On the Road With Jess, Alyssa & Kyle

Denver was fucking amazing. At first our prospects of participating in the convention looked grim, as you couldn’t get within a quarter mile of anything without a pass. But then David helped me score a press pass and I got to go into the center and see Hillary speak. It was amazing! I was only on the floor for the last part because the fire marshal was declaring it at capacity and wouldn’t let anyone in, but those few minutes I saw of her speech were incredible. The vibe was infectious. I’m writing an article about it for NYU Local so I’ll link to it here once it’s ready. I’ve always been incredibly fascinated by politics, but whenever I go to DC, or a place like Denver while overrun with conventioneers and politicos, I realize how much I really am attune to this whole thing and how I could potentially do it as a career. I think I’ve already fucked up too much in damningly public ways to ever become a politician — god, the dirt they could dig up — but I could definitely live in DC as I’ve always loved the vibe there, despite the surplus of preppies and douche bags (redundant?). And I could definitely write about political topics as a career, not to mention it would make my father beam with pride and admittedly that is something I enjoy making him do.

But yeah. We got to see Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow at the MSNBC booth. Kyle met Ed Rendell, governor of PA, and we all met David Patterson, governor of NY, at an afterparty for the New Hampshire delegation. We talked about NYU! I saw Michelle Obama and Joe Biden walk by me at the convention. It was incredible.

Tuesday night we drove over night to Des Moines. In Nebraska we got pulled over for speeding, and I got shamed for lying down in the back without a seatbelt on, but Alyssa sweet talked our way out of it and we just got a warning. In Des Moines we stayed with Kyle’s friend Salem and his parents. It was… awesome. Alyssa and I got warm showers and were fed tacos and then took a 3 hour nap in this deliciously comfortable and glorious bed, then woke up and got fed pizza. And then we went out and got fucked up and came home and crashed again. It was wonderful wonderful wonderful.

Today we are off to hang out with some of Salem’s friends at Iowa state, and then we are heading to Chicago tomorrow.

-Jess

Some pictures from Denver: