The Golden Ticket

I admit it. I feel like Charlie about to have an audience with Willie Wonka. Today I got the email that thousands in this city were hoping for: my non-transferable ticket for me and a guest to attend Barack Obama's Grant Park election night rally.

In answer to the obvious question that I've already been asked a dozen times, the second the Gapers Block announcement of the ticketed rally showed up in my RSS reader, I dropped everything and flew to the Obama campaign website to sign up. That's how.

You may not believe it, but unlike all the opportunists on Craigslist, I had a hard time finding someone who wanted to come. I asked my groovy ex, Chris--who still has a terrific apartment share in Oak Park for the right roommate, maybe you?--but pastry is his thing, not politics.

(The 12 hours of Ikea hell we collectively suffered through over the weekend to make my postage-stamp apartment Thanksgiving-ready for eight people probably sealed the deal.)

In the end, my old friend, florist-extraordinaire Brian Braddy asked to go. He drove me with a cat on my lap and my stuff all the way to Chicago from New York City in 2003, so I feel this finally returns the favor.

Even though I early voted for Obama (and against that nutcase Sarah Palin) and despite being a former citizen of an over-crowded metropolis, this ex-New Yorker doesn't care for crowds. But I do geek to once-in-a-lifetime events, and I certainly know them when I receive tickets for them.

Besides, fellow blogger Jasmine Davila will be there. Given our usual madcap topics of conversation, that in itself is reason to show up for me.

I don't know what the future holds for this country. And I doubt McCain can win every single contested and leaning state, as according to the Washington Post he would need to do at this point to win. But I'm holding my breath nonetheless.

Still, as far as I'm concerned, as long as there are enough porta-potties at the rally so I don't have to hold something else for six hours, I'm good.

Now will all the theater queens in the readership please stand and join me in a rousing chorus of One Day More...