Urban Camping

So this morning, and by morning I mean middle of the night. A group of us from Georgetown camped out for tickets to see the National Tree Lighting Ceremony. 2400 free tickets are distributed to 600 individuals on a first come, first served basis at 8am on the first Saturday of November every year. We arrived on the Elipse near the White House visitor center between 2:30 and 3:00, with some food and blankets and popped a squat on the nice cold, hard cement. We received badges to mark our place in line, mine was number 108. It wasn't long before the night before caught up with us all and we hunkered down to get some sleep. It was very, very cold. After arriving home, I checked, and it was 41*F. I got a couple hours of sleep cuddling together with others to keep warm and woke about 7 with my toes almost numb. The view was amazing. In front of us was the Washington Monument and the National Christmas Tree which will be lit at the ceremony in December and behind us the White House. Finally after 8 am we received our tickets and headed back to campus, but not before seeing the yellow morning sunlight illuminating the capital.