The Obama Rally

I was absolutely dedicated to seeing Barack Obama speak before he won this election. I wasn't going to tell my mom at first, because I knew that it would quite likely end in me driving a ridiculous number of hours to wherever he was on election night, or the night before, whichever I would find out was first. But sometime when I was home I sort of let it slip, and she didn't seem to have a problem with it, and neither did my dad.

Now, of course, Obama and his campaign had claimed that they would suspend all visits to Pennsylvania because they were so sure they were going to win it about a month ago, but then McCain realized it was his only path to something even close to a possible victory and began pouring all of his race-baiting and fear-mongering into Pennsyltucky. This kind of sucked, because it's terrible politics, but it increased the chances of Obama being back in Pennsylvania, which was (in a small way) good for me. As it turned out, he announced that he would be holding a rally on the quad at Widener University on Tuesday, October 28th, 2008, and my mom told me about it, and I decided this was my chance.

I also found out he was going to be in a huge stadium the Monday just before in Pittsburgh, which is closer by, but I wasn't sure how to get there and my sister and Sam couldn't go because grades were due, so I figured going home would be preferable. I was a little worried, though, that Widener wouldn't fit enough people. If I was going to an Obama rally, I wanted it to be a big one to really experience his campaign. But anyway.

So I made plans, talked with the parents, etc. I gave my fish, Gauss, to Cat, who often cares for him whenever I go away for whatever reason. She seems to like him a lot. I asked my mom if I could bring home some laundry since I hadn't done any in forever, and she said that would be fine. I didn't pack the night before because I spent all my time doing my linear algebra homework and my Math 451 assignment, and I knew it wouldn't be worth going to Econ the next day, so I'd use that time to pack. I finished early, so I went to talk to Gina, who was hanging out in the Hub, and I think she was there with Dani, and I got a Krispy Kreme doughnut before I found them.

After my next two classes, it was time to go, so I biked back to my dorm and picked up my stuff and gave my fish to Cat and changed his water with Gina, since I want his tank to stay as super clean as when I supercleaned it recently. Gina gets worried when I go away so I hugged her and stuff and then said goodbye and left. I was thinking about homework as I drove away and realized I left my backpack in my dorm room, so I had to stop back to get it.

I'm going into too much detail. I also went to Friendly's with Abby, Chloe, Lexi, and Sarah. Our waitress was really slow but very sweet. There was a huge bug that scared the crap out of us and followed us from one table to the next. Abby was wearing eyeliner and looked very pretty, and Chloe was wearing Dave's alpaca. Afterward I drove to Kristin's house and gave her a big hug since I haven't seen her in forever, and we talked near her fire outside. I visited Michelle and her boyfriend Cory was there, her dog attacked me. I did homework for the rest of the night and felt very frustrated and had to watch The Daily Show while working. My mom baked me cookies and made me my favorite incarnation of chicken for dinner and I appreciated it a lot. The Phillies were playing the fifth game in the Series, but it got rain delayed in the sixth inning.

The next day when we woke up it was very cold, very rainy, very gray, and very windy. We didn't know if it would be cancelled, but he has never cancelled an event. Instead of going super early at about 7:30 [doors open at 8], we decided to show up around 9, assuming no one would want to go in this weather. I frantically organized the change in plans with Chloe and Abby, and found out later that Wasiq would not be coming. We all bundled up - I more than I ever have before - and went to the rally. We talked in the car about politics, and I caught up with Chloe and Abby on what was going on around school, with band, with the football team, with teachers, and other things. Apparently Mrs. Rock was never told by Julie that we had visited her, but that's okay.

There was one fun story about the rally that I will save for a separate post. Daily Show time for now.

Peace out.