Imperial Parade

So I had a meeting in Washington today, that lasted about two hours, at a building on Pennsylvania Avenue and we'll just leave it at that. If you want to know the details you can get them offline -- for a price. Anyway when I walked out of the building everything had changed outside. There was no traffic. The street had been completely cleared of vehicles, there were police cars at all the intersections and people standing still on the sidewalk, waiting. The oddest sort of frozen quality. It didn't take me long to figure out that some exalted personage would be passing through. So I thought well, what the heck I'll wait and watch the show. On the cross streets the lines of waiting vehicles got longer and longer. A helicopter circled overhead. From time to time a DC Police motorcycle cop would roar up the road with all its lights flashing. This went on for about 20 minutes. Wayyyy off in the distance I could see the dome of the Capitol, lit up and glowing in the lovely balmy light. That was another reason to linger -- it was so pretty and so balmy out.

A sudden flurry of more motorcycle cops, and then down the road, in the direction of the Capitol, I saw a cluster of flashing red lights. Sound of a siren. Then all these vehicles -- six motorcycles, a couple of black lead cars, a limo with a seal on the door, several vans and SUVs, some sort of black Brinks-truck looking thing, another van with a superduper antenna on top, an ambulance, all with lights flashing, they all had extra extra flashing red lights on the roofs and in the windshields, the headlights, extra bright, were all flashing, they all came roaring up the street. They whizzed by and after another minute everybody could move again.

Another bystander said it was the president's limo. I suppose it could have been. I should think the whole experience would have been touchingly nostalgic for Albanian emigrants to Washington D.C.