While attending the recent Democratic National Convention in Denver, City Weekly staff writer Eric Peterson posted 13 articles on the Salt Blog. Peterson lists five of his DNC highlights below:

Gotta give props to Jim Leach, whose speech on the first night of the convention made the party’s message of “post-partisan” unity transcend cliché. Leach, a former Iowa GOP congressman of over 30 years, reminded us that in times of crisis, “country comes before party.” Hell of an endorsement.

For days, convention-goers were beaten over the head with the slogan of “change.” During a break on the final night, they played some inspirational music. The Beatles’ “Across the Universe” wafted through the hall with the lyric “Nothing’s gonna change my world.” I’m guessing some DNC intern had grabbed every song with “change” in it from the iTunes store without realizing the message didn’t quite fit.

I heard that Nancy Pelosi, after counting delegates’ votes for Obama, then asked for and closed the “nay” vote in, like, 0.35 seconds. They didn’t want to hear any “nays” from bitter Hillary-ites.

Joe Biden’s speech was a disappointment. It was real stumbly. I might just still be bitter they didn’t pick [Texas congressman] Chet Edwards for veep. Now, there was a real country-fried Democrat!

The day before Obama’s speech, my dad told me he had a dream that the stadium exploded. An ominous prediction, but I went anyway. Amazingly, after days of clichés and the tedium of awful speakers, Obama finally spoke. When he did, I felt the collective hopes of 80,000 people ignite. Obama delivered and with enough spark and substance to make history. His explosive speech blew apart the cliché of his own campaign slogans and made them something real. But when the fireworks went off, I have to admit I jumped a little bit.