This has sure been some trip. Sunday afternoon, I parked my truck at my girlfriend's apartment building, and was greeted with a most vigorous osculation. She then raced me to the airport in her car, where I sat. And sat, and sat and waited. I called my girlfriend to chat. Then my gate was changed. Then we waited some more. On the flight out (Jetblue), I watched the second half of Goldeneye on BBC-America, then the first half, then watched Mythbusters. And along the way, we flew over the huge thunderstorms sweeping as if in a phalanx across the midwest. I hadn't seen lightning from overhead in a while, and it was amazing. Like looking at the moon through clouds, but downwards, brighter, and gone in an instant. Balled up like a miniscule sun threatening to spark a thermonuclear chain reaction in our atmosphere a la 2010. And the plane shook like a psychotic version of Captain Eo. I watched the guy next to me try to keep his cola from spilling amidst the vomit-comet-like physics.
Finally, the plane arrived at 22:30 or later. Phoenix time. This means that my brain already thought it was 1:30, after a night of only about 3-4 hours sleep. By the time I got my baggage and took the bus to the car rental terminal, it was 23:30. And, of course, my card was declined. So I called my credit card company and they told me they had placed a block on my account because my address had changed. I rectified the hold, but the girl behind the counter said she couldn't run the same card twice in the same day, once it'd been declined. ARRGH. She suggested we try again after midnight. 3am, my brain time, remember. I checked out the other car rental companies in the terminal, but only one was within $50 of the $115 I'd been quoted for 5 days. So, thankfully, my card was accepted after midnight, and I got my BRIGHT YELLOW Chevy Cobalt. And it is a surprisingly sporty little coupe! I scanned the local radio stations without much hope and ended up finding MY JAM. They were playing Ice Cube's "It Was a Good Day" and suddenly the fact that it was nearly 4AM was not important. So far, this station has played Digital Underground, Parliament/Funkadelic, Run DMC, Zapp, Eric B./Rakim... and it just keeps getting better. I had totally given up on radio, but I would work at a station like this. I would scrub toilets if I had to, just for a chance to get into the late night rotation and raid their vaults. They played De La Soul earlier, and now they're playing the song that "Me, Myself, & I" samples. So yeah, I been rollin down the street with my stereo blastin and my windows down in my BRIGHT YELLOW b-boy car. I wonder if I could install a huge muffler and gigantic spoiler without the rental company wigging out.
So it was probably around 4:30/1:30 before I got into my bed. When I woke up, I couldn't get my internet working in my room. Frustrating, since
tckma's internet was out most of the weekend, so I haven't been online in AGES. AEONS. EPOCHS. ETCs. In fact, on Sunday, I'd had to drive to work to print the directions from the airport to the hotel—EXCUSE ME, resort. So I was running late for meeting up with people in the lobby so (since I wasn't driving anyone) I took off for the training center. I got signed in, and still had 45 minutes until my class started. So much for "YOU MUST BE THERE BY 7:45!!!" So I headed back to the CVS I'd passed on the way there, and got some cough medicine. YES I AM STILL SICK. Then I headed back to the hotel to mention a few things (lightbulb out, no internet) at the desk. I ran into a couple of classmates and ended up driving them to the training center. In my tiny coupe. While the girl with the minivan waited for anyone else to show up. Because no one had since they'd been waiting there. When I got back to the training center, everyone else had signed in, so we called the other girl to come over and join us. In her empty minivan. Yeah. I think tomorrow I'm just going to TEH WAFFUL HAUS by myself and not worrying about others. I mean, I'm paying for my own car/gas, and not getting any reimbursement from the company, so I don't have to act as a taxi.I hit a diner for lunch (ow!) and got their French toast dealie with a cookie shake (!) for my first real meal of the past ??? days. For dinner, I went to the SONIC BURGAR for their carhop service. Like a sucker. I am going to try not to do much fast food out here, but cheap healthy food is far and few between. And tomorrow is the MeFi meetup (anyone reading this is invited; I think
d_klein is coming), and then Wednesday I'm going to dinner with Sethaus from Cornell (!). Thursday is a dinner for work and then Friday I'm on my own in the afternoon til my flight leaves.I hope I was right proper awesome in front of my boss-boss lady today. Answering questions no one else could while also fixing her computer. Hah! If only I could bottle me aweseom and sell it.
