This afternoon I was at the Missouri Capitol building taking pictures of National Day of Prayer for work. After I’d taken what I needed, I decided I’d stop by to say Hi to a guy in my Wednesday night Bible Study who is a legislative assistant.

It was his lunch break and as soon as he finished putting official “State of Missouri” seals on 50 congratulations-on-graduating-kindergarten proclamations from the Rep he works for, he grabbed a key and took me up 189 rickety, narrow, scary stairs beyond the fifth floor of the Capitol into “The top.” 

It’s only 120 stairs from the parking level to the seventh floor of my office, and this was 189 stairs BEYOND the fifth floor of the capitol. You’d climb up this flight, then that one, then the scary spiral case and then another flight and then you’re ABOVE the dome that itself is 238 feet above the ground. I normally don’t LOVE heights, but I can handle them. This, on the other hand, made me woozy.

After successfully (if slowly, and with many breaks) climbing the 189 stairs, we had a pretty terrific view of the city and river. Except for those flying, I was the highest person in Jefferson City.

This picture is taken from the highest floor people are allowed to go. Notice the placement of the chandelier and the stained glass windows.

Looking DOWN on that chandelier

Daniel, my tour guide and a humble servant to the good people of Missouri’s 88th District

I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to be able to see the inside of the outside of a dome

Seriously, eight of these.

Stained glass… from the wrong side

That sprial stair at the very very top of the picture takes to you the tip top

The winch that holds the chandelier and sprial staircase. In case you were wondering, yes, the stairs do rattle ominously.

I double, triple and quadruple checked the door did not lock.

Nice view, and pretty much worth it. I’ve always like the Mo River Bridge.

Megan’s office is the building hiding behind the Governor’s Mansion. Mine is the ugly thing with the two prison guard-tower lookin’ things in the far upper right corner.

Oh, but it gets so much better!

On the way back to my office I stopped into Subway (I’d EARNED my chicken bacon ranch sandwich, darn it). The Sandwich Artist saw my camera and complimented me on my taste in electronics. Now, this isn’t really that odd enough in and of itself, but he took it further asking if I was a professional photographer.

Technically, taking pictures is part of my job description, so yes, I’m professional photographer, but I’m a terrible one. So I explained that I was a writer who occasionally had to take his own pictures. That’s when he took it to a whole ‘nother level:

Sandwich Artist: “Oh, that’s so cool! Are you into cosplay?”

Brian: “… … …”

Sandwich Artist: “There’s this big cosplay convention that’s going to be at the Capitol June 23rd. It’s called CosPlaCon and it’s going to be so cool!”

Brian: “… … …”

Sandwich Artist: “It’s going to be so cool! We’re bringing in the top four or five cosplayers in the country! Would you like that toasted?”

Brian: “Yes please.”

I REALLY wanted to ask him if I could come dressed as a chicken bacon ranch sub, but I don’t think he would have appreciated the joke.

* I make it sound like this was some super secret thing. In reality, however, we had to wait because there was a group of school kids ahead of us. Evidently it’s a standard stop on your run-of-the-mill third grade field trip.

You’d better hold onto to your black and gold socks, Mizzou fans, because I have the Jayhawks losing in the first round!

Feel free to steal my picks above for your own bracket, but I’d like a 10 percent royalty on any winnings. Will keep things on the honor system, okie doke? I won’t bore you with a blow-by-blow run down of every game, though I thought through each match up very carefully (the UConn Huskies are used to inclement weather, and thus are very well prepared to face a Cyclone shaped like a bird from Ames, Iowa). But let’s cut to the chase and take a look at my Final Four:

Baylor Bears over Mizzou Tigers: This is a tough Big XII rematch. On the surface, their pretty evenly matched. No, I’m not talking about shooting percentages or points off the bench; they’re both large land mammals with big teeth and fearsome claws. Heck, both even like to spend time in the water (and frankly, that little trick is what is going to give Mizzou the edge over the BYU Cougars in the fourth round)! It will be neck and neck the entire game. In the end, though, I think the win is going to go to Baylor simply because of the weight/height advantage (though the Tigers have a slight edge in speed/natural jungle camouflage/props in Siegfried and Roy magic shows). I’m sorry, Mizzou fans. Don’t blame me, blame Mother Nature.

Alabama Crimson Tide over the Montana Grizzlies: No one will expect a 13 seed to make it this far, and alas, the Grizzlies will go no further. Elephants never forget, so they will bring up that one really embarrassing thing that the Grizzlies told the Crimson Tide back at camp years ago, even though they pinky swore they’d never tell anyone. I’m sorry, Montana, but you’re knocked out of the tournament AND everyone knows you wet the bed.

NCAA Tourney Championship: Baylor Bears vs. Alabama Crimson Tide: I bet you’re expecting a replay of the previous round, simply because a bear and grizzly are the exact same, so they should have the same outcome, right? Well, you’re right – ‘Bama is going to beat Baylor for the championship – but not for the reason you’re thinking.

You see, the Baylor Bears went to the summer camp across the lake from the Crimson Tide and Montana. Even though they met briefly during the Intra-Camp Olympics (the Bears from Waco won the three legged race AND capture the flag that year, but the Zips from Akron cheated and took home the prize for best popsicle stick sculpture), they didn’t have enough interaction for the Crimson Tide to get any gossipy dirt on the Bears. The fact that an elephant never forgets is irrelevant.

What is relevant, however, is that while the mascot of Alabama is a pachyderm, that’s not what “Crimson Tide” refers to. The nickname is shout out to huge patches of sea water that occasionally turning red due to a poisonous algae. Normally, this wouldn’t be a problem, because, as we all know, bears typically do not frequent the toxic shores of southern Alabama. No, they prefer spend their Spring Breaks at the Dr Pepper Museum not far from their campus. Ah, but the finals games are played in New Orleans, a metropolis famous for its inability to hold back the tides. The levees will break, and Alabama will cut down the nets as the tournament champion. As the Bears drown in poisonous waters from the Gulf.

Man, New Orleans just cannot catch a break!

Let me know if you disagree with any of my picks in the comments; I’ll be happy to defend my matchup!

I had to (got to) lead chapel this morning at work. It’s always an intimidating prospect, especially since half the audience have Ph.D.s or D. Mins. Since I knew I couldn’t come up with an actual expositional sermon, I wrote up this little devotional and hoped the audience would be overwhelmed by the sight of a cute dog and overlook any stumbles or slip-ups. This much I know to be true: All the advanced seminary degrees in the world are no match for a grandmother holding a schnauzer.

Brian’s Chapel Devotion, 2/15/2012:

This morning is going to be warm and fuzzy. That’s why we’re starting off with a picture of my grandmother and her dog.

She is a great woman of God, and even though she doesn’t know I’m doing chapel this morning, I’m positive she’s already prayed for me. Her first name is Opal, and they wanted me to call her “Grandma Opal,” but when you’re a little kid sometimes the words don’t always come out right. I heard Opal and thought it was apple. It made sense to me, ‘cause she was always eating apples. So I called her “Gran-Apple” and the name stuck. The other grandkids all had to call her Granapple, too as well as many of her friends. I lived with her and my grandfather three of the summers when I was in college, so we’re pretty close. And that’s her dog, Charlie. He and I aren’t as close.

Someone please read 2 Timothy 1:16…

May the Lord show mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, because he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains.

Clearly, there’s something good and essential about refreshing someone. Paul, of all people, – the greatest missionary and church planter in history – needed to be refreshed. If he needed to be refreshed, we need to be refreshed.

Back over Christmas, I went down to Oklahoma to visit my family. Part of our Christmas is always going to my Granapple’s house for a nice Christmas dinner. She always does the whole nine yards with turkey, the world’s best gravy, amazing mashed potatoes that are more butter than they are potato, and the world best dressing.

Anyway, I went down to her house a day early and just hung out with her, and to help her get stuff done around the house that might be distracting her from the dressing for my Christmas dinner just right.

• [list of errands and chores, including putting air in tires]

Anyway, that evening she got a phone call from one of her friends, and I overheard her talking about me. I thought, “I’m about get some major bragging.” But instead, it was something to the effect of “I’m so happy that Brian came to visit because he put air in my tires.”

At first, it kind of annoyed me that I’d driven all that way, done all that work and all I was getting credit for was taking her car to the 7-11, paying a quarter and making sure her tires got to 32 psi. But then I realized that had been worrying her for weeks, and it was a high priority to her that I had done it. More importantly, the fact that I was there to do something like that was just emphasizing that I was there to love and encourage her when she felt stressed and overwhelmed cooking my turkey dressing. I put air in her metaphorical tires, just like Onesiphorus put air in Paul’s tires.

Paul was obviously very thankful for the air his friend put in his tires. So thankful, in fact that he took the time to make it is recorded in scripture. I’m thankful for the way this staff puts air in my tires just about every day:

• Don’s not here today, he’s in Phoenix, so I can brag on him and say that a month ago when I got a pretty major blow to my ego and was discouraged professionally, he was there to pump some air into my tires
• Whenever I’m not having the best of days, I can always walk by Becki Kelley’s desk and she’ll make me laugh, putting air back into my tires.
• If there’s ever a day when I show up feeling like this is just a job and it’s just work I have to slog through, I guarantee Gerardo is going to show up and remind me that what we do here is for the glory of God.

I’ll close with this, Hebrews 10:25: not staying away from our worship meetings, as some habitually do, but encouraging each other, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. You’re here in chapel today, so you’ve got the first half down. Putting air in each other’s tires is more than just a cute story about my Granapple, it’s a biblical command. So, as you go about your day, I encourage you to find ways to put air in the tires of one of your co-laborers who might just be feeling a little low.

(originally posted a year ago today… what a difference a year makes!)

Day 1: Looking out the windows, it has become apparent to me that I must begin to consider the possibility that I may never make it out of this house again. The streets show no signs of plowing and I’m starting to lose hope that help is even coming. Like Robinson Crusoe or Gilligan, I’m trapped in a frigid island surround by an ocean of snow. I sit down now to record my last days, in the hopes that some day, some how, my story may be known. (See Day 2 here)

It’s been only one day, but already my meager provisions are growing frighteningly low. I had to hold myself to a bagel and cream cheese for breakfast, a turkey and cheese sandwich for lunch (+sour cream and cheese flavored Ruffles), and a frozen dinner for supper. Oh, the cruel irony of that frozen dinner! It’s as if the Fates are mocking my misery! And to relegate my snacking options to grape popsicles or old spumoni? Frosty torture!

Speaking of bagels, how is it that we can put men on the moon, but we can’t fully slice a bagel all the way through and put it in a package? We do it with hamburger buns, how hard can it be? It’s just one of the things I’ll likely never learn unless I am rescued.

I’m beginning to forget what the outside world looks like. When I look out the window my mind must be playing tricks on me. Everything looks white. I seem to remember my world having at least some color. Is failing eyesight a symptom of cabin fever? Is this the so-called snow-blindness I’ve heard about? I don’t know. I mentioned Robinson Crusoe, and it’s his pattern of intellectual stimulation I’m following to avoid losing my mind and succumbing to cabin fever. Namely, writing down this account and coloring. Here’s a picture of my Spongebob:

I hope that all who read this message learn from my misfortunes: You should never attempt a Spongebob coloring book unless you have a healthy surplus of yellow crayons. They never teach you that back at the academy; it’s something you just have to learn on the gritty streets. Or in my case: the snow-encased basement in front of the 52″ TV.

I’m reminded of the occasion oh so long ago when Megan and I bought these coloring books. Gosh, that was ages ago; like in a previous life…… pre-Snowpocalypse. It must have been, what, two, two and a half days?  I see the coloring she did posted on my fridge, its bright colors torn from her Strawberry Shortcake coloring book. I’m beginning to doubt I’ll ever seen her or anyone else again!

Look at the inscription at the bottom of Ms. Shortcake’s picture. Is it a message of hope or a mockery of my pure-white prison?

Luckily, I still have some primitive forms of communication open to me, namely an iPhone. I checked out Facebook and read this status update: “Man, I’m glad I’m not in Egypt.” I couldn’t agree more. That would mean we’d still have nine more plagues to go after this snowy one was done with. I can’t deal with frogs, locusts AND a blizzard!

I attempted to burrow my way to freedom yesterday, twice in fact, by shoveling the driveway. Yet each time I made progress, Jack Frost just covered it right back up. I feel like I’ve built a raft and set out to sea and the hope of the mainland only to have the waves push me further back up the shore. In the wise words of Queen, I want to break free!

Day 2: As the day wears on, conditions worsen. No matter how much I play bowling on the Wii, I can’t seem to keep my poor little toes warm. Soon, I may be forced to do the unthinkable and actually put on socks.

It might as well be Alcatraz

If the calculations carved into the walls of my house-shaped prison are correct, today is Feb. 2: Groundhog Day. How appropriate then, that today should be just like the previous! The snow has stopped falling from the heavens, but there’s still little hope of it melting or of impending rescue. (See Day 1 here)

I slept reasonably well last night, all huddled up in blankets and comforters I miraculously found hiding in the hall closet/survival shelter. The only disruption came at around 2 a.m., when I heard what I assume to be the grunts and groans of the Abominable Snow Monster traipsing through my backyard. The snow kept on coming down though, so his footprints were nowhere to be seen come sun-up. Or it could have been my own snoring. We’ll never know.

My link with the outside world all-but-completely severed, I’m losing my connection to my culture and humanity. I no longer remember my real name. Here, in the midst of the post-Snowpocalyptic snowscape I now call home, I’m known simply as Thundersnow.

With snow up past my knees, I managed to scrape the driveway clean this morning, all the way to the unplowed street. The temp is 13 degrees with a wind chill of -3. Despite the temps, I still worked up quite a sweat and burned off my heaping bowl of S’mores cereal (it’s part of a balanced breakfast). This snow-removal achievement led to a brief feeling of euphoria that all was in fact not lost. My hopes were immediately dashed however, when a snowplow drove by piling an entire street’s worth of cold, muddy slush in my way. This must be how shipwreck victims feel when a search plane flies overhead, yet they remain unseen. If I haven’t been rescued by tomorrow, I’ll start spelling H-E-L-P in large rocks in my back yard.

I read an article this morning describing the wrong way to shovel your driveway. In addition to proper technique, it said you shouldn’t drink a cup of coffee or hot chocolate before hand, because it will increase your heart rate, thus increasing the risk of overexertion (apparently 1,200 die shoveling snow each year in the U.S.). Luckily, I don’t drink coffee, and simply drank a Diet Dr Pepper instead. Crisis: averted.

There’s a Toyota in there somewhere

It’s been a full 48 hours since the mailman has come by. This is the surest sign yet that all is not well with the world. Is a life without daily piles of junk mail and credit card applications a life worth living? More importantly, I’m two postcards behind in my daily dispatches to Nashville.

Despite the isolation and boredom, my spirits are still surprisingly high. This kinda worries me. They say that in the latter stages of hypothermia, the victims stop feeling cold and instead feel a curious warmth as their body shuts down. I wonder if I’m experiencing the mental equivalent. Other symptoms of mental hypothermia (a condition I just discovered): an unnatural desire to go back to work, the passionate belief someone should totally draw an editorial cartoon depicting the President as the Obama-nable Snow Monster and wondering why the heck the new Glee episode is scheduled for Sunday after the big game, instead of 3 p.m. Wednesday when I need it. And a runny nose.

If this snow never melts and we never seen each other again, stay warm and have a Happy Groundhog Day!

Thundersnow, over and out.

Here’s an excerpt:

A San Francisco cable car holds 60 people. This blog was viewed about 3,100 times in 2011. If it were a cable car, it would take about 52 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

That's a Christmas card picture if I've ever seen one

While normal people were making their final plans for their assault on the next day’s dinner table, my dad gave me what is probably the coolest early Christmas present on the face of the planet. No points for guessing, because the photo makes it pretty darn clear. But wait! There’s more!

For a modest rental fee and the price of ammo, you too can fire fully automatic weapons and a sniper rifle with an effective range of more than 1.5 miles. I had a few moments with five fully automatic machines guns: an MP5, an M4, a Bren MkII, a TP9 and an AK 47. After that, I took a single shot with a 50-caliber AR50 sniper rifle that is longer than I am tall.

It was loud, it was violent, it was destructive and it was glorious. My mother more or less thought it was a waste of money (and you do go through the ammo quicker than you can blink) but both my dad and I had a blast (pun very much intended).

The machines guns were harder to handle accurately than I expected. Unless you’re trying to mow down entire units of advancing soldiers, I’m not convinced that (non-mounted) fully automatic weapons are very useful (granted, soldiers are presumably better trained than I). Here’s my target at 25 yards with the AK 47:

This was firing 4- or 5-shot bursts and just look how inconsistent I was: Half landed in the upper right hand corner and missed the target entirely! The first and second shots would more or less be in the center and after that they started flying off to the upper right. I’m not a terrible shot, either. With a semi-automatic handgun I can get every shot in the 10 ring from that distance on a good day, and within the nine-ring on a terrible day. After the first two or three rounds go off you lose your sight picture and your more or less just pointing the gun the direction you want the bullets to go. And this was at just 25 yards!

Out of the five automatic weapons, I think I preferred the… well, they were all awesome. It’s pretty much a toss up between everything but the AK 47 (IMHO it’s just a lump of metal designed to intimidate). The M4 was the one I was the most accurate with; the Mp5 was awesome because it as suppressed and barely louder than a hand clap; the Bren Mk II was awesome because it was loud, heavy, mechanical and straight out of WWII; and the TP9 was awesome because it was so ridiculously compact.

The TP9 had an awesome holographic sight. WANT.

Look at the size of that cartridge compared to my keys!

Since this was an indoor range, things are going to be a loud. A .22 is loud and the suppressed MP5 was loud. But every now and then, in between the various pops and bangs of the “normal” guys firing all around you, you would feel the ground shake then instantly hear a tremendous BOOOOOOOM that rattled your bones. It was the Big Kahuna: The Armalite AR50 sniper rifle, firing a monstrous .50 caliber round. (For comparison, check out this pic to the left. The Mp5‘s 9mm cartridge is the puny-looking one on the right)

I settled in for my single shot, and prepared for the boom. At 190 decibels, the .50 is not only loud, the sound by itself will actually harm you if you don’t wear ear protection. I’m not talking about hearing loss; I’m talking about bleeding of your ears. Then I lined up on my target 50 yards away and pulled the trigger. The sound was amazingly loud, but it was the concussion wave that  quite literally blew me away. If I had hair, I’m pretty sure it would have blown it off. My dad was standing behind me and said it was like someone shoved him very hard.

Watching the video (it’s embedded below) still cracks me up when I see that shot. It’s just… violent. And we’re on the polite end of the gun!

Anyway, I have precisely zero experience firing a scoped rifle, so I wasn’t look for a bulls eye or anything. An expert marksman can put a bullet between the eyes of a terrorist at 1.5+ miles. I would be lucky to hit a man-sized target at 50 yards (1.5 miles is 2,600 yards). Still, I was very proud of my proverbial “lucky” shot:

Be sure you watch the video below (it’s short) and check out the rest of the pictures on Facebook.

A month or so ago, I took part in a fantastic project known as Snail Mail My E-mail. The idea is that you sent an e-mail to this dude in California and he farmed it out to a team of scribes who copied it down longhand and physically mailed it to its final recipient. It was weird and crazy labor-intensive, but all kinds of awesome as well.

Here’s the letter that some dude in Tennessee copied from my e-mail and mailed to Megan:

Megan and I both volunteered to write 25 letters each, but alas our pens and paper were not called upon to do our duty… UNTIL NOW! I’m very proud to say that we’re among 234 letter-writers writing 10,457 letters to 71 countries on all seven continents.

A few letter-writers apparently got a little overwhelmed with the volume (could’ve been deadly hand cramps, who knows), and now the organizers are redistributing the remaining workload. We aren’t getting the full load of 25, but we do get to write six strangers’ letters to six other strangers, which again, is pretty amazing.

Of our six combined letters:

• One is headed to New Zealand
• One is headed to Germany
• One is headed to Australia
• One is headed to the UK
• One is headed to California
• One is headed to Florida
• Two are poems
• One is a birthday greeting including the words “you’ll always be a lot more more mature, wiser and knowledgeable than me I’M A PLASTIC BAG WHOOOOOOOSHHHH!”
• One uses the phrase “I miss you like a pedophile misses driving an ice cream truck.”
• One asks that we include a doodle of a mustache.
• One appears to a be a Canadian stalker letter to this YouTube “star.”
• One is to “Putt-Putt” from “Little Foot.”

I'm not gonna lie: I'm rather proud of my illustration

In an attempt to kill two birds with one stone, here’s a combined entry on my night in Cole County Jail and my 12:01 review of Harry Potter 7 (2). Spoiler alert, they’re more alike than you might think:

Why?
Harry Potter: I’ve seen three of the previous films at midnight, so it would seem a shame to leave out the grand finale. It’s kinda fun to say you were among the first to see it. Alas, I wasn’t crazy enough to attend the eight-movie marathon playing in St. Louis (which started at 5 a.m. and ended at 2:30 the next morning). It’s my favorite of the series, and not just it solidifies the romantic connection between Luna and Neville.

Cole County Jail: For the past two years, I’ve watched this thing go from a hole in the ground that blocks my entrance to my parking lot a giant behemoth of a building that only two weeks ago stopped blocking the entrance to my parking lot. I had to see the inside. Plus, how many times in life do you get to spend the night in the slammer and it not go on your record? I was the first to ever sleep on that “mattress,” and the first to ever eat powdered eggs off of that tray. What an honor!

SEE OTHER BED, BREAKFAST AND BARS POSTS: Introduction, The Going-to-Jail Playlist, Pre-Lock Up Movie Review and Last Meal

Waiting times?
HP: We wanted to be in the middle and get seats together, so we arrived 3.5 hours before showtime. Once 12:01 arrived, there was still a 10-minute delay.

CCJ: Booking takes a LONG time. It seems like that’s half your sentence served right there. Really, that’s what jail time is: waiting. You eat dinner then there’s literally nothing to do but wait for lights out. In our case, we ate dinner at 8 then waited until about midnight for our “VIP” tour.

Crowd control?
HP: Not good. Terrible, even. The lines were very nebulous and kept shifting. I know it’s not an every day event for the theater staff, but they didn’t do a great job keeping things organized.

CCJ: Nothing if not controlled. In my cell, jailers could see in, but I could never see out. There is no privacy, even though there is a toilet and shower in each 6×12-foot cell. ZERO PRIVACY.

There are eight “pods” (I call them “blocks”) in the jail, with 12 cells in each pod. Each cell sleeps two inmates. Blocks are arranged in a ring, with the cells on the outside and each has a common “day room” toward the center. In the very center of everything is a satellite control room where a single jailer can see into each pod’s day room through one-way glass.

There are eights pods in reality, but I realized that after I

Action sequences?
HP: The Battle for Hogwarts did not disappoint. Aside from the distinct lack of galloping desks (more on that later), it is probably the best action sequence of the eight-movie series.

CCJ: If there is a riot in the “pod,” the jailers warn you to go back to your cell and shut the door. If you don’t, they release a “grenade” loaded with a hundred “superballs” which ricochet around the room, each hit stinging and giving you a nice bruise. If that doesn’t work, they have an “emergency response team” that will enter the pod, the lead man carrying a riot shield that also acts as a giant taser. If that’s doesn’t work, the next guy in line has the short-barrel shotgun that shoots bean bags, then the next guy has the taser shotgun. They wouldn’t tell us what comes next, but they don’t anticipate ever having to go beyond the “grenade.”

I stole this picture from the local Rotary club, because for some reason they were allowed to bring a camera. This shows the satellite control and you can see into one of the pods in the background. You can

I kept count, and when I was in my bed with my cell door closed, there were nine locked doors between me and the outside (and only one of those nine could be unlocked at the same time). And these weren’t like the locks on your house door. They didn’t budge, rattle, give or flex. Once they locked, it was like they were carved in stone.

Soundtrack?
HP: I loved that David Yates kept things very quiet and very still, especially in the opening moments. Until the finale, there’s very little music in this movie.

CCJ: In the day room, voices echo and bounce around like one of those “superball grenades.” If I was in for an extended stay, my fellow inmates and I would have to have some rules about volume. Things weren’t too quiet in the cells either, even with the doors closed. I didn’t hear any snoring or conversations, but I very clearly heard each and every flush of the toilet. I think this may be intentional.

Desks?
HP: The one thing above all else I was looking forward to in the HP finale was the galloping desks McGonagall magic-ed into protecting the castle. They were in the book, but not in the movie. FAIL

CCJ: Suspended from the wall in the cells.

Boredom?
HP: I got a little bored waiting in line, but the people watching made the time go by pretty quickly.

CCJ: If you’re an inmate in CCJ, boredom is your life. You never ever leave your pod. You shower in your cell, and eat in the 700-sqft day room (that you share with 23 other inmates), so you don’t ever have any reason to go anywhere. If would be worth getting sick just to visit the infirmary. The only colors you ever see are white (walls) and orange (prison garb). You don’t even get to go to a visitation room; there’s a video visitation station in the day room. You have an “exercise yard,” but those quotes around the words are there for a reason: one hour a day (if you behave), you get to go through the locked door into an adjacent concrete room about the size of your day room. It has vents that bring in air from the outside, and if you stand near the wall at an angle, you can see daylight through a grate about 25 feet up. This is the legal definition of “fresh air.”

From what I understand, prison (as opposed to jail) is much less boring and much less strict, though there’s significantly more chance of violence.

Costumes to show enthusiasm?
HP: It wouldn’t be a HP premier without ‘em. I particularly enjoyed two very pink and frumpy Delores Umbridge fans, and a very convincing Bellatrix and Ron practiced their wand-dueling (see video here). There were tons of Harrys and Hermiones, but I liked it when someone busted out a lesser character like Luna (lots of radish earrings), a Death Eater or Professor Tralawney. But nothing can beat Hedwig from HP7(1). [Affectionate sigh] Nerds.

CCJ: Surprisingly, yes. A great many wore stripes, and one woman even sported a homemade shirt that said “Prisoner to Zumba.” There were also quite a few wearing shirts memorializing Elizabeth Olten.

Outside food or drink?
HP: Nope, although if Megan had let me, I would have left her in line and purchased some H2O and snacks at a nearby convenience store.

CCJ: Absolutely not. I only brought in my chapstick, my car key and wallet. I was quite sad I couldn’t bring my camera or iPhone, but I understand the desire for a measure of secrecy. And really, as long as I have my chapstick, do I really need anything more in life?

Concessions:
HP: The usual fare: popcorn, nachos, boxed candy and various carbonated beverages.

CCJ: One of the things I was most interested in was trying “prison food.” Dinner was served warm (not hot), and was turkey + noodles, coleslaw, navy beans, cornbread and bread pudding. My fellow “inmates” and I discussed picked the raisins out of our bread pudding to make jailhouse hooch, but we didn’t have the time. I ate everything but the navy beans and coleslaw. Breakfast was lukewarm at best and consisted of “scrambled eggs,” grits, coffee cake and turkey baloney. The coffee cake was quite good, but everything else was terrible. I asked one of the guards the food rotation, and he said it’s two weeks, meaning it’ll be 14 days before the prisoners have to repeat the baloney/eggs combo. I think that’s more than generous. The sheriff told us that a common prisoner complaint once they get out is that the jailers starved them. To guard against this accusation, they weigh each prisoner during booking and when they’re released. On average, they gain three pounds.

Again,

In 3D?
HP: Yes, although I’ve got to say that I’m over the whole 3D thing.

CCJ: Yes. At times I was convinced I could reach out and actually touch that prison toilet if I wanted to.

Dim?
HP: Yes. Very. It’s a dark movie anyway, and once you add in the 3D murkiness, it was even darker. It’s almost black and white, with very little color.

CCJ: Just barely. When the guards said “lights out in five minutes,” you’d be justified in thinking that 300 seconds later the lights would be turned out and you’d be able sleep in darkness. You’d be wrong. They want to be able to keep an eye on you even at night, so they lower the lights to about the level of a 40-watt bulb instead of a 100-watt bulb. I was on the lower bunk, so I was at least in the “shade.” It would take some serious getting used to. Not only does incarceration take away your freedom, it takes away your night.

Capacity?
HP: It was sold out. There were 980 people crammed into the theater lobby, which has got to be a violation of some fire code.

I

CCJ: Inexplicably, the spend-a-night in jail program was not sold out. They can house 180 prisoners (expandable to 360 in the future), but there were only about 95 of us there. I had a private cell. Coincidentally, it was absolutely up to fire code. The only thing more common than security cameras were fire sprinklers. And that’s in a building that has virtually nothing that will burn!

Did you sleep?
HP: I was tired, but after waiting in line for 3.5 hours, I was not about to fall asleep mid-movie.

CCJ: Not really. I was exhausted from my HP thing the night before, but we didn’t even get back to our cells from our tour until 2:30. They woke us up at 2.5 hours later at 5.

Free fortified calcium beverage?
HP: Nope.

CCJ: Yep.

Souvenirs:
HP: We got Harry Potter-style rounded 3D glasses, but to be honest, I didn’t like them. Normal 3D glasses are a pain with regular prescription specs, and these were even worse.

Actually, now that I see the picture, I make this look work.

CCJ: A free t-shirt and a mug shot. Now that I think about it, it probably would be in poor taste to have a jailhouse gift shop full of Wish You Were Here Postcards.

Tattoos?

HP: If you count the dozens of lightning bolt scars Sharpied onto peoples’ heads, then yes.

CCJ: My fellow residents of my pod got ink pen tattoos on our arms, showing that we were from C-Block and proud of it (see the video linked below). We were the fun group, in case you didn’t realize it. Seriously, some people heard we were enjoying ourselves and requested a transfer from boring old E-Pod.

Was it worth it?
HP: Yes. Go see the movie if you haven’t already. The kids have grown into fine actors, and the adults are absolutely incredible to watch.

CCJ: Yes. Not only did it satisfy my curiosity AND get me and my tattoo on the evening news, but it gave me an entirely new respect for the sheriff’s department. They don’t lock people up because they get a kick out of it, they do it to protect the other 99.995 percent of us on the outside. They truly are professionals with a heart to serve their community.

What could have been better?
HP: Somehow, some way, I would have loved to have seen Ginny written out of the movie. Bleh. Go away, Ginny! Go away! Boo!

CCJ: I would have loved to be able to wear the orange pants, orange shirt, orange sock and orange Crocs (yes, inmates wear Crocs). I’m also sad my prison nickname never caught on.

Would you go back?
HP: Yes, hopefully in 2D.

CCJ: NO.