Category Archives: Event

Omega

Monday night Obama made his last campaign stop ever in the East Village in Des Moines. I attended his first ever campaign stop in Iowa at Hilton Coliseum all the way back in 2007 with Jen and Derrick and maybe Willy. I figured that I should be there for the last. So Jesse and I went down there and got in line with at least 20,000 other people to at least say that “we were there”.

The line to get in was over 8 blocks long and it kept growing after we took our place at the end of it.

When we got in, we were probably 2 blocks from the actual stage and couldn’t actually see the stage, but we could hear everything clearly and there was a giant jumbotron, so we could see everything clearly.

I didn’t take a good camera in, but I did snap a few photos of the event with my camera phone. So, understand that these pictures aren’t all that great.



The Capitol lit up to look impressive on television.


The backside of the rally space, from outside.


A protester.


I love protesters as a general rule. Even when I disagree with them, I still love protesters. Maybe it is because I love making signs and chanting. But these protesters kept chanting: “1 More Day!”. Even if Romney didn’t get pounded on Election Night, he wouldn’t have taken over on November 7th. Work on your rhetoric people! Since this picture is so bad, I don’t know if you’ll be able to make it out, but 1 of my favorite protesters ever is in this picture. She is holding the sign that says “Real Women for Real Change”. I love this kind of rhetoric. When you take a word like “real” and misuse it to insinuate that other women aren’t “real” because they don’t hold your political beliefs or frightening levels of anger.


Another one of my favorite protesters of all-time is in this picture. The other is the woman (presumably not in the ‘real’ demographic) holding the sign that says “Short People for Romney”. What a delightful demographic to identify one’s self with! I also love the guy in the picture that isn’t holding a sign, but a coffee from Starbucks. He strikes me as a guy that doesn’t really support Romney. He just came down because he didn’t have anything to do on a Monday night and his buddy told him that protesting was a great way to meet chicks. Sorry. My apologies. A great way to meet “Real” Women. Incidentally short women too.


A sign outside of Zombie Burger. A chick standing outside Zombie Burger gave us a tip on how to get to the end of the line, that saved us several blocks of walking.


The American flag at the back of the rally event space.


After the speech, we wormed our way up to the stage. Snagged a pretty sweet poster to boot!


Another weak photograph of the stage.


Another…

I actually wanted to run over and see if I could get my picture taken with the protesters, but the line was moving too quickly. Maybe next big protest movement or 2016.

I need to find out what other political movements short people are passionate about. Shannon?

Block Party

As a representative of the Methodist Men, I had to administer and run the PET Obstacle course for the church’s Block Party.

Teresa took my camera around and took some pictures of the event.

Here are some of those pictures:


Next week’s Wednesday randomness will involve the Computer Mine Holiday Card.

Personal Photo Project of the Week #131


The Audacity of Hope
The Audacity of Hope

My Personal Photo Project of the Week this week was to photograph the historical event of a sitting President of the United States visiting Boone. It hasn’t happened since Eisenhower.

It was a surprise bonus that I would be able to photograph my Mom in the crowd. I wasn’t sure she would be able to attend this event, despite being a big Obama supporter, because it was a standing event that required standing for several hours. However, she handled it very well. Then walked home.

I was able to get at least fairly close to Obama for the rally because rather than getting tickets and going to the event, I volunteered to work it. This was partially because I didn’t want to wait several hours in line to get tickets. Even if it meant meeting the former Mr. Reese Weatherspoon.

I also had never volunteered to work this kind of event, so there was a certain amount of intellectual curiosity that contributed as well.

I signed up to work with Amy. We originally were assigned to hand out water bottles, but since there were so many volunteers we ended up working the “door” to the pavilion. We made sure that people with Blue Tickets went into the Blue Ticket Section and people with Red Tickets went into the Red Ticket Section.

Becky also ended up working the event with us, when she wasn’t working the crowd for votes.

Here are more pictures from the The Audacity of Hope Series:


The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope
If you look closely, you can see Pastor Phil Webb in the crowd!

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

The Audacity of Hope

I know I stated last Friday that my goal was to publish lily pictures this Friday, but I changed my mind so that these pictures would at least be timely and so Russell might stop calling me Mr. Flowers. Okay, I kind of like it when Russell calls me Mr. Flowers. Almost as much as I like it when he calls me Foursquare Boy.

Next week’s Personal Photo Project might involve lilies or sunflowers or trains for that matter.