I had tickets to the Silver viewing area, which was the farthest-back ticketed area.
Jumbotron!
Oh Aretha, that hat is so fabulous.
Ole W looks a lot like his father.
The crowd behind me, fenced off into the riff-raff general public section ;-)
Flags!
This is from my cell phone camera, from Obama's final rally prior to election night on Nov 3. It was in Manassas, VA and was estimated at 100,000.
Also from my cell phone camera, a crowd of several thousand having gathered on Pennsylvania Ave to cheer after Obama's Nov 4 victory.
Back to inauguration day! I-395, which goes under the National Mall in a tunnel, was closed to cars for inauguration day.
At the very north end, where Girlfriend and I entered (we biked to the ceremony), it was pretty empty.
It started filling up as we made our way through downtown.
Passing under the Mall, it got very crowded.
Capitol, after the ceremony.
After folks left, the streets were covered in trash.
On January 21, the day after inauguration, Girlfriend and I scored invites to a reception at the White House, where we got to meet Michelle. Barack had been there, but left before we arrived, unforch. The funny this is that our invitations read "no cameras", as the Bush administration had a strict rule against photography in the White House. Hours before our group arrived, however, President Obama changed the policy. Thus we were allowed to take pictures (of the grounds, though not the Obamas themselves), but only had cell phone cameras available to do so.
The East Wing.
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