TEA Party Report
Apr. 16th, 2009 08:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fantastic_jackieTerri and I ended up taking the day off from work to recover from our 25 hour trip to and from San Antonio. During which we did not eat; I forgot to mention that in the last post. Next to no sleep and a tiny breakfast is what we ran on for the day. More on why that was later.
Beneath the fake cut is a more detailed report complete with piccies and a short slide show at the end! :)
On Tuesday, we didn't get home till nearly midnight. We left half an hour later, filled up on gas, and were off by 12:45am Wednesday.
The plan was to make it to San Marcos between 3:00 & 4:00, but due to construction, we didn't arrive until 4:30. On the way down, truckers and passing motorists flashed their lights at us in support of the sign on the back of the car...
We've actually had different forms of this up for two weeks and even had some people come up and ask for information on where they could attend, when, if they were real, etc.
At the hotel, the staff had been waiting for us, and they were generous enough to give us an extra hour to get checked out rather than the usual 12 noon. Despite not getting to sleep until around 5:30 (restlessness), I woke at 8:00 and went downstairs to nab an omlette and sausage to split between Mom and me and a little box of Raisin Bran for Ter. After that, we made some finishing touches on our protest sign, got dressed, and left for San Antonio.
Along the way, we stopped at Lowe's to get a stick to complete our protest sign. We ended up using duct tape - the solution for everything - rather than the usual staples.
At last, we finally made it to San Antonio where traffic was already congested. Finding a parking spot took a good half hour despite that we knew to park at the Tower of Americas.
By this time, it was already 2:30 - barely an hour and a half before Glenn Beck's show started. With the intention of getting a quick bite to eat at the Riverside Mall, we left the sign behind. As it turned out, it was way too packed to get anything, so we headed straight for the Alamo.
This is what we found when we got there, and that's not even the half of it. It was just around 3:10. The actual Tea Party didn't start until 6.
Not a single person stepped foot on the grass of the Alamo, by the way, in continued respect and reverence for the men who sacrificed their lives and held out for 13 days against 4000 of Santa Ana's troops.
Seeing all the signs, we realized our mistake: should have brought ours to begin with. So I determined to run all the way back to the car and grab it while they found a good place to watch the show. I had 45 minutes.
Completely exhausted and toasty in my cowboy hat, I made it back to the Alamo in 20 minutes. Which is really good conisdering all the streets I had to cross!! Along the way back, lots of people asked to either take pictures of my sign or me with it. :)
It took a while to get to where Ter and Mom had migrated, though - towards the front of the stage. I got stuck in one place for 20 minutes as the crowd was so massive that we had nowhere to move. Thankfully, it was a balmy 70ish day with a heavy breeze, and we fellow Texans were all very polite and patient and well deoderent-ed. LOL I ended up having to squeeze out an entirely different way, backtrack through a narrow ally to Houston Street and came around on the other side of the Tea Party.
It was here that I saw maybe 5 protestors of our protest, and judging by the rainbow version they had of the American flag draped around their shoulders, I'm guessing they were probably part of the gay rights crowd. They seemed particularly intimidated by the sheer size of the crowd staying far off, which I found amusing, but they had nothing to fear from us. :)
With only 30 seconds to spare, Glenn already onstage and enjoying the crowd, I squeezed myself into the little space that Ter and Mom had miraculously saved just for me!
We couldn't see a thing. LOL
But we could hear everything and occasionally got a peek at the Jumbo Trons which was how most everyone else was able to see anything that happened on stage the entire time.
The guy in the hat is Ted Nugent if you don't know him; he played an amazing version of the National Anthem and had a lot of things to say that expressed our feelings extremely well. It was Glenn who nailed us by definition, though. :) They were both really awesome.
When Glenn's show ended, we left in search of munchies. On the way, we ran into the actual tea of the Tea Party! A local business donated and served gallons upon gallons of sweet (and unsweet) Texas Tea! :D I didn't think to take their picture, though.
Unable to find anywhere that would have been able to serve us within the next 45 minutes (talk about a Stimulus Package for San Antonio LOL), we headed down to the riverwalk. More pics were taken of me with the sign, and we sat at a restaurant with the intent of just getting drinks and an appetizer. We sat for 20 minutes and were not even approached by a waiter, so we left and went back to the Tea Party just in time for it to start.
Here, I finally had room to take a pic of Ter & Mom with the sign:
The the speech bubble says, "Woah there, Pard'ner."
The speeches were excellent, my favorite being by an immigrant named Katharine Moreno who told her story and of her pride to be an American. Ted Nugent's was pretty awesome, as well. Glenn's 5 minute speech I've uploaded to Youtube here.
Here's the last bit that wasn't caught by that stretch:
Everything else is pretty much summed up in pictures.
We left about 25 minutes early, needing to eat and get back home safely. We made it home at 1:45am this morning.
Click the Pic for a quick slideshow!
All in all, it was a very successful, very optimistic, and 98% bi-partisan protest. (There were a couple signs I didn't like, but we weren't required to agree with everything.)
Yes, I did meet some Dems and Libertarians and *gasp* even some black people! Some Hispanics and Native Americans, too! No, I didn't think to take their pictures to prove they were there; I didn't even think about it, to be honest. They're just people to me...
Anyway. The protest was successful in the manner of expressing ourselves and coming together. The media has been stifling the actual success with brutal bias, as was expected. There were over 2000 protests across the nation and many had not hundreds but thousands in attendance. But believe if you will that the media isn't biased; our goal isn't to persuade the media - it's to persuade Washington and to call you to peaceful arms. ;)
Beneath the fake cut is a more detailed report complete with piccies and a short slide show at the end! :)
On Tuesday, we didn't get home till nearly midnight. We left half an hour later, filled up on gas, and were off by 12:45am Wednesday.
The plan was to make it to San Marcos between 3:00 & 4:00, but due to construction, we didn't arrive until 4:30. On the way down, truckers and passing motorists flashed their lights at us in support of the sign on the back of the car...
We've actually had different forms of this up for two weeks and even had some people come up and ask for information on where they could attend, when, if they were real, etc.
At the hotel, the staff had been waiting for us, and they were generous enough to give us an extra hour to get checked out rather than the usual 12 noon. Despite not getting to sleep until around 5:30 (restlessness), I woke at 8:00 and went downstairs to nab an omlette and sausage to split between Mom and me and a little box of Raisin Bran for Ter. After that, we made some finishing touches on our protest sign, got dressed, and left for San Antonio.
Along the way, we stopped at Lowe's to get a stick to complete our protest sign. We ended up using duct tape - the solution for everything - rather than the usual staples.
At last, we finally made it to San Antonio where traffic was already congested. Finding a parking spot took a good half hour despite that we knew to park at the Tower of Americas.
By this time, it was already 2:30 - barely an hour and a half before Glenn Beck's show started. With the intention of getting a quick bite to eat at the Riverside Mall, we left the sign behind. As it turned out, it was way too packed to get anything, so we headed straight for the Alamo.
This is what we found when we got there, and that's not even the half of it. It was just around 3:10. The actual Tea Party didn't start until 6.
Not a single person stepped foot on the grass of the Alamo, by the way, in continued respect and reverence for the men who sacrificed their lives and held out for 13 days against 4000 of Santa Ana's troops.
Seeing all the signs, we realized our mistake: should have brought ours to begin with. So I determined to run all the way back to the car and grab it while they found a good place to watch the show. I had 45 minutes.
Completely exhausted and toasty in my cowboy hat, I made it back to the Alamo in 20 minutes. Which is really good conisdering all the streets I had to cross!! Along the way back, lots of people asked to either take pictures of my sign or me with it. :)
It took a while to get to where Ter and Mom had migrated, though - towards the front of the stage. I got stuck in one place for 20 minutes as the crowd was so massive that we had nowhere to move. Thankfully, it was a balmy 70ish day with a heavy breeze, and we fellow Texans were all very polite and patient and well deoderent-ed. LOL I ended up having to squeeze out an entirely different way, backtrack through a narrow ally to Houston Street and came around on the other side of the Tea Party.
It was here that I saw maybe 5 protestors of our protest, and judging by the rainbow version they had of the American flag draped around their shoulders, I'm guessing they were probably part of the gay rights crowd. They seemed particularly intimidated by the sheer size of the crowd staying far off, which I found amusing, but they had nothing to fear from us. :)
With only 30 seconds to spare, Glenn already onstage and enjoying the crowd, I squeezed myself into the little space that Ter and Mom had miraculously saved just for me!
We couldn't see a thing. LOL
But we could hear everything and occasionally got a peek at the Jumbo Trons which was how most everyone else was able to see anything that happened on stage the entire time.
The guy in the hat is Ted Nugent if you don't know him; he played an amazing version of the National Anthem and had a lot of things to say that expressed our feelings extremely well. It was Glenn who nailed us by definition, though. :) They were both really awesome.
When Glenn's show ended, we left in search of munchies. On the way, we ran into the actual tea of the Tea Party! A local business donated and served gallons upon gallons of sweet (and unsweet) Texas Tea! :D I didn't think to take their picture, though.
Unable to find anywhere that would have been able to serve us within the next 45 minutes (talk about a Stimulus Package for San Antonio LOL), we headed down to the riverwalk. More pics were taken of me with the sign, and we sat at a restaurant with the intent of just getting drinks and an appetizer. We sat for 20 minutes and were not even approached by a waiter, so we left and went back to the Tea Party just in time for it to start.
Here, I finally had room to take a pic of Ter & Mom with the sign:
The the speech bubble says, "Woah there, Pard'ner."
The speeches were excellent, my favorite being by an immigrant named Katharine Moreno who told her story and of her pride to be an American. Ted Nugent's was pretty awesome, as well. Glenn's 5 minute speech I've uploaded to Youtube here.
Here's the last bit that wasn't caught by that stretch:
Everything else is pretty much summed up in pictures.
We left about 25 minutes early, needing to eat and get back home safely. We made it home at 1:45am this morning.
Click the Pic for a quick slideshow!
All in all, it was a very successful, very optimistic, and 98% bi-partisan protest. (There were a couple signs I didn't like, but we weren't required to agree with everything.)
Yes, I did meet some Dems and Libertarians and *gasp* even some black people! Some Hispanics and Native Americans, too! No, I didn't think to take their pictures to prove they were there; I didn't even think about it, to be honest. They're just people to me...
Anyway. The protest was successful in the manner of expressing ourselves and coming together. The media has been stifling the actual success with brutal bias, as was expected. There were over 2000 protests across the nation and many had not hundreds but thousands in attendance. But believe if you will that the media isn't biased; our goal isn't to persuade the media - it's to persuade Washington and to call you to peaceful arms. ;)
