Overdue: Volunteered at a Brooklyn for Barack rally

About a month ago I volunteered to help coordinate an appearance by Barack Obama at a downtown Brooklyn hotel (ok it was the Marriott, which has now hosted more than one such appearance in NYC; a kudos to them). In an ironic twist of fate I was charged with a task which required two skills in which I particularly lack those abilities: schmoozing and handwriting.

I was asked to do "press intake". What that means is that as members of the press, be it magazine, newspaper, radio, TV, whatever, arrive they need to be "checked in" against a list of those who were known to have RSVPd and if they weren't already on the list -- and here's where the handwriting comes in -- write them up as walk-ins. I was also expected to explain to said members of the media why, for example, they were not allowed to enter the rally/speech/convention space for fully an hour after they were cited to be at the location -- not the sort of diplomatic assignment with which I brag about having had experience on my resume.

I did manage with the help of various people whose names are lost to posterity.

What most impressed me about the afternoon was that in the space of minutes this:

... turned into this:

The power of a rock star, in essence (or, GQ, in this case).