bethb's Diaryland Diary

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2 milllion descend

DC is a pretty sleepy city. It has a long and storied history of parties ending sensibly at 11 (even in the short 10+ years I've been here, I've seen metro's hours extend from midnight on the weekend to one and then 'til 2. And it use to stop running at 10 on sundays. Seriously.) It's far more bucolic than New York and smaller than chicago. I can't really compare it to boston or seattle or LA or atlanta so really I guess me comparing it to another city (Oh wait- cleaner than philly. more convenient public transit but otherwise, pretty similar. snobbier than philly for sure) is mildly retarded.
But I do it to say, I don't know if you've ever had about 2 million tourists dropped on where you live? but it's not fun.
For the inauguration I went to a friend's apartment where in the comfort and warmth of a couch, we watched the ceremonies, ate brunch, sipped mimosas and since we were about 8 blocks away from the capitol building, could hear the guns during the salute. it was nice. i probably would have been freaked if i was with 2 millions people in 25 degree weather for 5 hours. I am sure i would have landed in jail.
Later that night another friend and I went to the artist's ball and i had a great time. it was cold as balls and when we first got there, we stood by the heater in the tent as i drank my 2 gin and tonics (the bartender lady made me two. perhaps she read my mind, but the sad fact is, the best and fastest way to get me to ease into a situation is alcohol. which i think is one of the signs i have a problem but whateves.)
There was a stage with different acts (some really good- a funny comedian, some boring- bad burlesque, some terrible- a girl singing all that jazz and starting over because she botched the lyrics. She botched it the second time too) and a lot (a lot!) of bars. and bathrooms. And dancing. and dumb costumes (bien sur!) some i think i took photos of.
The good definitely outweighed the bad. And i got *hammered*. we took a cab back to C's and the driver was all sorts of awesome and i slept on their couch. I woke up every hour at the same time. 2:49, 3:51, 4:49, etc. it was weird and annoying and i was beginning to wonder if i was sleeping at all. it did allow me to sleep in 'til 7:30 which was nice and i went to work from their house still wearing my party wristband. bad.

7:24 p.m. - 2009-01-21

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