Vacation, part 2

So, last night I just made a quiche for dinner and everything was fine.

I have my cellphone back, finally, making the last two weeks the longest I've gone without one since 1999.

I didn't take any pictures at all on my vacation, which was stupid. And sad. See, my brother is a fantastic amateur photographer (with a fancy camera), who takes beautiful, artistic photos of the landscape, the sky, all that jazz. My sister has a cool new digital, one of those flat, pocket-sized, take-anywhere ones that is great for capturing spur-of-the-moment candids. The pictures she got of our sledding adventure, alone, are worth the price of the camera. Parents sledding equal great pictures. Four-months-pregnant sister, looking like the Michelin Man in ski pants and a parka, also sledding, is priceless*. Hopefully she will be emailing these to me soon, so that I can share the hilarity here as well. But my camera is neither impressively hefty and amazing, or sleek and tiny... it's a seven-year-old, 3.14 - megapixel digital that still works well enough but somehow never made it out of my backpack, because theirs were just so much better, why bother? (The answer, apparently, is "because they will forget to share their pictures with you afterwards, and you will have none of your own.")

I managed to get wrong-sized sweaters for half the family. My sister and my mom got each other copies of the same book, which was pretty funny. (There's a lot of reading-material overlap in our family.) My dad's New Year's Eve toast, (which we did at 11:00pm because I couldn't stay up any later, justified by the fact that by then it was midnight in Texas and 1:00am in Virginia) made me cry: "To this time next year, when we will meet here again but will also be joined by the newest member of the family..." There's not too much else to say about the trip, as 85% of it was spent sleeping, eating, and lounging, which while wonderfully relaxing and restorative does not make for amusing blog content. I will post sledding pictures should I ever receive any.


*Thank God nobody has a video camera, or the potential footage of me spreadeagled at the bottom of the hill, entangled in the sled, a foot deep in snow and hollering for help, I would never live down. You know that classic I Love Lucy scene of a heavily pregnant Lucille Ball trying to get out of the easy chair? This was worse.

Vacation-- Day 1

My flights from New Mexico back to Virginia yesterday, were perfect. Unfortunately, it will take ten perfect air-travel experiences to make up for the horrors of the trip out there. I had to get up very early, before 4 in the morning, in order to drive from here to Richmond. I didn't mind, though, because with the time zones and everything it would still be morning in New Mexico when I would get there, so I would probably be able to catch up with a nap then. Ah, "would", and the conditional tense. Conditions changed.


The first flight, from Richmond to Dallas, seemed to be going along OK until the captain announced that nobody could land at DFW due to thunderstorms. So, we entered a "holding pattern" (read: plane circles the city, tilting and turning until I'm good and sick) for half an hour... Until the captain announces that, actually, we are being re-routed to Austin for the time being. This is a bit upsetting as I have a connecting flight to catch, but I figure that if no planes are able to land, then nobody is taking off either, which should delay my second flight as well.


The landing in Austin takes us down through the far end of whatever storm system is over Dallas, making it rougher and more turbulent than any landing I can remember. I had to use my Little White Bag for the first time in probably ten years. Is there anything more embarrassing than throwing up in public? Let me know, because I sure can't think of it. Once we're on the ground at the Austin airport, we sit. And sit. There are maybe ten other planes in exactly the same situation, having been turned away from DFW airport and waiting to return there.


After about an hour and a half on the tarmac, we finally re--fuel and take off again for Dallas, which takes forever considering you can drive between the two cities in less than three hours. Once again the landing is so rough that I use another bag... eugh. By now the flight that should have taken 2 1/2 hours has taken more than four. I haven't eaten anything except a bag of pretzels, which was wasted anyway. When we land at DFW there is no gate for us, (being that every plane that had been rerouted is back and they're all waiting to de-board) so... we sit, on the tarmac, again. For a long time. It is during this time that I find out that my second flight was not delayed, but cancelled entirely. Why? WHY? It is two days after Christmas, and every flight is completely booked or close to it. How can they cancel a flight and expect to squeeze all 160 people (or however many fit on a 747) on standby for the rest of the (ALSO FULL) flights to that destination? It makes no sense.

By the time I actually de-plane, I'm starving and actually pretty out-of-it. My sister, who was supposed to be on the same (CANCELLED) flight to Albuquerque, met me at my gate and explained the situation to me. She, having been at the gate when the flight was cancelled, managed to get a confirmed seat on a later flight. I, however, had to get on standby, after being told by the gate attendant that not only was every flight to Albuquerque for this day booked solid, but also the next day and the next. And, unfortunately, there are about 90 other people also waiting on standby seats, all in exactly the same position as me. Also, unfortunately, each flight left from the other end of the airport, so I (and the other gazillion people doing the same thing) had to scoot from Terminal C to D, back to C, back to D... repeat as needed. Did I mention that I am still pregnant? And that I carried on all my luggage rather than checking it? Hoofing it all over DFW lugging my baggage, unable to eat, was a BAD combination. I end up waiting on standby for the next three flights, before finally boarding a plane again. I have never been so incredibly glad to actually get on a plane. It just seems so weird to think that you can buy your air tickets four months in advance, check in first thing in the morning to confirm your seats, and still be confronted with the possibility of not getting to your destination. What other industry could work like that?


KK and I were supposed to arrive in Albuquerque about 11:10 am. She ended up getting in about 6:00, and I about 7:30, which isn't bad at all considering that I was afraid of not getting to New Mexico for days. What was bad, was that Albuquerque wasn't our final destination; Mom and Dad's vacation house is about three hours away, north of Taos. So my brother and Dad had set out first thing in the morning to come and get us, and ended up spending all day hanging out at the airport waiting for us. Once we had both finally gotten in, we of course have to drive the three hours back to the house. We get to the house around midnight, which is 2 am Virginia time, making my total awake-time almost 24 hours. The drive from Taos to the house is so mountainous and twisty that I threw up for the third time that day, thankfully at the house and not, say, on the side of the road. Small blessings.


Need it be said that we all of us did nothing the next day, but sleep? Apparently, at some point in the Albuquerque airport, I dropped my cellphone on the floor without realizing it. We couldn't find it that night at the house, but as I was sleep-deprived and barfy I didn't worry about it at the time. The next morning we got a call (on my brother's phone) from a nice lady who had found my phone at the airport and is in the process of mailing it back to me. So, if I've been ignoring anybody's calls, don't take it personally; it's because I've been without cell phone for over a week (a truly strange feeling).

I know that observing human behavior at the airport is passe and over-done, but it really is interesting to see how people react to adverse situations. For three flights, I had to wait with the dozens of other booted passengers desperate to get on a plane. Standby is computerized and in order, so you can see exactly where you are; for example on my first standby I was number 50-something. For each subsequent flight your place in line remains stable, so your number drops as the people ahead of you get on planes. By the time I was on standby for the flight I eventually boarded, I had dropped to number 12. The vast majority of people seem to both understand the system and comply with it, realizing, I guess, that there is nothing else to be done. There is also a lot of commiseration, even camaraderie, among the stranded. But there are always a few folks that just don't know how to act. Their situation is so terrible, they must whine and bitch and moan, loudly, for all to hear. Hello, we are all in exactly the same boat! All of us were supposed to be on that cancelled flight; all of us are in the uncertain position of waiting. All of us had confirmed, paid-for seats at one time that no longer exist, and are now stranded. YOUR problem, that you seem to need to broadcast all over the airport, is no bigger, no different, than that of the other 50 people shuffling from gate to gate with you. You are not as special as you seem to think. Seriously: read the manual, "How to Act".

Epic

If only I'd been able to live-blog the entire journey, to really give an idea of the crazy that is camping someplace twelve hours away, with the entire 'family', in a small car. My mind is so full and tired, that all I can offer is snippets...

Like getting pulled over on the interstate in New York, going through the whole license-and-registration rigamarole, and finally:

Officer: Do you know why I pulled you over?

Don: Honestly? No. No idea. (We weren't speeding, see, because the were police everywhere due to its being Memorial Day Weekend.)

Officer: Don't laugh, but I saw your dogs moving around in the back seat, and thought that they were kids that weren't buckled in. Now I see that I was mistaken. Sorry about that.

And so we were let back on the road, our "kids" still loose in the back. Too bad that the next time we were pulled over-- about four hours later, in Vermont-- it was because we were speeding, and resulted in a ticket.

There were lovely meals with friends we haven't seen in years... Friends that should come with a label: Do not be afraid of the vegans, they still eat pizza* and drink beer, and they don't sneer at your omelet! Friends that are coming down to visit us next month, at last!

"Camping" within the city on a holiday weekend was a new experience for us; we usually aim for off-peak times and out-of-the-way places, hoping to get a little peace, quiet, and privacy. This time, we were sort of treating the campsite and tent as a very cheap hotel room; not a 'getting away from it all' time so much as just a place to crash after being in town all day. Good thing, too, as it was pretty crowded and loud. The cat was wonderful; twelve straight hours in the car, two days in a tent, and another day back in the car doesn't phase her at all. She is the best road-trip cat imaginable**. Sometimes she's so quiet in the car that I have to check to make sure she hasn't slipped out somehow, but she's always just sleeping under the passenger seat. Alice loves it, too. We've taken so many trips (and moved cross-country) so many times in the eight years we've had her, that she seems to think spending days in the car is perfectly normal.

Cocomo, the sister's dog, was less relaxed. She is not a fan of the road trip, but that's one of the reasons why we took her; my sister is coming up in a few days to collect her and drive her back to Texas. We were hoping this trip would normalize the experience of being in the car, and I think it helped. Mainly, though, we just wanted to enjoy our last week with her:

Vermont is still awesome. We sort of spent the entire weekend saying, "Why did we leave this place, again? Why aren't we still here?" and reminding each other of the six-month winters. It just doesn't work, though, because who can think of snow, in the face of this:

Or this:

That picture encapsulates so many things that I love: my husband of one year, two days; my baby with the floppy ears; the neice-dog; and Speeder & Earl's mochas, of which I have been suffering withdrawal pains for four years. It's been too long.

*hummus, no cheese, tons of veggies. Looked yummy.

** I don't know anyone else that takes their cat on road trips, so I'm just guessing. But she handles it like a pro!

To think, for some people it's free

OK, so I was all exited and smug because a jumbo, nasty bill came from my infertility doc's office, but it had all been covered by insurance, (thank you!) leaving me only fifteen dollars left to pay. (Which really makes me wonder-- why? Do human people ever actually look at these bills? Why cover over nine hundred dollars' worth of procedures and etc, but leave the last 15? Anyways.) You know how you're supposed to read through those bills to make sure you're not getting charged for stuff that wasn't done to you? Nothing like seeing, "catheterizing" on that list and going, "yup, yup, sure do remember that catheter! At least my bill's correct!"

Right now I'm less exited, having been informed that the twice-daily progesterone supplement that is my future offspring's only chance for survival, is NOT covered, for the stupidest reason involving how it's billed or something. It's going to cost me sixty dollars a month until we conceive, then $120/ month for the first three months of the pregnancy. (Hopefully.) AND, I have to use ovulation-prediction kits every month to pinpoint exactly when to start the hormones; I thought those would cost about what a pregnancy test does, seeing that they do the same trick of analysing the chemical content of urine. They don't. So, a couple of those kits every month, also until we conceive again. Essentially, trying to concieve is going to cost over a hundred dollars a month until we get lucky. I ran all this by Don, with the inevitable conclusion: conceive ASAP, save $$! It's going to be a busy month...

But first, we get to go camping* with not one dog, not TWO dogs, but two dogs AND a cat**! This is going to be super, super fun. Or, at the very least, give us good vacation-from-hell stories for another few years.



* What, isn't that how everybody celebrates their one-year marriage anniversary?
** She gets LONELY if we leave her behind! I know I swore she'd never come camping with us again, but it will be different this time. Really.

Corporate Traveller, I am

It's like I've been gone forever, right? I haven't abandoned the blog, no worries. Just been extra busy lately with work and all. I spent this week in Baltimore for a training seminar, and the two weeks previous to that feverishly trying to catch up on the pre-work that was supposed to be done before class. It's about ninety hours of computer work, and ideally I would be tucked into a corner computer or the back room for a couple of hours a day to finish. But we're so short handed that I had no time at all to work specifically on the training and had to squeeze it all between customers and during my lunch break. Which is when -hello!- I usually do things like check my email or update this page. So between that and not bringing the laptop with me to Baltimore... no blog.

Traveling for work is kind of neat. I felt quite grown-up: staying in a hotel room by myself, dressing up every day, getting everything comped by the bank. Why yes thank you, I WOULD like a taxi! I don't let it go to my head though, because if I were still in Texas I would just go downtown for the training and not have to stay over. The traveling is really more a result of being so far from a big city than of being promoted. Unfortunately, the other nine associates taking this class were local to the area-- not shipped in as I was. Which meant that instead of us all going out after class (because we're all staying downtown and separated from our families and friends) they all drive back to whatever Baltimorean suburb they're from, leaving me alone in the city to do my thing. Which was cool, OK, I have no problem entertaining myself... but it would have been fun to have company!

I did what I always do in a new city with time to kill: find the nearest bookstore, which in Baltimore was the Barnes & Noble down in the inner harbor area. Quite nice actually. Except... I wanted to finish reading a farming book I'd picked up to look at here in Virginia, so I scoured the store (upstairs and down) looking for the agricultural section. (Generally in a B&N, agriculture is sandwiched between ecology and pets.) When I finally asked for help, the dude at the info desk explained to me (in small words) that Baltimore isn't very "agricultural", that there aren't a lot of "farms" in the area, and that there may not be any actual "books" in their agricultural section. Actually there were: three books about tractors. I guess I've gotten used to living in the sticks... if a city of 40-50,000 can be considered the sticks. But we are surrounded by farms here. And cows.

The Wedding Trip, Part Two

First, what is up with Blogger? I tried to lay my previous post out neatly, photos and text aligned, enough white space to make sense. It worked for the first part but by the end, it looked as though I had just thrown everything together. Nothing worked as it should have. I'm hoping this goes better...

After the wedding we stuck around Angel Fire a few days, to spend time with our families; especially Don's parents, whom he doesn't see so often and whom I'd never met until now. Then: in reverse! Drove back to Santa Fe, back to Albuequerque... Decided then and there not to rent a car in Seattle but to walk or take public transport. Enough driving for one week already. Flew from Albuequerque to Phoenix to Seattle. On the second flight we couldn't sit together due to the rather last-minute booking, (Hurry! Only 3 seats left on this flight! None of which are together, of course.) but were across the aisle from one another instead. Which would have been fine, except that the two seats next to me were occupied by not two but THREE people: man, woman, 18-month-old child.

Quick aside: I DON'T CARE that the airlines let you "carry on" any child younger than two. A big, rambunctious toddler needs his own seat. Period. This is not a small, sleepy infant that wants just to cuddle and nurse the whole flight. No, he wants to throw his sippy cup at the homicidal stranger in the third seat (me). He hit me in the head TWICE with his damn sippy cup, in addition to the expected screeching, screaming, maniacal laughter, and random sobs that come from a kid that age. I swear on this blog that when we have kids and travel, they will have their OWN seats, no matter how much it sets us back. So that I never have to simperingly apologize to strangers that my kid has just beaned in the head. Who happen to be on their honeymoon.

Don and I agreed to have many drinks ASAP after getting off the plane.

In addition to my brand-new husband, I am now IN LOVE WITH the following:

Seattle. The good news is that it is a wonderful city, everything that we expected and then some. The scenery is lovely; all blue waters, green trees, Mount Ranier hovering like a hologram in the distance. The people seemed so friendly, the nicest we've ever come across. Of course we were dealing mostly with service people-- hotel front desk clerks, bartenders, waiters--people that are paid to be friendly. Then again, there's no reason that they still couldn't serve as some kind of barometer for the whole city really. The food. Oh, my goodness. That deserves its own sub-header. The bad news is that now, we want to live there. Well, what's one more cross-country move, right?

Our Hotel. It was so cute in a rustic, welcome-to-the-Northwest kinda way. Totally touristy, totally kitch, but adorable and so comfy. It was walking distance (at least for us) to everywhere, and we could see the Space Needle from our balcony. The staff was so friendly; kind, even. Really, how can you not love a hotel that has a fireplace in every room and puts teddy bears on the bed?
Pike Place Market. Seattle's iconic marketplace lives up to the hype. There is a local law preventing any chain or franchise from opening a store here, so every storefront is unique: restaurants, specialty stores, coffee shops, bars. But the best part is the farmers' market; the produce, the flowers, the seafood...oh man. I have never seen seafood that looked like that. A foodie could go there every day and never tire of it. These huge bouquets of the freshest flowers, and they sell for ten dollars. When at the grocery store here they cost twenty, are half the size, and flown in from South America or somewheres. We walked from our hotel to the Market every morning for breakfast: a latte here, a piroshky there, a half-pint of raspberries. The original, very first Starbucks is here as well.

Elliott Bay Book Company. When Don and I walked into this bookstore, he turned to me to say, "Sweetie, the mothership has called you home." From the outside it looks small, or at least normal-sized, like a typical Barnes&Noble or Borders. But inside, it just goes on and on. Doorways lead to more rooms, staircases to lofts (the gardening/pets/ecology section had its own little loft); a result of expanding through the building over decades. Even the bathroom grafitti is hilarious: seemingly ongoing exchanges and conversations. It is without doubt the most wonderful bookstore I have ever seen-- and as Don said, that's really saying something. I wonder if the staff would notice if I moved in and set up camp in a corner somewhere.

Over the years we have changed each other's idea of vacation. He never used to consider bookstore-exploration as an integral part of a trip whereas I can point to at least one book from every vacation. I have adapted to the bar-hopping that he considers essential and am better off for it...

...and I try to appreciate things like drawbridges and big phallic monuments. (He never agrees that they're phallic, but it is so obvious.) We mastered Seattle's public transit system and got out to the outer neighborhoods like Fremont and the University Distric. Note to fellow poor travellers: that's where all the cheap food is! As well as the Troll. We took the Underground Tour in Pioneer Square, which explains more of Seattle's history than any of the guidebooks that I read, and even found a Lush, which is sorely lacking here in Virginia. The worst way to find a store, by the way, is to pass it on a bus and try to find it again the next day on foot.

Random observations: So many gardens. Gardens everywhere! Love the lovely gardens. Fruit. Fruit seems to grow willy-nilly all over the city. I saw strawberries on traffic islands; apple and cherry trees all over; raspberry and blackberry brambles that seemed to be growing wild. It's as though the area is so fertile that it will grow produce unless actually restrained. Tip jars. They all had clever captions or jokes.

The Wedding Trip, Part One

The problem with having a blog and taking a vacation--especially a trip like this one-- is that in the time it takes to get home I forget half of what I wanted to write about. I know that there are scenes, events, moments to describe that have already slipped away. I will try to go in order, use the photos my brother took. Start with the wedding before going to the honeymoon. Still, half of the trip seems hazy already. In the course of twelve days Don and I took 6 flights, drove over 500 miles, took a train, multiple taxis, and walked maybe 15 miles. If you charted our journey on a map, it would look like something from a cartoon, with dotted lines running everywhere... But we never have been resort-hotel kind of people.


Travel Stage One was flying from Virginia to Albuquerque, New Mexico; driving from there to Santa Fe to pick up Don's parents, and getting to Angel Fire, location of my parents' new house and the wedding. This took the better part of two days. Angel Fire, New Mexico, looks like this, with mountains, pine forests, ski slopes. We saw deer and a coyote there.





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My sister was a lifesaver with the whole girly getting-ready thing. She did my hair, my nails, my makeup. Brought me wine (white, of course, just in case) when I was upstairs alone, waiting. Here we are, grooming: helping me with eyeliner I believe. Shortly after this shot, she will demand that the photographer (I mean brother) leave the upstairs to girls only, and leave us to these private ministrations. When guests started to arrive she helped to mingle everybody, especially Don's parents as they were meeting our family for the first time.



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The judge that married us was so very judge-like. As one of my uncles said, he looked straight from central casting. Distinguished mien, silver hair, billowing black robes. The ceremony took place on the back deck of the house and was quite informal; no procession, no 'aisle'. We just all stood up together, with Don, my father (who was "giving me away" although I've been living with Don for 6 years now, haha), and me before the judge. Dad actually didn't quite get the hint to step back until Mom kind of pulled him away a bit, so most of the ceremony pictures look like that one. In his defense, though, he was to read a Shakespearean sonnet afterwards and didn't want to get lost in the shuffle. I have no idea where my brother stood to get this picture-- in a tree? From the railing of the deck? We look so far away. It gives a good idea of the scenery though, and explains why there are trees growing out of people's heads in any given close-up. As soon as we stepped outside, everyone started fussing that I must be freezing-- strapless dress, chilly evening in the mountains. I wasn't, though; I was warm, flushed even, all night. Maybe from the dressing-room wine, or just from sheer nerves.

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The reception, of course, was inside the house. This is the part that gets fuzzy: I remember champagne toasts; that the food was really good; us cutting the cake. There was just so much happening throughout the evening that it blurs together. I loved having the party at the cabin; it made everything so comfortable and homey. A fire in the fireplace, wine, talking, laughing, eating. It felt more like a cross between a family reunion and a dinner party than a wedding reception, at least to me. One of my cousins has a baby, the first new baby in the family for a long time. She was, quite definitely, the hit of the evening-- but who could be jealous? Even a bride can't compete with such perfect adorableness. In every picture I seem to be kissing her sweet little head. Our obvious infatuation with my baby cousin brought the inevitable questions about starting a family; (none of the relatives outside my parents/sister/brother know about the miscarriage) but we fielded them pretty well. Just knowing that we were trying again now made it easier to feel happy and hopeful; a few weeks ago I probably would have cried. Here it looks as though Don is just talking to her, but he is actually pretending to eat her fingers. She loved him, of course.

The Cake. Inside all the innocent-looking butter cream frosting is a deep chocolate cake, with a chocolate and raspberry filling. It came from the catering company rather than a fancy wedding-cake bakery, which is why it looks more homemade and less formal than most wedding cakes, and why it tasted divine-- not the usual wedding cardboard. As per tradition, we saved the top layer for our first anniversary and I'm looking forward to it. In addition, we held a big brunch the next morning and the rest of the cake made a reappearance then, by popular demand.

I love this photo, taken shortly after everyone left. To me it represents the entire evening better than any other. In the background you can see my mom and sister in the kitchen, tidying up. I am not trashed, merely exhausted and blissed out. Having it finally having happened, after all the anticipation and planning. Having the entire evening come off without a hitch anywhere. Having everything just as I had hoped, and then even better. That is what this picture is.

Terlingua: Not a Ski Town

Man. I have about six post's worth of stuff swirling around right now, and no way to get it all out except for my favorite, the rambling stream of consciousness! This was seriously an amazing vacation. Amazing amazing amazing. I'm the first to admit that a hiking-based trip is not my favorite kind of vacation; give me a big city with cafes and art museums and I'm happy. But, hiking is good too! Who knew? My brother and I took about 400 photos between us-- coming soon to a blog near you!

So, my entire family-- parents, brother, sister, me-- squeeze into one vehicle and drive the 10 hours from Dallas to Big Bend National Park. Big Bend is that green area there in the very southern tip of Texas, bordered by the Rio Grande. My dad very recently purchased one of these new smaller SUV's and let me just say that they don't really comfortably hold 5 normal-sized adults with a week's worth of luggage. The fact that we were all still on speaking terms on arrival is kind of miraculous.

The drive between Interstate 20 and the park is very remote; we'd go half an hour at a time without seeing another vehicle. The park itself is remote, too. No cell phone reception, no TV's in the lodge rooms, no Internet. Hiking, kayaking the Rio Grande, and communing with nature are really the only things to do out there, but there's enough of that to go around. The nearest town is the ghost town Terlingua, which we visited twice. If you think that you know Texas because you've lived in Dallas your whole life (like me) and have maybe driven out to Austin and San Antonio a few times, let me tell you that you have to see this park, 'cause you don't know Texas. Texas has mountains! Cliffs! Gorges! Wild pig-like creatures called javalinas! Fantastic photos to follow soon, with explanatory text and stories!

My trip back to Virginia yesterday was... interesting. Had to be at DFW at 7:20am for my flight. They begin boarding. They stop the boarding. They reverse-board, because the plane is very broken-- something about loose screws ripping up fan-blades that are supposed to be perfectly calibrated. They announce that this particular aircraft is going to be "grounded" for a few days (I love that, because it sounds like the plane has misbehaved) and because they don't keep extra planes sitting around for things like this, our flight is canceled. Every single person on that flight has to be re-routed through other airlines, terminals, and cities to get where they're going-- the line for getting re-routed takes more than an hour. I get routed through Cincinnati on a flight that leaves from the other side of the airport four hours later. But, at DFW it's very easy to get from one terminal to another with the Sky-line-rail-thingie. I know I sound biased but DFW really is the best airport in it's class. Well-laid-out, easy to understand and navigate, heavy on the Starbucks. Especially compared with crazy places like the Cincinnati airport, which was utterly weird. I'm not exactly an airport virgin-- I've been through La Guardia and JFK, O'Hare and Detroit, Washington Dulles, San Fransisco. Never anything like yesterday, though... I was wandering around lost like some kind of hayseed. It seems like that place is stacked up in layers instead of being sprawled out horizontally, and the terminal at which I landed was some kind of reject leftover, tacked onto the very end.

Because my new flight plans were made so suddenly, I got to be on the list for the Special Search every time I went through security, at each airport. Yay for the 15-minute search of the backpack, in which all the little Chanukah presents are poked through and swabbed for explosives; for the physical pat-down, the new air-puffy thing (also for explosives). I pointed out at Cincinnati that I'd just come off of an airplane and hadn't left the airport but it made no difference-- "detailed search" was apparently encoded into my ticket. I wonder if the hundred or so other passengers that I was originally scheduled to fly with had to do the same thing.

Still, if the original plane was broken, I'd much rather be canceled and re-routed and delayed than, you know, dead. I'd rather them figure out ahead of time that the plane needs repairs than search through wreckage trying to figure out what went wrong. I only got in six hours later than planned, and the flights themselves were perfect, so no harm.

Tripping

Back from Chicago. What a trip. Chicago is an amazing city; I wish I'd had another week there. Everything we tried to do--a few hours here, a few hours there--I wanted to spend a day just exploring. The Oak Park neighborhood, filled with beautiful old Victorian houses, bungalows, and the first Frank Lloyd Wright homes; the Magnificent Mile, which would inspire even me to shop and shop; the Art Institute. So much stuff happened in one weekend that it's all in bits and pieces now in my mind and I can't comprehend it all.

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We flew out the day after that foiled-terrorist-plot thing that raised all the Terrorist Levels or whatever to Orange. Everything went really smoothly as far as that went though. Except that my mom thought that my luggage was her gym bag (they're identical ugly green duffel bags) and tried to put it back in the car, thinking that Dad had grabbed it out of the bedroom by mistake or something... I panicked: that's all my stuff, what are you doing? That's my bag! Solution: I'm getting a smart carry-on bag for my holiday present, one of those square-ish rolley ones, like everyone else in my family (and the airport) seems to have.

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Driving in Chicago is CRAZY. They don't use 'lanes' the way that we do--driving straight forward in one lane or moving to another lane to drive in that lane. They just act as though there are no lines whatsoever painted on the road. And they take the attitude that to signal turns is to let the enemy know your plan. Downtown there are hoards and hoards of pedestrians and cyclists, it looks like Manhattan. They just surge into the street randomly, brazenly, knowing that no motorist would mow down 20 walkers at once.

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The Jeep Liberty wins the coveted Worst SUV Ever award. I mean the only good thing about SUVs is the space, right? Luggage space and leg-room? It has none. Our luggage barely fit; backpacks and things had to be carried on laps. Backseat as cramped as my Chevy Cavalier-- a compact car. (Luckily as the Chief Navigator I rode shotgun most of the trip.) On top of that the thing had the child-safety locks set on the back doors, so nobody could get out of the back seat until somebody came around and opened the door from the outside. This went on for a day and a half, until we figured out how to unset that feature.

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Spending 86 million consecutive hours with my family makes me crazy. Crazy. We do better with moderation, not with flying together, eating together,

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Under the right circumstances and with enough wine, my family will dance. With each other. In public. I'm scared to see the wedding videos.

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If my entire family has entered an art museum and I wander away to contemplate some paintings in silence, my mom will call my cellphone to ask if I'm okay. Where am I? Did I get lost? Spending more than 1 day with us makes her forget that KK and I are 23 and 25, not 3 and 5. I guess it's sweet really.

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We barely made it onto the plane back in time. You know what I said about the Jeep Liberty? It goes double for Thrifty rental car company--don't use them if you can help it. When you live in Dallas, it's easy to forget what a great airport we have. Clean, modern, well-laid out. Up-to-date systems, efficient equipment. We just take it for granted until dealing with some old crumbling structure filled with catatonic personnel. Like, I don't know, Chicago O'Hare?

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I got in trouble with Mom for stopping to talk to the handler of one of the bomb-sniffing dogs. But it was the most beautiful German Shepherd--long haired-- and they were still putting their shoes back on...

The handlers are actually the dogs' owners; they take them home at night and spend all day and night with them. Like pets, but pets that deter drug traffickers and terrorists.

A Few Pictures

that Don took on his interview trip. This is apparently this wall downtown where people can write things in chalk.

A really nice tree for rent. Seems to come with a house behind it.

Shots of the "downtown" area.

Siriusly, if we have to move there would be worse places to go than this....

I'm back.

Sorry for the long absence there, it's been a terrible week. My grandmother died on Thursday and I flew up to Detroit with my family for the funeral and etc. Weirdly, my first reaction was anger at my dad, because he told me that she was doing better. Like it's somehow his fault that his 95 year old mother passed away. . . I guess she was trying to fake us out or something. Even stranger was my next thought, that I didn't have to worry about her dying anymore . . . not one of my more rational moments.

The trip: a bizarre combination of grief and hilarity, mourning combined with a crazy family reunion. Travelling with my parents always seems to reduce me to a child-state, which added to the overall unreality of the trip; going from my usual autonomy to being strapped into the backseat, sharing a room with my sister, and being kept on a need-to-know basis . . .


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Upon first checking into the hotel, KK accidentally crushes our dad and his suitcase between the elevator doors-- she was trying to hit the 'door open' button but got confused. We're all five of us crammed into the elevator with our bags, waiting, complaining about how slow the elevator is, when we realize that nobody's hit the floor button; we're still sitting on the ground floor. Good thing nobody else tried to go up or else we would have filed back out into the lobby. Travelling doesn't bring out the best in my kin, I guess.

On the flight back to Dallas we were all in different rows because we got the tickets last minute. Right before takeoff, my mom calls me-- her cell phone to my cell phone-- to ask where we are. We are on the same plane. She wants to know what row we're in. And if I can see my dad on the plane too. (I can.) One of the many unfathomable mysteries of motherhood, I guess.