Red, White, & Blue Inauguration Ball

On Tuesday, January 20 we flew into DCA at about 6:30 PM. My cousin Jake was nice enough to pick us up even though he'd been attending inauguration festivities since 5 AM. We hurried home and got ready for the ball that Albert had gotten free tickets for through the military. The Red, White, & Blue ball (aka Hero's Ball) is for the wounded soldiers and military folks in general so there was a lot of thanking the troops and very little about Obama.

We went with Jake and his friend from medical school, Priya. We opted to drive, which was crazy since so many streets were still barricaded from earlier and traffic was horrible. There was trash EVERYWHERE. I had never seen the city sooo dirty. After a lot of slowly driving around trying to find a parking spot, Albert suggested that we move over some cones randomly blocking off part of a street. Jake jumped out and moved the cones so there was just enough room for us. When we got back after the ball the cones were completely removed as other cars had done the same thing.

The event was in the Warner Theatre which is beautiful. I loved the chandelier!

Albert took this one so he's not in it, but here's the rest of us:

They had the Latin American Idol winner sing. He was pretty good.

Isaiah Washington (formerly of Grey's Anatomy) was there. Apparently he used to be in the Air Force.


Here's Judy Reyes from Scrubs. Jake was excited cuz he loves him some Scrubs. The other guy was the emcee. I think he was a basketball player or something.

George Duke, a blues guy, played the guitar with his TEETH!

Peter and Paul sans Mary. In her place they had the guy who played on the Broadway version of Lion King, or so says Jake who apparently knows these things.

Lastly they had George Clinton who I didn't know, but I guess they are pretty popular funk peeps. There were sooo many people on the stage it looked like half of them were just hanging out. There was one guy who looked like they picked him up from his home outside Union Station before the performance. I did enjoy his colorful hair and their enthusiasm.

I was disappointed when the guy with a sheepskin suit came out carrying a sign with "F*** Bush" on it. Common' guys!! Let it go! Personally I think the worst thing about the last 8 years was the juvenile hatred of Bush by the left and it ruined the whole performance for me. It was supposed to be a celebration. I'm not anti-anybody and I really don't like it when people boo others, regardless of who they are. We need to learn to disagree in respectful ways. Sorry, it's one of my pet peeves.