Hilary Booth... of course!

After using up my camera on local snow photos, my photos from St. Augustine are up on Flickr. I do wish I'd captured more of the wacky architecture but they're not too bad. I'm still deciding which snow photos to share. None of them really convey how bad the storms were.

So I awoke way too early this morning to bundle myself up to go to National Airport. When the taxi dispatcher tells you to stay warm, it's probably a warning of how bad it is. We may have gotten into the 20s when I left. At least it was clear and sunny. I don't even want to think about snow and ice in that equation.

The airport was the usual organized chaos. I had to pay even for the first checked bag which ticked me off, especially since it's credit cards only, no cash. I know it's the way things are going with the airlines, but it still bothers me. Alas I discovered one distinct minus to leaving this early -- the Borders hadn't opened yet. *sighs* The flight boarded on time, but we were delayed half an hour because some of the maintenance equipment was having problems. Some poor lamb behind me managed to lose her Ipod in the airport waiting area; her mother was not amused or sympathetic. I put on my headphones on my now ancient Dell DJ and listened to music for most of the flight.

I still have to say -- DC is a pretty city, especially from the air, spotting all the monuments. Usually I'll spy the usual threesome, but this year I also saw the WWII memorial too.

After my arrival, my parents and I had an okay lunch at Cici's pizza, which is a buffet style deal with pizza, salad and dessert. My uncle sent me a book on city foxes for Christmas present to go with his charitable donation in my name.

So I am in Florida for the Christmas holidays. The plane trip was surprisingly uneventful, considering the horror stories I kept hearing. I landed in concourse A and took the train over to concourse. Of course they changed our gate number later. We only left about forty-five minutes late, but again not bad, at least we got there, unlike some of the people stuck in Chicago.

The weather varies between balmy and cloudy. The sun couldn't decide whether it wanted to come out today. But it's a welcome change from DC hovering in the early 40s.

Today was mostly shopping at the local mall. One of the stores was in the Christmas spirit. Instead of calling for a particular salesperson, they apparently had codenames. So we heard "Prancer and Vixen to the customer service counter..." (For some reason it makes me think of Hilary and Jeff in "Christmas in the Airwaves":

Hilary: "Oh, Jeffrey!--why every Christmas do you start acting like Santa's reindeer?"
Jeffrey {puzzled}: "Reindeer? Ah, what--like Dasher and Dancer and Prancer and Vixen?"
Hilary: "Yes. You start dashing out with some dancer and prancing around town, you vixen."

Probably not the image the store was going for...

I've gone ahead and backdated the Sunday recap from last year's Baltimore trip.

I should break into a rousing chorus of "Good morning Baltimore", but I'd say Miss Saigon would be more appropriate with "The Heat is on" because dear god is it sweltering here. The heat was absolutely brutal. The only relief was the few breezes you could catch on the water taxi. Even some of the shops had signs promising air conditioning, which was a welcome little break, before heading back into the sauna.

( Saturday in Baltimore with books and fountain pens and storms oh my! )

Actually it's more like 100 and we won't even discuss the heat index involved. I'm planning on staying in for lunch. At least my co-worker is out for the bulk of the week, going to a Beyonce concert. She's usually freezing in this office, so she turns on her space heater! In August! Not what you want to feel blasting when you come into the room.

Last month or so, I was debating whether I'd do my usual birthday visit to Baltimore. But my hotel didn't have any rooms available initially, so I thought "Well, I waited too long, it is August." Yesterday rooms had opened up. So I may be visiting my wacky art deco city by the bay after all.

Barry Bonds whacked home his 756th home run to pass Hank Aaron -- a record I never thought I'd see beaten in my lifetime. I wish it was someone more... likable? I rooted so hard against him when he played for Pittsburgh. Funny thing I root even harder against him now. As I feared, he hit it against the Nationals. On the bright side, the Nats won the game and are now tied for last place with the Marlins, rather than holding the basement by themselves. Maybe things are looking up. And football is returning. It won't be summer forever.

I am writing from the lobby of the Media West hotel in Lansing, using their wireless to catch up on two days of email and LJ. I had good intentions of updating on a regular basis like last year, but nothing works out the way you expect it to.

( It must be Thursday or They don't want me to leave Chicago, do they? )

I made it safely to Florida for the Christmas holidays despite a rather trying day. I arrived at Reagan National a little behind schedule only to discover my flight to Melbourne was delayed by an hour. That delay increased to three as the day wore on. The door seal on our plane was having issues, so they were busy getting it fixed. Unfortunately we had a mumbler giving announcements for our gate. I swear I could understand every other departure in that corner except mine. And every time someone mentioned it, she'd blame the surrounding noise. So needless to say, I was just happy to board the plane and get on with it. We actually had to go outside to board the flight, rather than use a gangway.

Then I discovered that to my horror I had seated in front of a babe in arms and her parents. A rather vocal one, in fact. I could deal with that. I could even deal with her jostling and occasionally hitting the back of my seat. To their credit, the parents did try to shush her. Unfortunately, when the flight started, they opted to use a portable dvd player to entertain her... without headphones. Isn't there supposed to be a rule or something about that? Someone objected and they did turn it down a little, which was fine for the people five rows back, but I could still hear it. At least the child was quiet. Then came the descent. She was having inner ear issues. I sympathized whole heartedly. I am told I had many inner ear infections in my youth. However, my adult ears could have done without the wailing and screaming.

I definitely don't need a heavy coat here in Florida. Yes, hate me all you like, even in short sleeves, I'm sweltering. It's December. I don't do late 70s this late in the season! Still waiting to hear word on Discovery's return. For some reason I feel like quoting "Space Camp"... "It seems I remember reading something about the shuttle landing in White Plains or something..."

Having a decent time in Baltimore. It's shaping up to be a very different trip in some ways. The weather is muggy and overcast and threatens thunderstorms all weekend. The hotel room can't decide it's just freezing cold or humid or both for amusement. So while I did some general shopping, I didn't really do much, except stare at a few of my favorite architectural buildings. Only I would have a love affair with an art deco bank building. I hope to have pictures eventually. I still think "Alter Egos" should open with a scene on its heights, but I haven't been able to write it properly. On the other hand, I came across a lovely book I should look more closely at soonish, talking about the postwar era Baltimore streetcar system. I had been asking myself how people got around Baltimore, especially before the water taxi system. Obviously I didn't remember "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" very well.

For those fans of overdue_comic, merhawk has created unshelvedreader for those who want to talk about the strip. As long as you don't talk about the book club... 'cause... there's a rule, y'know?

I'm spending some time condensing and sorting all my graphics/writing/etc files on my desktop and laptops. I'm anticipating needing to take the laptop with me on some upcoming trips so I never want to say "I can't work on X because the file is on the other computer." At some point I need to consider an external hard drive for the heftier files. I wish I knew whether I could run Musicmatch off one of those. The music takes up most of the room.

And I'm flailing and debating the birthday trip. I had planned a short weekend in New York under the "I never go anywhere" excuse. But it's now Sunday and I still haven't bought the train ticket yet. I did go ahead and take the Monday off work. If all else fails, I'm contemplating a short day trip up and back to Baltimore for research and sightseeing all the things I didn't see before. Except no art deco hotel to inspire me... What to do, what to do?

GIP from glimglamoury because I needed a local icon and good cherry blossom memories.

Huh, apparently the group doing AnimeNext is planning an manga oriented edition in October, called MangaNext, set to be held in Seacaucus, NJ. Unsure how one gets there though, since I do not speak the NY/NJ transportation system fluently enough. Presumably I'd have to transfer from Amtrak? And it's certainly cheaper than Katsucon or Otakon and smaller which is a blessing. I'm not sure I can deal with 9000 people anymore.