After all those posts about the Purple Tunnel of Doom, you might think that I didn't have a good time on Inauguration day, or even during my trip to Washington, DC. The Purple Tunnel experience did suck, but the trip, and even Inauguration Day were redeemed eventually.
I have to start with the fact that I got to spend a lot of time with Sara during the trip. It was the first time since she got back from Albuquerque that we've been able to spend a lot of concentrated time together. It was nice to take a vacation with her. I also got to hang out a lot with my Little Sister, Maria. We haven't really gotten to spend much time together since 2001 when we took a trip to New York City after 9/11. My friend Janet and I also got to hang out as well (Janet and Maria were stuck in the Purple Tunnel too).
Monday of the trip, while exhausting was a lot of fun. Sara convinced me to go to RFK Stadium and be a volunteer making care packages for the troops overseas. I dragged Maria along with me too. It was a totally crazy project called Operation Gratitude. They set up a tent covering most of a football field and in that tent they built a huge set of assembly lines. As the "Volunteers" we helped "Participants" fill zip-loc baggies with various goodies and then pack the bags into cardboard boxes. It's really hard to describe the controlled chaos going on in the tent, or really just the amazing amount of work that was done. Overall, they made 85,000 care packages and a large number of letters to soldiers. This works out to over 3.37 packages per second for 7 hours. During the day several elected officials and cabinet secretaries-designate stopped by and helped. Michelle Obama also stopped by at one point. It was a lot of fun to be caught up in the Mayhem.
Monday Night, after stopping by for some cocktails with Sara's Emily's List Friends, we went to the Netroots Nation Ball. We were late getting there, so I don't think we really got to see as much of it as I would have liked, but if we hadn't been so wiped out from getting to Operation Gratitude at 8:00 AM, I think we would have had a good time. As it was, the food was good, and the last little bit of Howard Dean's speech was excellent. We went out to drinks after that and met up with some of Sara's friends from New Mexico. It was a fun little packed party at a bar, and I didn't end up getting home until almost 2 AM - in hindsight, I probably should have just gone straight to the Mall and gotten in line.
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