"Let Garnett be Garnett"

First trip to the White House = Done! (and no, I didn't steal anything. sorry Em!)

As some of you may have heard over the weekend, I completed my first assignment at the White House on Friday afternoon. Not only did I get to go to the White House though, I got to go to the White House to shoot the Boston Celtics ceremony!! 

The Celtics were at the White House for a ceremony that Bush spoke at honoring their championship season and all that. It's basically a photo op with the President where they bring him a jersey and a ball and he makes a fool of himself. So a good time all around. 

The event was at 3pm so I had to get there at like 2pm to get my pass and be escorted to the East Room. When I arrived, I was instructed to go to the northwest appointment gate on Pennsylvania Avenue. So I get there, and it's literally a gate with a little button and a speaker on it. My deductive reasoning skills told me, I probably had to push the button, so I did and a guy says, "Name." So i said, "Sarah Yoder." A few seconds later he says, "You're on the list, come on in," and the gate opened. 

What was hilarious about this whole process was that there were a whole bunch of tourists lined up against the gate taking pictures of the White House and after they let me in I heard one of them say, "Wow! Wouldn't it be cool to say your name and have a guy say you're on the list and let you into the White House!" Which was just funny cause that's exactly what I was thinking. 

So after I went through security in the little gatehouse, they gave me a press badge and sent me on my way. I step out of the gatehouse and now I'm just on the driveway to the White House. That was surprising because I had no clue where I was going. So I'm just walking up the driveway to the White House hoping I'm not gonna walk in some door that I'm not supposed to even be near. Luckily, as I got up the building, I saw a bunch of people on cell phones with press badges around their necks hanging around one door so i figured I'd found where I needed to be. 

Sure enough, I open the door and it goes into the press briefing room. Cool. So now I'm just standing in the White House press briefing room with a whole bunch of TV camera guys and a couple of reporters. Luckily, my internship supervisor, Rick, had prepped me about where to go once I was in the briefing room. I headed downstairs to where Cox has a desk so I could put my bags and my laptop there. Totally awesome that I had a desk at the White House. 

After that, I headed over to where we were supposed to wait to be escorted to the East Room. As press, they trust us, but not enough to let us walk by ourselves up a flight of stairs and in a door. Of course, once we got to our positions, we had to wait for like 20 minutes for all the guests to be seated and what not. 

Finally, only a few minutes late, they begin. Bush gave a speech that he thought was funny, but no one else did. Then Paul Pierce got up and said a few words before presenting Bush with a ball and a jersey. Then there was the photo op and the handshaking. And then they left. 

I immediately just followed the other photographers cause I had overheard a few of them saying something about a press conference outside. Sure enough, there was a press conference outside the door to the press briefing room. This would have been an opportunity for some great pictures of the Celtics, but the sun was in an awful position, so we were all having a hard time. It was, however, where I got to talk to Kevin Garnett, which was awesome.  

Long story, sorry. But it's a good one. =) 

One of my picture made it in at least one paper so far, the Worcester Telegram & Gazette. I'm waiting to see if it's in a couple more too, so i'll let y'all know!

Hope everyone had a great weekend! I've got an assignment tomorrow that I'm sure will thrill you all... the unveiling of the new penny! Don't get too excited! lol.