came from…We drove back from D.C. but not before I spotted another star! We were walking to Bobby Vans to eat and I noticed Bill Murray! I said his name aloud and he didn’t seem to respond but I am almost positive that it was him. When I noticed his face I immediately could see him holding flowers on the cover of JJ’s move Broken Flowers.
This is probably the longest post I have ever written and I hope I never write another one like it. It is just too much work.
I’m opening up comments to anyone so feel free…