Today I'd like to welcome my mom to be my guest blogger, and document her recent trip to the White House for a Christmas party with my aunt Marlene.
We have arrived!
Which one should I wear?
Just a few Godivas before the big evening. Have to keep our strength up!
How does my hair look?
Thelma and Louise arrive at the BIG HOUSE!! Do we HAVE to behave?
Marlene and Robb Thomson (NH Bush Co-chair)
Thelma poses after just entering the White House.
Lighthouse in first entrance hallway. This year's theme - our National Parks.
The Grand Floor Corridor.
Ground Floor Corridor where previous White House Christmas cards are displayed.
Thelma and Kim Thomson seated in the Theater which is used as a coat check room.
Thelma seated in 1st floor Vermeil Room (features portraits of First Ladies) waiting her turn to go into the ladies room to steal all the hand towels.
Fresh amaryllis centerpiece in Vermeil Room.
Stairway to second floor. At the top of the stairs, East Room is to the left, Entrance Hall is to the left.
The "President's Own" Marine band playing Christmas selections in the 2nd floor Entrance Hall.
Louise seated in the Red Room. (Are we allowed to sit on the furniture??)
Thelma approaches the banquet table in the State Dining Room.
One of the pastry chefs in the State Dining Room. The tiered dessert is all browned marshmallows - something you'd eat around the campfire in one of the National Parks.
Portrait of Lincoln over the fireplace in the State Dining Room. (Is that Gladys?)
The Gingerbread House this year was white chocolate instead of gingerbread. They must have known we're all about chocolate!
Thelma in front of one of the fireplaces in the East Room.
Thelma seated in the Green Room.
Thelma and Louise in front of the Christmas Tree in the Blue Room. All the hand-painted ornaments were from each of the states.
Louise with Charlie Weiss (Notre Dame football coach). What do he and President Bush have in common? They both should be out of a job next January.
Thelma in the Cross Hall outside the Blue Room.
In the Cross Hall, looking towards the East Room. The State Dining Room is at the opposite end of the Cross Hall.
Another fresh amaryllis arrangement.
Thelma taking a picture of Louise taking a picture of Thelma.
Banquet table in East Room with Nativity scene (blue background).
One of the pastry tables in the East Room.
More goodies in the East Room. Check out that silver bowl of shrimp!!
Banquet table in East Room.
Louise with good friend Jason Recher. Jason is in charge of all travel details for the President.
Louise seated in the Cross Hall ... behaving.
Louise and Robb Thomson under the Presidential Seal in the Cross Hall leading into the Blue Room.
Thelma and Louise with one of the Military Aides from the Coast Guard.
Stairway to the family quarters. Thelma tried to sneak up but the coffee lady stopped her.
The Devil wears Prada.
Thelma and Louise "livin' large"!!
Thelma and Louise take a moment to dine with Matt before heading home ... back to reality.
A few posts ago, I wrote that I would write about why I so passionately support Barack Obama. The Boston Globe, in its endorsement of Obama yesterday, laid out many reasons very clearly and more eloquently than I could, so I am posting that further down on the post if you'd like to read it.
I am frustrated and disillusioned with all of the bickering in Washington, with red states vs. blue states, and with both extremes trying to "defeat" the other side. Nothing is getting accomplished. Barack Obama can and will change that. He is honestly interested in solving problems, not in gaining political power or earning "points." His book, "The Audacity of Hope," explained how he felt about many issues, but also explained the other side of those views and how he considers those when making his decisions. He listens to people, and not to polls. I don't agree with him on every issue, but I TRUST him.
I also have a lot of respect for how he has run his campaign. He does not accept any money from PACs and special interests, and he refuses to go negative, even in the face of dirty tricks from another campaign.
Obama offers hope and optimism for our country and our future. He will ask us to sacrifice and work together, but he will not disappoint us!
Please consider voting for Obama in your caucus or primary. I welcome questions and comments - click at the bottom of the post!
(Oprah likes him too!)
Boston Globe Editorial December 16, 2007
THE FIRST American president of the 21st century has not appreciated the intricate realities of our age. The next president must. The most sobering challenges that face this country - terrorism, climate change, disease pandemics - are global. America needs a president with an intuitive sense of the wider world, with all its perils and opportunities. Senator Barack Obama of Illinois has this understanding at his core. The Globe endorses his candidacy in New Hampshire's Democratic presidential primary Jan. 8.
Many have remarked on Obama's extraordinary biography: that he is the biracial son of a father from Kenya and a mother who had him at 18; that he was raised in the dynamic, multi-ethnic cultures of Hawaii and Indonesia; that he went from being president of the Harvard Law Review to the gritty and often thankless work of community organizing in Chicago; that, at 46, he would be the first post-baby-boom president.
What is more extraordinary is how Obama seals each of these experiences to his politics. One of the lessons he took from organizing poor families in Chicago, he says, was "how much people felt locked out of their government," even at the local level. That experience anchors his commitment to transparency and accountability in Washington.
Similarly, his exposure to foreign lands as a child and his own complex racial identity have made him at ease with diversity - of point of view as well as race or religion. "I've had to negotiate through different cultures my whole life," he says. He speaks with clarity and directness, and he is also a listener, a lost art in our politics.
In what looks like prescience today, Obama was against the Iraq war from the start. But his is not the stereotypical 1960s antiwar reflex. "I don't oppose all wars," he said in the fall of 2002. "I'm opposed to rash wars."
When it comes to waging peace, Obama has the leadership skills to reset the country's reputation in the world. He notes, for example, that the United States would be in a stronger position with Iran if it took more seriously its own commitment to the nuclear nonproliferation treaty. His bill, cosponsored with Senator Richard Lugar, to add conventional weapons to the nation's threat reduction initiative, became law this year.
On domestic issues, the major Democratic candidates are reduced to parsing slivers of difference. But Obama has been more forthright in declaring his slightly heterodox positions to traditional Democratic constituencies. His support for merit pay for teachers, or a cap on carbon emissions, suggests a healthy independence from the established order.
The first major bill to Obama's name in the Illinois Legislature was on campaign ethics reform. In Washington, he coauthored this year's sweeping congressional lobbying reform law. When he describes his approach to healthcare negotiations, he says, "The insurance and drug companies will get a seat at the table, but they won't get to buy every chair."
Obama's critics, and even many who want to support him, worry about his relative lack of experience. It is true that other Democratic contenders have more conventional resumes and have spent more time in Washington. But that exposure has tended to give them a sense of government's constraints. Obama is more animated by its possibilities.
In our view, the choice on the Democratic side is between Obama and Hillary Clinton. Clinton has run a diligent, serious campaign, and her command of the issues is deep and reassuring. But her approach is needlessly defensive, a backward glance at the bruising political battles of the 1990s. Obama's candidacy looks forward.
Obama's memoir, "Dreams From My Father," is divided into three main sections. The first is a reflection on his youthful search for identity. The second recounts his days in Chicago, which include the first stirrings of a religious life. The third is a roots pilgrimage to Kenya, to better understand his often absent father. It is hard to read this book without longing for a president with this level of introspection, honesty, and maturity - and Obama published it when he was only 33.
"I genuinely believe that our security and prosperity are going to depend on how we manage our continued integration into the rest of the world," he says. Obama's story is the American story, a deeply affecting tale of possibility. People who vote for him vote their hopes. Even after seven desolating years, this country has not forgotten how to hope.
I finally have some pictures way back from the Symphony Aaarrrrrrghestra concert in the College Mall! Unfortunately they do not feature any of the maestro's pirate accessories.
This Saturday is the Bloomington Symphony Orchestra's next subscription concert, featuring several chamber pieces rather than one or two large works. Hopefully it will be another big success.
We have no room in our apartment for the Christmas tree, even though it's only 5 feet tall. So I brought it to work at my boss's suggestion, and it looks very nice there!
Lenny and Chuck came to visit to see the tree and I attempted to snap a festive Lenny photo. He was not too interested.
The good news is that, after a few weeks of searching, we have found a doggie hotel about an hour and a half away for Lenny over Christmas break. Just like the little baby Jesus, there was no room at the inn for him. We will probably need to send him in swaddling clothes so he can't keep scratching himself from his allergies.
Last weekend, I drove out to Columbus, Ohio, to run in the Jingle Bell 5K for Arthritis. My friends Jen and Pete ran the race with me! All three of us are relatively new to running, but Pete is a very fast runner now and Jen has run a 10K! I am the slow-poke of the bunch.
It was a fun race because there were really a lot of people, and the race went down High Street, through downtown, and into German Village. Everyone tied little jingle bells to their shoelaces. It was pretty cold too!
It was my third 5K, running the whole way, and I finished one second faster than the Turkey day race. Jen was nice enough to jog at my slow pace with me the entire way.
And since the race was raising money to help fight arthritis, people could run in honor of someone with arthritis and pin a little sign to their shirt. My best buddy with arthritis is Lenny, so I ran in honor of him.
The Russells celebrated Annie and John's engagement at Thanksgiving. Annie sent me some of the pictures from that, which I thought I'd share. I wish I could have been there to celebrate too!
