White House Press Secretary Nathan Dawson

So, guess what I did this weekend. Watch the game? Nope. Mow the yard? Nope. I went to the White House. No, not my buddy's white house. The White House. Yeah, that one. And I didn't go see the boring old Lincoln Bedroom crud. I got to go to the West freaking Wing:

You might be wondering how one gets to take a tour of the White House West Wing in this post-9/11 world. First, you have to know somebody who works there. Fortunately my wife has a cousin who is a Coast Guard communications specialist stationed at the White House. Next, you have to pass a Secret Service background check. Fortunately they didn't find out about my time as an Uzbek goat smuggler.

So I'll try to skip most of the boring stuff and get right down to the juicy tidbits of my tour. We started off going to the Press Briefing Room. You know that big, well-lit room you see on TV all the time where the Press Secretary answers questions from annoying reporters? My first impression: what a dump! It was tiny, dimly-lit and had stains on the carpet (I guess reporters are messy). But it was one of the few areas inside the House in which they won't shoot you for taking pictures. So I snapped a few. And now, White House Press Secretary Nathan Dawson...And my wife's cousin revealed a dark White House secret to us: there's a trap door right in front of the podium in the Press Room. He claimed that the room was built over the old White House pool, but I think it's where people go when they "disappear." I betcha Hoffa is down there somewhere.

So then we went through the West Wing. Sorry, but I don't have any pictures. It's really, really forbidden. Had I tried, I think I would have would have wound up in that room underneath the Press Briefing Room. But I did get to see the Oval Office, the Cabinet Room, the Roosevelt Room, the Rose Garden and four Norman Rockwell drawings worth $1,000,000. Here's a picture from the Rose Garden: I also got to see what was on the menu at the White House Mess Hall. It included such fine delicacies as PB&J sandwiches. And I got to see some of the Official White House Snipers and this mean-looking White House guard dog:

But I just had to get a picture somewhere in the West Wing. Feeling the call of nature, I saw my chance. Right around the corner from the Oval Office is the men's room. I dashed in and locked the door. My first thought: "Jeez, how tiny!" I mean, it was nice and everything, but I would have thought that the President might warrant something more, well, Presidential. So I snapped the following picture before taking care of business:

And it got me to thinking. How many Presidential buttocks have graced that porcelain seat? And how cool is it that I, a professional computer geek from Orlando, could use it, too?

You know, even though we don't have a King in the United States, at least our President has a throne.