Well it was an interesting morning. I gave the people in my department release time to go see Bill if they wanted and then went up there myself to wait in line to get in. I stood there for an hour or so chatting with the democratic masses around me and tried to avoid getting a sunburn.
Then five minutes prior to them opening the gates to let us into the concert bowl my boss came up and said that Clinton's aide needed a laptop and an extra network connection in the building adjacent to the bowl.
I tracked down a laptop and got it set up for them and met his aide who is young and attractive, but is in no way Lewenski-ish
By the time I got back out there the line had of course already moved in and I had to haggle my way back up to the area where I would have been standing if I had kept with the people I had been talking with. I had to run the gauntlet of a couple of unhappy civiallians and one feisty Clinton volunteer, but I got there!
By now it was about 11:15am and he was supposed to speak at 11:30. While we waited some co-workers and I played "spot the plainclothes secret service agent" - I think we came up with two for sure's and another couple of maybes. Clinton was delayed and arrived around noon, which was good because any later and people would have started to drop from the heat out there.
He made his grand entrance
notice the guy in black kind of tucked away? Well there was a standard contingent of secret service in their black suits and all and then there was this guy. Both of his arms were "sleeved" with tats, he had paratrooper pants and combat boots and a belt with enough destructive 'toys' to do some real damage. Not a guy you would want to be on the wrong side of.
Clinton got up to the podium and did his speech
He really enjoyed making gestures
During his speech I actually caught one of the secret service guys talking into his mic, although I was vaguely disappointed that he didn't just talk into his sleeve like you see in the movies
He spoke for about an hour and he is a good speaker and sold his product (Hillary) very well. Afterwards he did a bit of gladhanding
He headed back stage and the crowd broke up. I went back to the building where his aide was working to see if I could pack up the laptop. She was in there cursing at her smart phone and we joked about the joys of technology. I packed up the laptop and then wandered to the door facing the parking lot where the motorcade was going to depart from.
It was just me, the president of the college, and a few foundation and board members. We found out that our pres hadn't gotten a chance to meet Clinton and one of the assistants convinced one of the officers to relay a message to one of the secret service agents to see if he would come down for a minute.
It was relayed back that there just wasn't time since they were running behind schedule. Bill and the secret service and the police got in their rigs and I got ready to take a couple of shots of them driving away when Bill's rig stopped.
He got out and with his entorage of secret service guys came walking down to us
He said hello to our pres and shook his hand
He then came over and shook our hands
Yup, I shook ole Billy Boy's hand
He talked with us for another couple of minutes...
...said some final words to our president
(See Cheri - I told ya the secret service guy was eyeing me!
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...and then he was on his way.
I did think it was pretty cool of him to take the time to come down there, he didn't have to and he made the effort despite his own people pressuring him to go.
I packed the laptop back down to media and finally had some lunch (it was around 2pm by then). So there you have it - my day with Billy Boy
You got some GREAT shots of the stretching room. I'm jealous. And wow on the shot of the hanging man just before you walk out of the stretching room. Not everyone knows it's there. Chris tried to get a picture of it last year but he left the flash on 
Hello and welcome!!! Thank you very much for stopping by and joining us on our adventure 
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