We just wanted to go to a movie.

It was Saturday night, and we took the D.C. Metro downtown to the E Street cinema for a movie. We arrived at Metrocenter station just as:
1) the protests on the mall for/against gay marriage let out
2) the concertgoers for the AC/DC show at the Verizon Center started arriving

On one side of the platform, the Christian anti-gays starting singing hymns. And preaching. We didn’t realize why they were there, singing, or preaching, until:

On the other side of the platform, the pro-gay marriage contingent arrived with their signs aloft, taunting those singing hymns, and eliciting nasty boos from the anti-gays and cheers from supporters.

The AC/DC concertgoers, who I can fairly safely say were mostly from outside the beltway, were annoyed by the hymn-singers and rumbling about retaliating with a chorus of “Highway to Hell.” They didn’t seem to care one way or the other about gay marriage, but this was not exactly the way they wanted to get their party started.

Myself, I just wanted to go to a movie. But this is Washington, D.C. and I love it for cultural trainwrecks like that.