Republican gubernatorial candidate Bobby Jindal of Baton Rouge, with wife Supriya, speaks to supporters during a stop Friday at Shreveport's Downtown Airport. (Louisiana Gannett News Photo/Shane Bevel)

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BATON ROUGE - Pumped by crowd-fed adrenaline, Republican Bobby Jindal of Baton Rouge campaigned through late Friday night on a 40-hour bus and airplane tour interrupted by one quiet hour Friday night - to attend an old friend's wedding.

Jindal, accompanied by wife Supriya, also 32, made good on his promise to high school friend Lori Johnson to read at her marriage to Kevin Rutland. After state police whisked him from a Baton Rouge airport rally timed for 6 p.m. live television news coverage, he arrived just early enough to find out exactly what he would read.

The 7 p.m. wedding was the one quiet hour in a well-coordinated, on-time but frantic dash through Louisiana mostly by private jet that ended in a New Orleans area rally planned for the 10 p.m. newscasts. "This election is going to be close," he says. "As I've said all along, I can win as long as I talk directly to voters."

And he did a lot of talking, especially into microphones for the portable sound system he carried on buses or airplanes or for radio and television stations in Louisiana and his parents' native country of India. The radio stations he couldn't make in person, he talked to by cellular telephone.

Jindal campaigned with only catnaps on the seven-hour private bus tour that began at midnight Thursday, with stops at plant shifts in Monroe and Pineville and overnight coffee shops, wherever a hand was to be shaken.

"When you talk to someone coming off work, it's real. If they want to talk, they want to talk," Jindal says.

Both the Jindals dress in clothes that would wear well: him in a dark blue wool suit, a blue shirt and maroon tie; her in a green suede pants suit with a beige turtleneck. "This won't wrinkle," Supriya says.

At 6:45 a.m. Friday, Jindal's bus parks outside the Lafayette radio station complex while he talks to an Alexandria radio station by cell phone. There follows a well-coordinated ballet of sorts as Jindal and opponent Kathleen Blanco are whisked in and out three different sound booths for the AM and FM stations and the country station. Their eyes never meet, even though at one point they were about 10 feet away from one another, separated by a glass wall.

After a live shot for a Lafayette television outside the station, it's off to the Lafayette airport, where Blanco's and Jindal's airplanes await them. Jindal's plane is wheels up first.

During his 22-minute jet ride to Shreveport, Jindal explains how he is going without sleep. "It's these crowds. I draw strength from them," he says, talking about the morning poll numbers showing it is close and could turn on turnout.

The whirlwind

Noon: A crowd of about 100 awaits Jindal at Shreveport's Downtown Airport.

The Rev. Billy McCormack, 75, a key Christian Coalition leader who was with Jindal early and will be with him in New Orleans tonight, is confident. "I had every confidence from the very beginning."

At his University Baptist Church's prep school commencement in May 2002, "I introduced him as the next governor of Louisiana," McCormack says, claiming he influenced Gov. Mike Foster to back Jindal.

Vorcellie Wyatt, 54, who moved back to her North Louisiana roots after growing up in Oakland, says she's not worried about Jindal being able to handle being governor. "When I was 32, I could handle a lot of stress."

Jindal speaks briefly: "Thank you for your most precious gift. Thank you for your time." He asks the crowd to be respectful of Blanco supporters who are arriving for a 1 p.m. rally at the same location.

12:40 p.m.: Wheels up for the half-hour flight to Alexandria. Jindal's and Blanco's airplanes pass each other in the skies about 10 minutes out of Shreveport, the sight of Cross Lake fading in the distance. Lunch is from McDonald's, Jindal's favorite campaign restaurant because you can eat on the road.

1:15 p.m.: Arriving early for a 2 p.m. airport rally, Jindal goes into an airport office for another radio talk show interview. Rachael Lagrange, 40, of the Tioga community repeats her line that has made her a local radio sensation: "In my opinion, Blanco is as blank as her name," she says, a line her father, Paul Lagrange, says she came up with after watching a debate. Blanco signs are visible through the door. Her rally trails his by an hour.

3:15 p.m.: Lake Charles Airport for another rally. Josh Burill, 25, of Lafayette, who left for Texas after graduating last fall from the University of Louisiana-Lafayette, says he came home to work in Jindal's campaign in Lake Charles. "I was a college student who had to get out."

4:30 p.m.: At the Houma Airport, Jindal is met by defeated Republican candidate Hunt Downer, who urges the crowd of 75 to 100 to vote today. "The weather is cool and the ducks are flying," Downer says to his hometown crowd. "Go hunt, then go vote."

Then Downer reminds Jindal "that if he doesn't do something about coastal erosion, the ground on which we stand will be under water."

Jindal said he hopes the Houma area voters "will help me convince Hunt Downer that he has some public service left in him."

At sunset, the airplane takes off, the alarmingly short distance between Houma and the encroaching gulf waters visible underneath the left wing as the plane banks for the 15-minute flight to Baton Rouge.

5:45 p.m.: After touching down in Baton Rouge, Jindal is swamped by the international media that have dropped in to cover his election. Among them is Niharika Acharya, who is doing a story for the Hindi language cable channel in India. "Indians love success stories," she says, explaining that the Louisiana gubernatorial race is big news. "It is something that has captured the attention of the India people. And it kind of helps Indian-Americans to get into the mainstream."