It's not Monopoly money. It came in twenties and fifties and hundreds, and even some tens, fives, ones, and even twos. In just three hours, we handled nearly $200,000.00.

Once again this year, a small group of guys from Federal Lodge volunteered to assist with the National Kidney Foundation's big annual fund raiser, the D.C. Chili Championship. The chili cook-off attracts big crowds (as in 15,000-20,000), especially since they have rock bands playing all day long, this year including Live, Staind, Chevelle, Finger Eleven, Seether, Deaf Pedestrians, and The Blackjacks. All of the people attending buy a $40 advance admission ticket (they sold out in advance again this year), then, once they are in the area, they buy tickets for food, beverage, and beer purchases. We counted and sorted the concessions money as it came in.

They have a group of "runners" accompanied by armed police officers who pick up the sale proceeds at various ticket booths around the grounds who then bring the cash to the secret hotel location where we sort and count the money. It's actually a fun afternoon, complete with free pizza. Once we finish our shift, we have the opportunity to go to the festival (if we can stand the noise from the bands). About eight of us went this year.



Laurent was in our little group. Of course, we just can't take him anywhere. He got a big can of Guinness and decided to drink it through this funnel and tube device all at once. He made it, though he spilled a fairly good quantity of the brown beer all over his pink shirt.



Meanwhile, John and Ian M. (different Ian) were occupying their time trying to flirt with the girls at the beer booths getting free and/or extra beer—not a bad idea, given the $7 they were charging for a plastic cupful of beer! They had some initial success, but John got a little over the top with one of them and she made him pay for everything on that trip! He was crushed. LOL Here they are on one of their earlier beer runs, when they found someone to give them two-for-one beers. That nasty brown stuff is Bock, and I got a couple, but didn't like it and gave mine away. Yuck. But, I'm not a beer fan.

Here are some pictures of the festival, if you'd like to see all the wildness and the crowds.