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July 14, 2000 |
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I suppose this is really the fourteenth, although it is functionally for me
still the thirteen. I'm starting this entry from the airport in Pittsburg.
I'm here on a layover to West Palm Beach. The airport seems nice I was
afraid I'd have to walk across thirty-something gates. We landed in gate
B28 and my next flight was in gate A6. Fortunately, they were only a short
walk apart.
I noticed a few things while flying into Pittsburg. While it was still
dark I looked down upon the clouds. Normally you would not notice them
there… however, I saw the occasional strobe of light from the window.
I didn't take me long to figure out that it was a thunderstorm. I saw
seemingly random patches of puffy sky light up. There was part of me that
wanted to take a picture, but it didn't take me long to realize that the
reason this was so mesmerizing is because the of the random pattern of
clouds which lit up. They didn't light up very brightly since we were
flying considerably higher, but it was still a sight to see.
I suppose that this is the part of nature that I like, the things that I we
probably don't imagine seeing. Like watching a thunderstorm from above the
cloud cover or the waves crashing into snow banks during a New England
winter. Many people take pictures of trees and forests and beaches.
That's so predictable. This is much more enchanting.
Oh, the other thing I noticed while flying into Pittsburg. I noticed that
during the entire approach, all I saw was farmland. In other words,
where's the city? I suppose that any one of a number of things were
possible. Maybe we approached the airport from a direction where we
wouldn't see the city… Maybe the airport sits in the outskirts of
town… Maybe it is nothing but farmland.
I briefly thought about picking up something for Len and/or Fred. They're both big Pittsburg Steelers fans.
I looked at the shops in the airport, but found nothing appealing. I
wondered back to the gate.
I got a seat near an electrical outlet so that I could plug in my notebook.
That's getting very scarce to find these days. Most airports don't have
any or conceal them very well. I figured that if I'm paying hundreds of
dollars for an airline ticket I should be able to get some juice. And I
started to write this entry.
It was 7am and Pam had a phone interview at 6am, I
was curious on how it went to I called her. It was right after the machine
picked up when I realized, that it was 7am… in Pittsburg. I
hung up. I hoped I didn't wake her.
Otherwise, my short three hour stay at Pittsburg was uneventful. I briefly
thought about what it would be like to see a Pirates game at Three River
Stadium. Then I got on the plane… for another nap, albeit a brief
one.
I arrived at West Palm Beach without any incident. Well, none on the trip. I wasn't sure which precisely who was picking me up. Although I was told by Aileen that it would be Fred. I was also told that I would be arriving only about twenty minutes behind Susan and Rob, so there was bound to be someone to pick me up. I arrived at the airport. No one here. The chances of their running late should be significantly less now because there were a couple of people arriving before me, but I didn't panic. I'm not the type. I went to get my luggage and figured that would take a few minutes.
Oh, did I neglect to mention that I was attending a family reunion? Although that's not entirely accurate. First, it's not the entire family… just the collection of cousins, similar age range. I think we now span from fourteen to thirty-two years of age. Second, they're not technically my cousins. They're Fred's cousins. I just get along very well with Fred and one year he invited me along, and I've been attending ever since.As I was waiting in the baggage claim area, watching other people's baggage scrolling by in this makeshift conveyor belt like contraption. They're not real conveyor belts, since they're composed of little platforms that connect up to each other, but they behave like conveyor belts.
I called Pam at work, to see how she was doing. Just my luck, I did wake her up that morning, but someone else had woken her up as well. Her interview seemed to go well. I forgot to ask her if she had actually prepared the pancakes that we went out of our way to get yesterday.
I wasn't waiting long before Tino, one of my cousins showed up. Tino is a cool guy, who is also in the computer industry, so whenever I geek out, which isn't very often actually. He catches those jokes and references. He came by and asked if I had seen Susan and Rob, who were supposed to show up some time ago. Nope. He tells me where Fred is pulling up with the car and wanders off to look for Susan and Rob (Fred's youngest sister and her boyfriend).
Fred rented a Jeep Wrangler for the day. Very Cool. Although, I briefly wondered how my luggage was going to fit in it in addition to five people. After we decide that Susan and Rob were officially missing in action, we go back and pick up Fred's car from the rental place. I drive his car back to his place. Once we get back to Fred's we realize that Susan and Rob were not arriving until 11:30… pm. [Sigh] After talking briefly to Aileen, we all decide to go get lunch.
Fred drives down the beach front… in a jeep. Woo Hoo! This part of town, Boyton Beach, is filled with very expensive homes that were grand to look at… not that I would ever get one, there are way too many other things I would get before a multi-million dollar home. The drive was picturesque and very pleasant. It was very warm, about 80° and a bit humid, though the breeze did ease it up a bit. We parked right by the beach and walked to the restaurant.
This
is where we had lunch. The name of the place is Boston's. Granted, we
actually had lunch downstairs, but the view was similar, though a little
obstructed. Why it was named Boston's, I could not begin to tell
you, but it was nice nevertheless. I think I had the crabmeat salad
sandwich and we ended up sharing an order of wings and some other appetizer
that I can't remember. That's right, I can't remember… sue me. I had
very little sleep in the plane, so I was close to being a zombie.
After lunch we still had some time to kill before Aileen got home. We were driving around a bit trying to figure out where we could go. Meanwhile, Tino stops by a market to get… breathmints. I wish I could be making this up. We ended up going to a bar, where we could take some shelter from the sun, chat, and listen to the music, and enjoy the sights of South Florida. I must've had two or three beers by the time we left and I can't quite remember how it was that I wound up telling her that I had a pierced nipple… or did she feel for it?
We got home shortly after Aileen had returned from work and telling her the details of our excursion, whatever details I could still remember anyway. Fred and Aileen had been planning for us to go to a place by the beach that specializes in oysters. Since Tino has such a fondness for oysters. We still had a couple of hours to kill before then.
One of the things we did during that time is to inflate matresses. I brought my own matress. I'm not sure if that makes me resourceful or strange. Aileen also had another matress that we would have to inflate to accomodate everyone. As we were all chatting and catching up on things, we took turns with the air pump. It wasn't that long before we got the suckers inflated. They even had stands for one of the matresses.
We also managed to get Susan and Rob on the phone. Apparently, their original flight was cancelled and they were on standby for another flight to Palm Beach. [Uggh!]
As
for dinner, we did end up going to the Oyster place. The name of the place
was Spoto's (… see the picture on right), and it was in West
Palm Beach. Let me make this clear, this place specialized in
oysters. I'm not kidding. They had at least three kinds of
oysters, prepared in an array of different ways. I think we all managed to
try them all. I had even ordered a Blue Point martini which came
with three Blue Point Oysters in it. I know that you probably think this
is sounds very strange, and ordinarily I would agree with you, but I simply
had to try it. And the martini wasn't bad, it is not as strange as you
might believe.
I also chatted briefly with Pam. I told her about Spoto's and all the little details about the oysters. I missed her; I regret that she wasn't able to come. We kept getting cut off, so we didn't talk for very long. At the same time, we were exchanging messages with Susan and Rob, who still hadn't left New England, but were hoping to get on a plane tonight. If so they would be arriving in the wee hours of the morning.
The food was exceptional. We sat outside again, this time as a matter of necessity, since it was the only table available. It's not from lack of planning, this place apparently doesn't take reservations, but we didn't have to wait long. I really wish I would remember everything we tried. We had oysters cold on the half shell, some were fried in a light batter, among others. We had wine… or rather Fred and Aileen had wine since Tino doesn't drink and I haven't developed an appreciation for wine, nor am I in a particular hurry to do so.
Of
course, by now you realize that I've been carrying my digital camera with
me. No surprise really; I normally carry it with me. At this point, Tino
had developed a… uhmm, fascination with the hostess of the
restaurant. Digital cameras are cool gadgets for obvious reasons. What
may not be immediately apparent is that it is a bit easier to take a candid
photograph with a digital camera. There are two reasons for this…
first, you have a screen where you can preview the picture before you take
it; second, you can take several pictures erasing the bad ones
until you have one to your liking.
This is a picture of the hostess that Tino was so enchanted with. He insists that she had exceptionally beautiful eyes, which I'm sure she did, but the rest of us were speculating that this is not the only thing that he had found so appealing, nor was it the feature he found most appealing. Some of us, even pointed out the low riding waistband of her pants, but no matter.
It must've been about ten or eleven by the time we finished dinner. We walked briefly down the streets of downtown West Palm Beach. It is a beautiful place really and quite lively even at this time of night. I would've enjoyed it more except that I was exhausted from the previous day's travel and the flurry of activity today. I suppose I'm growing old. [Sigh!] Aileen seemed pretty tired as well. Tino and Fred were still going strong.
Tino went into one of the shops and gets what we speculated was some sort of a grass shake. Maybe he needs fiber, or more likely he found the young woman behind the counter equally as appealing as the hostess from Spoto's. Still he didn't talk for very long, and he did end up with the shake.
We went home after that, I was falling asleep while holding on to the roll cage in the jeep. That's okay, it wasn't so bad really. I got changed and went right to sleep. It had been the end of a very long day, but a good start to our reunion.
July 14, 2000