ORD Sit Time

Recently, I had some sit time in the O'Hare airport. Normally, I'm running to the blue line or my hotel van; it was a bit of a treat to see what the other terminals had to offer. There's the standard food stuffs that seem to be in all airports - Starbucks, McDonalds, Johnnie Rockets. They have a kiddie playground which if Newark ever gets, I'll transfer (I think PHL has one too). And then I stumbled upon a series of posters, what I can only compare to academic style, describing the glories that is city planning, urban design, what it means to be part of a region, all things geographically Chicago: everything that consumed my time on the banks of the old Raritan. Things, unfortunately, I hadn't thought about or considered in quite some time but loved every one of those thirty minutes I spent standing there in awe, learning.

Big Girls Need Big Toys!

This weekend, I invested in a sweet mountain bike. It's nothing too expensive or overly fancy. It is, however, a big deal for me because this is my first investment in athletic equipment... and now I have a bike in my bedroom. I'll get hooks soon enough, and then it'll hang in the hallway. The best part is that it hasn't stopped raining since I bought it...

Bueller???

I'm sitting in the gate area, waiting for my flight to begin boarding as these others are getting ready to close the aircraft door. The gate agent just paged for the two Wongs... Wongs... Wongs... followed by a series of Buellers. This gate agent just paged for Bueller. Oh, Ben Stein, did you ever think while you were working for President Nixon that you'd be movies and quotable over pa's around the world???

I'm not sure if this was the highlight of my 15 hrs in Vegas, or if it was being picked up - literally - by a ginger from Holland to see if I could find his friend with a white hat on the dance floor in some club at Palazzo. Yes, picked up as in elevated above his head. Had his name been Patrick, then it would have just been another day, another dude ;)

Days Off

Teaching July was a treat. I loved being in the training center and living a "normal" life. Now that we're in between bid months, classes won't resume until August 3; therefore, I have five days off.

I came home for the weekend. My mom and I went down the shore and parked it on the beach for the day; it was glorious. Some light shopping yesterday, and today I had planned to return to the shore. I ran my errands in the morning and was filling up at Super Wawa when my best friend Kristy called to say that scheduling gave her a two day Vegas trip and asked if I wanted to go.

Yes. I want to go.

I'm gathering up all my things here, and making my way back up to Bayonne to shower and pack and head to the airport. Vegas baby, Vegas.

Medical Emergency Fail

"Did you page to see if there was a doctor on board???"

"Yeah, and no one rang their call bell so I guess we're not going to India or Tel Aviv."

Happy Birthday!

Today would have been my grandmother's 83rd birthday. She was an amazing woman, and the reason why I know all the words to this song:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSFLZ-MzIhM&feature=related

RIP - JLE

July 23, 1928 - January 30, 2010

Traffic

The best part of my place is the 15-20 minute commute to the airport. Not today.

This morning it took me an extra 40 minutes to get to work because there was an accident on the turnpike bridge. And now, whilst I should be opposite rush hour, the other side is cruising west no problem and I'm parked, for the second time today on the turnpike. Grr. Is this what normal people experience??? I'm not a fan. I'm working the next two days, normal people's weekend - aka days with no commuters.

Via iPhone