"The End is Near... The Signs Are Everywhere."

This past weekend I took my first trip to Washington, D.C. I'd been wanting to visit D.C. for a long time and Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert's "Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Keep Fear Alive" seemed like a good pretext.

Standing there in the Mall that afternoon was a little like attending a rock concert, except that the crowd was much more quiet and civil. Case in point: Someone about ten feet in front of us was holding a really large I'm really an Angrophile sign. Someone about five feet behind us was complaining that it was blocking their view of the JumboTron. A note requesting that the sign be lowered was passed forward through the crowd. The sign was accordingly lowered.

At 5'5-1/2", I could barely see the JumboTron at all, but I did enjoy the people- and sign-watching. Here are some of my favorites:

There were quite a few self-referential signs like this yellow one on the left.

Yes, the signs were all refreshingly free of spelling errors.

Friendly, mild-mannered signs such as this one were also quite common.

This one was sheer brilliance. I looked up Mark 11:12-14 when I got home:

"12And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry:
...
13And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet.

14And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it."

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