Inauguration Celebration

Okay, Portland, Belize, LA, and then, on the last leg of my walkabout, Washington DC for the inauguration of Barack Obama. I voted for Obama in the primary and general election and talked him up pretty good along the way. But I live in Manhattan, I don't think I could name a single person who I interact with on a regular basis that wasn't voting for him anyway. I knew 10 people who weren't voting at all for every 1 that was even considering McCain and the choice of Sarah Palin knocked those few people out of his column in the end. So I don't know that I actually helped Obama's cause much, but I was so glad to have a politician talk to us like adults that I actually took to wearing the Hope t-shirt.

My sister Rachel lives in DC and got tickets to the parade, so I pretty much had to go. I didn't realize yet that he was going to sign the Executive Order changing the way the government deals with Freedom of Information Act requests, nor did I necessarily believe he was going to act on Guantanamo as quickly as he did. I think the orders regarding transparency in government may ultimately change our country more than temporarily nationalizing the banks or even pulling out of Iraq. If the bar for secrecy is set as high as Obama claims, if our government is now truly operating behind a clean plane of glass, that would be every bit as big a change as electing a Black guy to sign those papers in the first place.

It was a great experience, being surrounded by 2 million people while Bush was packing his shit. So many people bowed their heads while Obama took the oath, like it was some kind of prayer, and it seems silly in retrospect, but it sure made sense at the time.

The Inspiration

Open The Gates!

Big Tent Politics


Citizen #1

Citizen #2

Morning In America

Keeping Warm

Rachel Loves America

Where Is He?

Secret Service

Obama Loves America, Too

The next day Weezy and I went back to the Mall and walked around a bit. It was cold but the sun was so beautiful that day it was hard not to be happy.


Flag Wavers

Stars

Weezington Monument

Californ-eye-hey

Something like 8 hours after I got back from Belize, I left for LA to direct the shoot of a one man show starring my very close friend Ernie. Ernie and I have been working together creatively since I was a teenager, so I was excited to shoot a show that he wrote and was starring in. The shoot itself turned out to be a disaster, but the show was great, and I actually enjoyed Los Angeles for the first time. This was my third trip there, but the first visit with spare time to drive around and, I don't know, take pictures.

I did a bunch of other shit too, but the pictures are often one of my favorite parts.

Jesus Loves Fatburger

So Do I




California is the land where the drive-thru was born, and it's still a state packed with cheeseburgers in paper sacks. I ate a ton of cheeseburgers on this trip, kind of a 'when in Rome' thing. I know, I know, California's also full of sushi and local produce, and French Laundry's there for christ's sake, but these little hamburger stands crop up everywhere and believe me, they're worth checking out.




Ate some Roscoe's too...mmm

One of my day trips was to Griffith Park with Anthony, the producer of the shoot I was on. We had a bunch of things to discuss and I wasn't about to spend an 80° afternoon in a living room. We could settle all of these questions just as well on the top of a mountain, so that's where we went.






St. Margaret On The Mountain

Producer

Ernie & The Stache





Erniewood #1-5

Belize 5

As is obvious in some of these pictures, I have Mayan iconography tattooed on my chest and arms, with inner arm and back pieces planned for the future. This, however, was the first time I'd been out of the country, so getting to check out some of the ruins was a big deal. Suffice it to say it was worth every dollar, every mile and every square inch of sunburn to see this stuff. This was the first thing I'd ever seen that was older than Philadelphia and I loved it.

The site I went to is called Altun Ha and is the second largest Mayan site in Belize.