I saw that there is already a diary of the Reno rally but wanted to show these pictures as well...
My husband and I were in Reno on Saturday morning too! We are from the Bay Area but drove up Friday night so we could see the next president of the US in person. We lined up at 5:30 am - cold, cold cold in the chilly Autumn mountain air. It was barely light...
But then the sun was on its way up....
After 2 hours of standing in line, we started to move. We were pretty close to the front of the line, so when we got through security, we walked out onto the baseball astroturf and realized that we could situate ourselves right in front of the speaker dias - just 20 feet in front of where Obama would be speaking - we were the second line of people from the barricades.
We watched the setup of the stage, and the bleachers filling up, the Obama signs passed out (got one!) and finally it was time for Obama (after 2 1/2 hours of standing in the slowly warming air);
Obama thanked the many messages of concern, support and flowers people have sent for his grandmother, but began his talk to us about where we are now in the campaign with only 10 more days - this is it! Lets go vote!
In the middle of his speech, the microphones gave out - but Barak was cool - tapped the mics a couple of times and then told us - the entire crowd quieting down so that we could hear him - that it would be 5 minutes. In the end, it was not more than 2 minutes and Barak stepped up - saying "now where was I?" and carrying on. Great speech - most of the stump speech but it was very real when delivered up front and present. Brought tears to our eyes. Told us that 'there was no real America and no fake America - no pro-Americans, no anti-Americans but only one United States of America!
Finally, he stepped down and began to shake hands - YES!!he shook our hands! He stopped in front of us where a little 7 year old girl was peeking over the guardrail - asked her how she was doing - so attentive!! before he carried on down the line, secret service guys in alert at his side.