Day 1: Really, Am I That Dumb?

Dear Diary-

At approximately 4:30 this morning I took a shower. After that shower, I made my final preparations to fly to Baltimore to begin my Washington D.C./ Inauguration trip. At approximately 5:50 am, I went downstairs with all my bags. This was beginning of my "Million Bag March." I was so prepared. I brought 10 pairs of socks, 10 pairs of underwear, 2 coats, a book bag with all my schoolbooks and this wonderful lab top I am writing on now, and other such things necessary for this sort of undertaking. Because my hands were full, I had placed my cell phone in the back pocket of my jeans. When I put on my boots, I sat on my stairs and placed my cell phone next to me. Soon after Cara, Sarah, and I were walking out the apartment door in order to begin our adventure.

Our wonderful roommate, Krisno, had offered to drive us to the airport, so I piled my bags in his trunk. At this point I had to move my car, so I moved my car safely to the side street; and hopped into Krisno's car, Diet Coke in hand, ready to take on the world. The Diet Coke had been in my car and had frozen just a little, so it tasted a bit like a slurpee. I thoroughly enjoyed it, so much so that I never realized I did not have my cell phone with me. As we approached O'Hare, I asked Sarah to call my phone to see where I might have placed it. No ring in the car. We got to the airport. No ring in the trunk. The phone must have been left in the car when I moved it.

I decided that my phone was a necessity because I would have to call my Aunt Moe while in D.C. We were early enough that Krisno was able to drive me back to the car to obtain my phone. Nope, not in the car. Must be in the apartment. And you guessed it, it was on the stair where I had left it. While retrieving my phone, our wonderful dog, Aki, decided to run all over the hallway. So, in turn, I also ran all over the hallway trying to get this damn dog back into the house. I finally cornered him, acted like I was really excited to run in the apartment, and tricked him. Yes, he is dumb. So, I run down the stairs, phone in hand, back into Krisno's car, and he drives me back to O'Hare airport.

Cara had obtained my boarding pass and met me before security, helped me with a couple of my bags, and we made it through security with approximately 15 minutes to spare before the flight was scheduled to depart. Sarah was at the gate. The door had been closed but we were allowed through. And yes, we made it onto the plane. I thought to myself, "Barack Obama, you are so right, yes we can."

We were seated in the last row of the plane. We had the luxuries of seats that did not recline and a wonderful screaming child sitting next to us. There was no overhead space left, so me and my 2 coats, bookbag, bag, and purse fit nicely into my middle seat. To put icing on the cake, US Airways is so kind and so concerned about the welfare of their passengers that they serve you tap water. No snacks, no drinks, no bottled. Tap water. To their credit, I guess they spend their money on good pilots. I believe we were not even ordered offered the tap water, but I had fallen asleep by that point.

Did I mention this was the first leg of flight? This flight went pretty well. We landed in the beautiful city of Philadelphia, PA. We deplaned and me and my bags proceeded to take a shuttle to a different terminal to board our flight. When we arrived in the new terminal, I ate a delicious egg, cheese, and bacon on a bagel from Au Bon Pon and then proceeded to the gate. Our plane was not at its gate, but we began to notice that all of the other planes were a little small and there was no skybridge. I have always told myself I would never fly on a small plane, only big jets, small planes crash. But when your propeller plane arrives to take you to Baltimore, there is nothing else you can do. While I did not quite like this idea, I boarded the plane somewhat confidently knowing that my emergency Xanax was in my bag. I flirted with taking it but decided to wait.

The inside of the plane was about the size of a CTA bus. And guess where we were sitting? The back row, which in CTA fashion had 5 seats straight across. The overhead bins could carry no more than a newspaper, so once again me and my bags fit in the second seat from the window. Cara won the lotto and got to sit directly in the middle with no one in front of her. We were waiting for the propellers to start propelling when the pilot announced that Barack Obama's train was moving through the Philadelphia area so it was now a no fly zone. We waited briefly and then took off. I perused the Sky Mall catalog and then fell asleep. I woke up to the plane moving a lot like a roller coaster. Instead of taking my emergency Xanax, I put down my head and pretended I was on a very bumpy Lake Shore Drive. Worked perfectly.

We landed and deplaned in Baltimore. We went into the bathroom and spent close to an hour trying to make ourselves look pretty. Not sure if it worked. At about this point, I realized I had no idea where my phone was. I had never put in on silent for either plane because I had no idea where it was. So, I figured it would eventually ring and I would figure out in which of my million bags I had put it.

We next walked through the airport and hopped on the what they call in Baltimore a light rail, which is a train. I purchased three tickets for the train, which were never checked by anyone, so I basically wasted my money. We took the train past the Ravens stadium and Camden Yards and got off at Convention Center to go pick up our rental car. We walked a couple blocks to a hotel with a Hertz mobile. We entered the mobile and were given a beautiful red Chevy Cobalt. However, to get insurance or not to get insurance? Finally, we decided it was probably better to spend the extra money and go with the insurance, especially with the way I drive. We put our stuff in the car, bundled up, left the car in the garage, and headed over to where Barack Obama would speak at his stop on his train tour to DC.

While it was a balmy 20 degrees in Baltimore, it was still cold. I was wearing my typical two pairs of socks, boots, two pairs of pants, and as many shirt layers as I could. This thing in Baltimore was very much the same as the one I attended in Springfield, except there was about an 80 degree difference in the weather. We went through security and found the spot where we could see the best. At this time, a fur-coated man kept getting closer and closer to us. Cara said he had been hitting on her earlier. In order to keep this man away and to keep warm, we all decided to hug and rub our legs together. At this point, I looked up and realized we were on Gay Street.

Anyways, it was cold. Not you couldn't stand outside cold, just you didn't want to stand outside cold. We only had about 30 minutes to wait though, so we decided we could it. I'm not sure if the frostbite on my toes got any worse, but it definitely didn't get any better. And then I found the best way ever to try and stay warm...dancing to disco. The music on around us was some disco song that lasted about 20 minutes and I danced the whole time and continued to dance when it ended and continued to dance throughout the 15 speeches various politicians made before Barack Obama and during his speech. Dancing keeps your toes and feet off the cold ground; however, I couldn't use my arms because they were busy trying to keep my fingers warm. Anyways, I was so busy dancing and so cold that I didn't really listen to him speak. But I figured, he never really says anything that different anyways...change is coming or here or something like that. So, as soon as he stop talking about whatever he was talking about we ran back to the car, which was much further now that I was frozen.

We got in the car and immediately thought about crab cakes. I was not leaving the state of Maryland without eating a crab cake. So, we drove around while Cara yelped places to go. We decided on one in Lexington Market, and as we decided, Sarah accidentally got on the expressway that lead to either Washington or NY. We took Washington and got off at the first exit we could. This is the point in the trip where we got to see the real Baltimore, and it ain't pretty. How ghetto is your city when you need a blue light camera on every other street corner? Seriously. And it wasn't just one block like that. So after our tour of the ghettos of Baltimore, we finally made our way over to this crab place in Lexington Market. However, we got there and you could only stand at high tables. And the whole thing was stands of different food places all right next to each other, kind of like a carnival. Anyways, we decided to go somewhere else.

We got in the car, drove the wrong way down a couple of one way streets (Baltimore doesn't appear to label these very well), and navigated our way over to Bertha's, which appeared to be in a non-ghetto neighborhood, possibly the only one in the city. At this point, we labeled ourselves Lewis, Clark, and Sacajawea, because the day had so far been filled with navigation and adventure. I decided I was Sacajawea because I really just sat in the back, took the occasional nap, and didn't really help in the navigation process. From the way we were looked at when we entered the bar part of Bertha's, I got the impression that these men may have never seen women before or we all had 666 on our foreheads. Either way, we were directed towards the restaurant, and I was finally going to get my crab cake. We ordered some mussels as an appetizer because the whole shtick there is "Eat Bertha's Mussels." They were delicious and none were chewy. And then I got my crab cake sandwich, which was extremely delicious. I think we may have to go back to Baltimore for more crab cakes. After cleaning our plates, we played our favorite game- set up the camera and put it on the timer with multiple shots and take pictures of ourselves. A nice waiter did offer to take a picture of us, but we kindly informed him that we actually like doing this and do it all the time. We paid and were given 3 "Eat Bertha's Mussels" bumper stickers. We left Bertha's, piled into the car, and headed towards the highlight of the trip- Hillary Clinton's house.

Sacajawea fell asleep in the back seat and woke up somewhere in DC to "insurance!" meaning we paid for the insurance so we could drive like assholes. And every time we did, we simply said, "Don't worry, we have insurance." I was asleep, so I don't know how long it took, but we made it to Hillary's house. It was very cute and on a dead end street. It was a three floor colonial type place, with one light on on the first floor, and one on on the second. I was under the impression no one was home, even though there were cars out front. We tried to get around the back, but apparently they don't have alleys in DC. We drove by a couple more times because red Chevy Cobalts are extremely inconspicuous and then turned around in the driveway. It had a circle drive, but we didn't go all the way through.

We started to drive towards the hotel and ended up at the National Mall. We found a parking spot right by the Lincoln Memorial and headed over. It was all blocked off in preparation for the concert the next day. We went over to watch the sound check and Garth Brooks was performing. He sang "American Pie," "Shout," and some freedom or America-type song. Pretty cool. Then we took pictures of the Washington Monument and headed back to the car. We drove by the White House, which you can't actually drive by, I should have figured. We were gonna head towards the Capitol, but there was too much traffic, so we just went to the hotel.

Again, I napped and woke up when we got there. Hotel- pretty nice place. One king bed for the three of us, but I don't think we would have wanted it any other way. I started to come out of my ignorance about my cell phone. I knew I had taken it through security, and after that was not quite sure. I chose to just ignore the feeling that I had lost it again, because really am I that dumb? Yes, in fact, I am that dumb. I called it from Sarah's phone and it did not ring. I did not turn it off for either of the flights because I could not find it. It was lost, probably at O'Hare. I was upset, but this isn't anything new in my life and wasn't anything to cry about, so I got over it. I guess change may be coming to America, but apparently not to my cell phone habits.

Anyways, Cara's mom sent us a care package with some wine, candy, crackers, and a candle. We settled in and I inspected my frostbite to see if it got any worse- nope, still the same. We decided to go to the vending machines and get some pop. Our floor was sold out of everything, so we headed up to the fourth floor and got a Barq's root beer. The Cherry Coke was sold out, so we headed down to the second floor. On the second floor, I hit the Cherry Coke button and got a Nestea- who the hell likes that shit. Cara hit a mystery button hoping it would be the Cherry Coke and got a water. So then, still wanting a Cherry Coke, we went to the first floor. It was all sold out as well. So then, I went back to the second floor to try my luck again with the Cherry Coke button. I gambled and I lost- Nestea again. We then headed back to the room. By the way, I did this all barefoot and in the stretchy pants I wear as my extra layer under my regular pants, basically my long underwears.

Well, I guess that's about it.