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July 17, 2000 |
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It wasn't until this morning that I realized that I had forgotten to bring
my drumsticks, which led me to wonder how I had miraculously avoided flight
mishaps on the flight down here. I often make a point of bringing them on my flights.
I'm not supertitious. However, the correlation of delays with my flights
when I don't carry them is a little amusing. I don't really
believe that my carrying two pieces of wood really affects the
flight schedule. Of course, Pam may disagree.
I would be flying out today and would be the first one dropped off at the
airport. My flight was about 2pm so I planned to get there around 1pm. I
got ready. I deflated by inflatable mattress and packed the remainder of
my stuff. I think I've given you a list of the stuff I bring, so you can imagine
that it takes me a little while to pack.
Fred cooked lunch again. He truly is an
exceptional cook and a wonderful host. He truly spoils us. I think Bruce
and Lily were leaving later today and Tino would be leaving tomorrow.
Fred drove me to the airport, with Aileen's car actually, a Honda Civic. They
had swapped cars for the day, since he would be dropping off a number of us
at the airport. Me, for instance. The drive to the airport was
non-eventful. I felt the warm of the Florida sun and looked at the palm
trees. I would be missing them until I return for Christmas vacation.
I got checked in to the flight without incident. E-tickets are wonderful. I no longer worry about whether or not I left the tickets behind; I just have to carry my ID. I did get my huge duffle bag checked in to Seattle for my return trip. It really is quite big. In fact, I'm fairly sure that if I had to I could carry someone's remains in it; it has that kind of volume. Granted the person would have to be average size at most, and I would definitely need to dismember him/her, but it can be done. However, this would not account for the weight, nor the mess that would surely follow the dismemberment. I'm just trying to give you an idea of the size… Really!
With the overbooking of flights, you rarely get to sit in a row my yourself anymore. In fact it has been years since it has happened to me. Granted, I'm not what you may call a frequent traveller, but nevertheless, it doesn't happen to me very often.
Although it did happen today. I was sitting in the window seat and the seat immediatley next to mine was vacant, and there were no other seats in the row. I was able to move the arm rest up between the seat backs and stretch out a bit. There was part of me that somehow thought that I should take advantage of the opportunity, but wasn't exactly sure what I should do other than stretch out. Should I try to lay across?. I suppose it is a microcosm of the feeling you get when you are finally home alone.
Otherwise this leg was uneventful. We arrived in Pittsburg. I had some time to kill before my next flight. There were a couple of stores that interested me, one was the one with the stuffed animals. I wandered in and looked around. Pam is fond of fish. No, really she likes fish. I asked the lady who worked at the store whether or not she had any stuffed fish and she pointed me to an array of them. I picked a couple of brightly colored fish, one small and a medium one. I hoped she liked them.
I found at seat near my departing gate. which had an electrical outlet and charged it up a little, granted not enough to bring it back up to full power, but some nevertheless.
I was seated next to a mother and her young teenage daughter, they attending a wedding. From chatting with them, it appears as though it had been years since they had been here. The mother, although a bit terse, was certianly polite and chatted intermittently. Her daughter was considerably less friendly and very apprehensive to chat at all. I briefly wondered if it had anything to do with me in particular, but also noted that she was equally apprehensive to reply to the flight attendant. I suppose she's just a bit shy.
The flight landed safely although about half an hour late. Normally, I wouldn't care so much, but I wanted to see Pam for dinner. I called her immediately and asked if she was interested. She agreed.
I gathered my abnormally large duffle bag from baggage claim and wondered to the station with the courtesy vans. I would've called the service which parked my car, but I saw the van pull up as I was dialing. It was the same driver that dropped me off a few days before; he asked about my trip. I told him I missed my family and Florida already, and could not wait to see them again.
Since I had not called the service, which they reprimanded me for, my car was sitting a bit far in the next parking lot. I paid their fee and decided that I would simply walk to my car and drive it off myself.
I drove to Pam's place to meet her for dinner. We weren't sure where we would be going, just that I hadn't seen her for a few days and probably wouldn't see her again until the weekend. I wanted to make sure that we spent some time together.
I gave her the two fish, which she seemed to genuinely like. Like I said, she has a thing for fish. I also gave her a couple of other souvenirs from my trip. One was a tiny bottle of tabasco sauce that we got from Charley's Crab on Saturday; the other was a souvenir cap from the reunion. I told her I wished that she had been able to come with me.
We went to Peso's for dinner. We drove there since I really wasn't in the mood for walking. We only parked about a block away. It was a little bit of a chilly night, and she wore a sweater while we walked to Peso's. Peso's is a Mexican restaurant and bar. The food there is pretty good, though they seem to run the food a little spicier than most other Mexican restaurants. They probably have as much business from the bar as the restaurant.
We each ordered the fajitas, she had the chicken and I had the steak. The fajitas were pretty good, although they didn't actually come out sizzling, which is a bit of a disappointment. I had to serve sizzling platters when I waited on tables. I understood that this process was probably more for show than for flavor, but I still have an appreciation for the theatrics of the sizzling platter.
Pam and I got into a little debate about the proper way to wrap a fajita. She wonders how I am able to wrap mine so nicely while hers keeps falling apart. There are two factors that go into putting together a fajita. The first is the position, you should lay out the contents of the fajita in the shape of a rectangle, from the center out to the top. The second is the anount of stuff per fajita, it is a common mistake to overstuff the fajita. You may be able to close it, but for a fajita to retain its shape you need significant overlap in the two outer flaps. You really weren't interested in how to wrap a fajita were you? [Sigh!]
We parted company shortly after dinner. It was a school night and I was still recouperating from my trip. I needed some rest.
When I got home there were two packages I found on my door. I looked at them briefly and knew what they were. I came in to greet Magic, who I hadn't seen for a few days. He even seemed genuinely glad to see me. I spent some time with him. We chatted briefly about how we each spent our weekend.
After catching up with Magic, I opened up the two packages. The first, was a new DVD. The DVD is new for me and it is recently released, but he movie is old. In fact, the movie is over then years old… The Princess Bride Technically, the movie is not released until tomorrow, but I pre-ordered the movie. It is one of my all time favorite movies. It just simply has a slightly twisted sense of humor, but yet happens to be quite charming. I was delighted to finally get it!
The other was a new Pocket PC. I had debated upgrading from Casio's E-105 to the E-115 for a while, but eventually decided to do it. I had placed the order some time ago. When I placed the order they had said that it would take "4 to 6 weeks" and they weren't starting on July, so I really wasn't expecting this for a couple of weeks yet. I was pleasantly surprised however.
Unfortunately, I was too tired to be able to play with either of my two new toys, so I simply put them aside and went to bed. I'll play with them after work tomorrow.
July 17, 2000