Destination: Crawford, TX

Warning: Long post

The alarm clock buzzed. I leaned over, saw that it was 4:30 in the morning, pressed the snooze button, and elbowed Zelda to wake up. She let out a small moan, said "ok", and didn't move an inch. Nine minutes later, the alarm buzzed. Again, I hit the snooze button and elbowed Zelda to wake up. This time, she said "okay, okay. I know." When 5:00 rolled around, our door bell rang. Zelda jumped out of bed to open the door. One of the Protest Warriors met us at our house. At about 5:45, we left. Our meeting place was at a Wal-Mart parking lot in Waco, Texas. We would then caravan to Crawford to show our support for the troops, their mission, and the President. We may not agree with him on a lot of things, but when our troops are fighting, we'll support them and him over the cries of the media and their poster larvae providing much needed morale boosters to the enemy.

We had to print out a map to the Wal-Mart in Waco on MapQuest. Let me urge all of you that if you ever need to find directions, don't rely on a computer. We got lost and ended up taking an extra hour to find Waco. I had to pull into a gas station and ask for directions. Getting side tracked wasn't so bad. We got to see the most beautiful country side. That is, as long as you were in a car with the A/C blasting. Anyways, we finally made it to the Wal-Mart in Waco with about an hour and a half to spare. After grabbing some breakfast at the Jack in the Box, we noticed that A LOT of people were gathering in the parking lot with their flags waving and shoe polish writings all over the windows of their cars in support of President Bush and the troops. The police had to come in order to block off the exit ramp to the freeway so that the caravan could leave the Wal-Mart.

Unfortunately, getting the caravan to stick together was a task easier said than done. There were numerous stop lights where sections of the caravan were split. Only a few people knew how to actually get to Crawford. After getting split up, I had to once again stop into a CVS to get directions. Before anyone told us the directions, they asked us which side we supported. When we told them that we were supporting the president, they said, "Good. Because last week a couple of guys were asking us how to get to Crawford who supported Cindy and we gave them the wrong directions." In order to get back home, I bought a map. Now, we were on our way to Crawford. As we drove, we noticed a big truck with Missouri plates and American flags flying from the window. In front of him were a couple of Red, White, and Blue choppers. We have found a small section of the caravan.

Crawford is a small town. The population is only 700. There is only one street light in the entire town. We drove past signs that read, "You're entering Bush country". We knew then that we have found the promised land. However, traffic stopped. So, we waited and waited and waited. Crawford was overflowing with people who were counter protesting Cindy Sheehan. Finally, we pulled off onto a side street and just parked the car. Then, we got out, got bottles of water from the cooler, and our little spray bottles with fans attached to them. We had no idea where to go so we decided that we'd follow the direction of all of the cars. One of the locals was walking her dog and overheard that we were going to meet a few friends at the main tent. Only problem was that we didn't know where it was. She smiled and told us to follow her. She would show us the way. Before crossing the main street, another traveler stopped and asked our guide where "Camp Casey" was. Our guide pointed back towards the opposite direction and said, "Down by the Church. Just follow the smell." Apparently, we were told that Cindy supporters were not exactly the best smelling people because they didn't shower in 2 weeks and were urinating and defecating into jars and buckets or other peoples' private property. So, the people of Crawford were not too happy with Cindy Sheehan supporters.

Our guide walked with us to Fort Qualls. It was a site set up in honor of Louis Qualls who died in Iraq. His father, Gary Qualls was there speaking to people about just how proud he was of his son's service and sacrifice. He spoke about how his family firmly supports the President. On this site was a huge framed picture of Louis Qualls and a framed letter from one of Louis's Brother-in-arms. We read how Louis had found a T-shirt and wanted to send it home to his dad. It was a Harley Davidson in Iraq T-shirt. As a last gesture of thanks, Louis's entire company signed that T-shirt and sent it home.

In front of Fort Qualls was where Gary Qualls and other families dug up the crosses that had the names of their fallen loved ones that was put up by Cindy Sheehan's group. They told Cindy's group that they had no permission to use their loved ones' names in their dishonorable act. Cindy's group didn't care. They put up new crosses using the same names that families specifically told them that they had no permission to use.

After making donations to the American Military Families Fund, we finally met up with our friends and proceeded to the main tent at the Crawford Civic Center where families of fallen soldiers spoke out against Cindy Sheehan. Even though we were under a tent, it was HOT! Now, I can handle the heat much better than Zelda. I used to go outside and play basketball in 100 or above degree heat. Zelda is from New York. She never could get used to the heat down here. She was CONSTANTLY spraying herself while trying to listen to the speakers. She would spray and clap and scream at the same time. After all the speakers were done, we walked back into downtown Crawford. Zelda was suffering. She was walking so slow so as to try to not generate any body heat. Our friends and I had to frequently stop so that she could catch up to us.

On the way, we saw that a lady was sitting down hyperventilating. People were fanning her. Traffic stopped as a Suburban offered to take her to the hospital. One guy in opposing traffic actually had the nerve to honk. Zelda's temper flared as she RAN up to the guy and said that there was a sick woman on the side of the road and that the suburban was going to drive her to the hospital. The guy responded that we should put the car to the side of the road because he's been waiting for four minutes. Zelda screamed right to his face, "Four Minutes?! For a soldier's mother who's ill? YOU UNGRATEFUL PRICK!" Remember when I said that she was having trouble keeping up with us? After that meeting, we had trouble keeping up with her.

"Zelda!"

"What?!"

"Wait up! You sure seem to be walking much faster. Adrenaline helping you, babe?"

Zelda smiled as she realized that if not for that encounter, she would have never made it back to downtown Crawford. We walked into a souvenir shop where I bought Zelda a Crawford tank top. I asked the store owner if she could use the bathroom to change because she was getting overheated. The store owner said that it was not a problem.

After Zelda changed, we got to see a few other sights. We rang the huge liberty bell in support of the President. We saw people on horses who wrote "Cindy, Go Home" on the horse's ass with an arrow that pointed directly to the horse's anal sphincter. We got to take pictures of the some of the bikers that we met. We just had an all out great time...except for the heat.

A few days later, I read a few news articles about the event. If you ever need proof that the media is nothing but a bunch of lying pieces of shit, listen up. I read how they said only about 1500 people showed up to counter Cindy Sheehan while Cindy had about 2000. We were there! The counter protestors easily numbered at least 5000-7000. The locals were told to brace for about 10,000 counter protestors. Cindy's protestors numbered around 500 with most of them being media.