Reporting Live from the Inauguration...

...or at least, the surrounding area! Things started getting pretty crazy around here last night. People were just flooding the sidewalks. Then, the police blocked the streets off in the late evening and people poured in all night. I looked out the windows each time I got up to feed the baby and there was a very steady stream of people all bundled up for the cold and ready to stake out a place in line for admittance to the parade. This morning, the streets are very crowded in front of the Secret Service parade entrance checkpoints.

Here's the security checkpoint crowd right outside our building. All those little dots you can see through the braches on the left are people's hats. Lots and lots of folks.

And here's a look down our street, in the other direction. You can see the next Secret Service checkpoint in the distance. Standing in the crosswalk is a man selling Obama scarves who, for the last couple of hours has been yelling, "One dollar! One dollar! Everybody's got a dollar!"

I took the above picture before I started this blog post, but had to take an updated one before I could finish the post because the crowds had gotten even bigger!

It's getting louder by the minute, too. This is going to be a very strange kind of day!