the great badass imposers

I traveled to Washington, D.C. with an amazing group of women: Bev (my mama), Wendy (my sister), Mary Jo (my cousin), and Kathy (Mary Jo's friend, now an honorary cousin). We decided we needed a name for our group and came up with "The Imposers."

We left Sunday morning and after a long drive through snow and mountains, made it to D.C. in time for dinner at La Lomita on Capitol Hill. It was great to unwind, eat awesome food, and catch up with the fam. After dinner, CousinBrent suggested we go for a late night stroll down to the Mall. Since we had been sitting in a car all day, we thought it was a great idea. Here is the east side of the Capitol...


And here is the west side where all the magic was about to happen...


On Monday we went to a Pre-Inaugural Michigan Open House hosted by the Michigan Dems. It was crazy crowded so we didn't get to meet any of the elected officials. We did, however, get to see Senator Levin and Senator Stabenow and Rep. Levin. I also ran into a dude I was in school with, Charles. I hadn't seen him since we graduated so it was funny to see him there. After the Open House we hurried over to the National Gallery of Art to meet Brent. First we stopped at the Capitol for daytime photos. Something about a Segway tour group cracks me up.


After Brent gave us a condensed tour of the National Gallery, we met Cori for lunch and went shopping at the Inauguration Superstore. There were so many vendors on the street, we probably didn't even need to go to the store.


On our way back to Cori's and Brent's, the sun was beginning to set and the light on the Capitol was beautiful!


At some point during the trip, The Imposers became The Great Imposers. Eventually, we settled on The Great Badass Imposers.

Tuesday morning we woke up early to the sound of police sirens. I think they started around 3:30 or 4. Not sure what they were doing but I think someone said they were escorting buses to the area since many of the streets had been closed off. I'm not sure why they needed sirens to escort buses on closed streets but I am pretty sure they weren't responding to emergencies every 2 minutes. CousinAaron, Lisa, and Lisa's Aunt April went to the mall at 5AM. We left Cori's and Brent's around 7:15...or 7:30? I think it was still dark. The streets were full of people making their way to the Mall. We walked by the long lines waiting to get into the ticketed areas. I was actually glad I didn't have a ticket because it was so cold and I was happy to be moving. CousinAaron had been texting updates all morning. Luckily we both have Verizon and still had service. Others in our group with different carriers lost service pretty early on. We knew where CousinAaron, Lisa, and Aunt April were standing on the Mall, but by the time we got there, it was too crowded to get to where they were. We ended up finding a spot near the Smithsonian Castle and settled in for a very long morning. It was a ridiculously long morning. Freezing cold. Super dry and dusty. I had to wipe the dust off my camera every few minutes. We had a fun group and we were actually able to stay in pretty good spirits. The crowd was friendly. I was glad the sun was shining. I wasn't able to see the jumbotrons for more than a glimpse here and there. It didn't really matter. When President Obama took the oath (thanks for nothing, Chief Justice!), it was an amazing moment that brought tears to my eyes. I will always remember where I was when he took office. I will always remember the warm and fuzzy feeling in my heart even though my extremities were frozen and about to fall off. Eventually I snapped out of my little President Obama trance and lifted the camera to take some photos...




I think even the snipers were full of joy and happiness.


President Barack Obama. Has a nice ring to it...

inauguration day.

I am absolutely exhausted so am not going to post much right now. We are leaving D.C. early tomorrow morning so I hope to get some rest tonight.

I just want to say that today was amazing. emotional. wonderful. hopeful. crowded. freezing temps but warm crowd.

I can't help but feel my life will never be the same, in a good way.

I'll post photos and stories soon.

i have two birthdays

Well, kind of. I have a birthday, the day I was born, and I have an "anniversary," the day I started my life with my new adoptive family. When I was growing up, my family and I always celebrated my anniversary. I'm not sure why they called it that and I'm not sure it makes sense but I guess it works. We would all go out to dinner and my parents would give me a little gift. As a kid, it seemed like a great idea because who doesn't like a celebration in their honor? And I always chose to go to Bill Knapp's for dinner because their chocolate cake was fan-fucking-tastic. I apologize for the bad word but I cannot think of any other way to describe it. As an adult, it's no longer about celebrating with gifts and dinner. It's about remembering this life-changing event and being thankful for the family that I love so much and that has loved me and has never made me feel I wasn't one of their "real" kids.

Yesterday was my anniversary. I went out to dinner with a good friend to celebrate her birthday. It was so nice to catch up and laugh and eat yummy food, even though there was no cake. When I got home, I had a voicemail from my parents. They sang a happy anniversary song and said they love me. It was fan-fucking-tastic.

welcome to cooperstown

Rickey Henderson and Jim Rice were voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. I am sure Rickey Henderson is very excited and happy about Rickey Henderson getting voted in on Rickey Henderson's first time on the ballot.

I am actually looking forward to his induction speech.

Something about him just makes me giggle.

Maybe because he comes off as a total nut job.

I am not sure why those sentences had to be their own lines. I think I'm tired. Yeah. That must be it.

strength training.

I just read what I wrote in this post and feel I must apologize in advance. Feel free to stop reading right now.

In preparation for inauguration day, I am working on strengthening my bladder. That's right, I wrote it. I keep reading and hearing things like, "there will be 1 porta-potty for every 6,000 people." Of course, I don't have a link for this because it was in an article when "they" were still expecting the entire world to show up on the mall on January 20. However, even if half the world shows up, or a quarter of the world, or half of the number they originally expected, there still aren't going to be enough places to pee. I worry about these things. A lot. And the more I worry, the more I have to pee. So I decided to be proactive and am in bladder training. I am drinking lots of water so by the time January 20 rolls around, my bladder will be strong and will not let me down. I have no idea if this really works. This morning I tried to convince Jesse that it is true. That after I start drinking water on a regular basis, I don't have to pee as often. The truth is, it doesn't matter if it really works. My brain will know that I am used to drinking at least 32 ounces of water a day. And when I don't drink that on January 20, my brain will know I won't have to pee.

I'm also thinking of buying some adult diapers and practicing using them. Just kidding. Kind of. When Joel and I lived together we had this great plan. We were going to get a minikeg, preferably the Molson Canadian one with the Red Wings, set it between our recliners, and drink beer all night while watching tv. How would this be different than any other night? We were going to wear diapers so we never had to get up to pee. Unfortunately, we never had the chance to carry out this plan. We never had the chance to put a target up on the back door and shoot bottle rockets at it from down the hall. We did, however, get to refuse to let Seth in the door and then throw rotten fruit out the window at him when he came to visit. Those were the days...

pennsylvania has a lot of history.

We swung by Gettysburg, PA on the way home.

it's 2009

I don't do the whole new year resolution thing, maybe because I spend so much time at work writing resolutions. Or maybe because I suck at following through with stuff. Oh well. I do hope to post more crap here this year. We'll see how that goes!

We just got home from DC on Friday. I'll be heading back on January 18 for inauguration madness. I took this photo last week. On January 20 I will pretend to be standing this close but am sure I will be waaaaay far away.