However, I did not know that fact a few days ago when I saw this sign:
It didn't take too much brainpower to deduce that the reason they were opening two hours later is that they were going to spend an extra two hours making the food for that morning. They just wanted to make sure it was perfect for America Day. But as soon as we realized that, we realized that everyone else must have realized it too, so the line would be terrible! Plus, everyone comes to D.C. for the fireworks, and people have to eat. Those two facts lead us to the obvious conclusion that SizzEx was going to be crowded as all get go.
Rather than letting those jerks eat the food we could only assume would be amazing, we decided to take matters into our own hands. We were going to camp out in front of the restaurant, to make sure that we would be the first in line. Packing up our sleeping bags we headed off to set up camp.
Roll call!
Captain Freedom is here, that's for sure.
It's a little rough sleeping on the ground, but by 2:30, we're all asleep.
Luckily, we put up a sign so people who showed up after us would know where the line started.
But at 4:00 AM, a mean security guard kicked us out of the Plaza we were on. He also snidely suggested that the buffet was good in prison. We left, and for a minute, we thought we had been defeated.
Perish the thought! We set up camp on 23rd street and went right back to sleep. Nothing would stop us from enjoying our breakfast.
Before we knew it, morning had come, and we awoke with a renewed sense of dedication.
At long last, 8:30 AM rolled around. Making my way down the row of steam-trays was an experience as of yet, unrivaled in my life. It was a mix of beauty, pride, joy...basically all good emotions, multiplied by 14 and then mixed together. Oh boy.
It was a good thing we showed up early, as you can see in this picture, the restaurant was PACKED!
One word: Victory.
