Quite a trip
Mar. 23rd, 2007 20:20![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
torquillSo... I'm in Richmond today. Richmond, Indiana.
I'd never been east at all before now, not even to Vegas. Now I'm way the hell out here, near the Ohio border. It's been good so far.
Yesterday really got rolling when![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
knaveofhearts picked me up at the BART station. We went down to Rivermark, got ourselves some Baja Fresh, and I ended up at SJC at noon for a 1:30 flight.
I shuffled through the security line to the point that they were asking whether we had any liquids like shampoo and such. I said no, then realized that there was a tube of toothpaste in the picture... crap. I surrendered the brand new fullsize tube of Tom's of Maine, which my mom had urged me to grab from the bathroom at the last moment. Nobody told me that toothpaste was on the (absolutely inane) list of "dangerous liquids". Now I can't brush my teeth out here.
After that, I rushed to put my stuff in the big bins (one for my bag, belt, phone, and shoes; I was going to put my laptop in too when a fellow traveler said no, you need another one for that). I got through the metal detector, picked up my stuff, got handed my hoodie by the same fellow traveler (thanks!) and got pulled courteously aside so that my bag could be searched. The guy opened it up, poked a little bit at it ("We noticed all the food," he said), swabbed the inside, and let me go when the machine gave him the all-clear. I had expected a little fuss over the half-mask respirator, or at least the four bags of white powder (rice flour), but there was no problem. Total elapsed time since getting in line: 15 minutes.
One of the guys at the luggage scan looked at me, pointed at my shirt, and said, "I love that comic!" I was too rushed to point out that my hoodie has Pintsize on it.
I tried the wireless at the airport, gave up and shut the computer off again, since I couldn't get an outlet either. I spent the rest of the time reading.
The plane ride was 3 hours 40 minutes, cramped, and boring. I managed to score some peanuts, but drank very little for fear of the result. We flew over what I think was Tahoe early on, and later I spotted an enormous dry lake that, in retrospect, I figure had to be Salt Lake. The weirdest part was after that, flying east of Colorado, when I looked out the window and saw fields stretching literally to the horizon. Farmland as far as the eye can see, all flat as a pancake. There's no place in California like that -- there's always the hills or mountains bordering it on one side or another. I can't imagine the world being that flat.
We rolled into Midway on time, and I checked in with home. I had an hour of sitting around, part of which was spent socializing with a lady from Lafayette, IN. The plane boarded late, and we were told we had to sit there, waiting for a flight plan that didn't involve the traffic being routed northward because of thunderstorms to the south of us. An hour late, we taxied out, and sat for another half-hour on the runway. At least we had a witty flight attendant. She continued to crack jokes ("Please stow your bags completely under the seat in front of you, leaving absolutely no leg room"), sing silly songs, and refer to the pilot as Captain America until the pilot came on at the end, after some applause, and said stoically, "Attention passengers, please do not encourage the flight attendant; I still have to work with her for two more days."
As a result of the delays, I didn't reach Indianapolis until midnight. Poor Emily had gotten there before we left the gate in Chicago, but patiently picked me up and drove the hour and a half to her place, despite occasional flashes of lightning. I unpacked the artichokes and avocados, went up the steep narrow steps to the attic, and got acquainted with the guest room. Then she gave me the grand tour, and we spent a little while listening to the thunder and watching the lightning getting steadily closer. The thunder was quite something -- sometimes like the crack of a rifle, sometimes like giants falling down the stairs. I fell asleep to that and the patter of the rain on the roof just overhead.
I woke up at noon local time and had some breakfast -- mushroom, cheese, and spinach omelet with toast and tea -- then figured out the shower and got dressed. I potted up the four seedlings I brought with me, then wandered around looking at their yard (OMG the size of the lilac tree!). The place looks good, though things are just starting to pop up from the ground, and it's hard to tell what's going to be where by summer.
We decided to rent a car, given that we wanted to go to Cincinnati with three people and come back with groceries, which would be hard enough in the truck without rain in the forecast. So we managed to score a Dodge Stratus for $25/day for the weekend, and drove it and the truck back here. After quite a bit of dithering, we got on the road.
The architecture out here is quite something -- I normally don't notice it much, but between the trees being barren and the striking gothic style of many of the public buildings, I can't help but admire it. The stone arch of the railroad trestle over the river is quite something as well. The river itself is in flood, brown and roaring, and we have a flood warning for tonight.
We got into Cincinnati around 5:30 or 6. Jungle Jim's turned out to be a sprawling complex, like five or six import stores, a Trader Joe's, a Whole Foods, and a supermarket megastore rolled into one. We grabbed a little something to eat, munched it there, and went out to explore a bit more.
I got a bag of Black Pepper Jack Doritos (not available on the West Coast), a couple of Zero bars (ditto), a couple of Cow Tails, and a passionfruit (which I can't find at this season in California). We decided to try a kiwano jelly-melon, and had to figure out how to determine whether it was ripe. I bought some mandarinquats, which look like enormous kumquats (and basically are, including the extreme tartness of the inside and the edible rind; I'll have to keep an eye out at the nurseries now). And I got boxes of gluten-free wafer-cookies, both the kind that is long and thin and crispy, covered in chocolate, and the kind that is broad and flat and has oreo-like filling inside. I knew they had to exist... but apparently they have to be imported from England. Sigh.
They had what looked like fresh curry leaves, and salsify root, and sugarcane. We bought a 4.5-pound slab of wild Alaskan salmon for $18. They had green-tea Pocky. They also had packets of frozen kaffir lime leaves; the sign underneath said $39.99/pound. Yow! I bought my kaffir lime tree for $35!
They have a ten-foot tall talking Campbell's soup can on a swing over one of the aisles, and a seven-foot cartoony wolf playing the guitar in a corner. The soup can was definitely the creepier of the two.
Three hours later, tired and footsore, we checked out. I had gone across the way to the garden department and souvenir shop (I did say sprawling, right?) to pick up a couple of miniature African violets and a self-watering pot; one of the plants will go home with me. I got to the checkout line just in time to pay the $140 bill for Sandra and Emily, and pay for my own stuff as well. Then we went home, past the church that used to advertise "Java for Jesus", through the slight fog and the open stretches of land between towns.
I'm in Windows right now because my linux wireless drivers are being pissy again. At least they do have wireless here. I figured I'd rattle off this huge long post before it got longer, try to catch up on lily (ha! 1641 lines, of 2500, still to go) and touch my Friends list before I go to bed.
It's fun out here. I get lost without having some sort of hills on the horizon -- Richmond has the hilliest terrain around, and it's not more than slight swells -- and it's raining a lot, but at least it's warm. I'm feeling pretty good.
I'd never been east at all before now, not even to Vegas. Now I'm way the hell out here, near the Ohio border. It's been good so far.
Yesterday really got rolling when
knaveofhearts picked me up at the BART station. We went down to Rivermark, got ourselves some Baja Fresh, and I ended up at SJC at noon for a 1:30 flight.I shuffled through the security line to the point that they were asking whether we had any liquids like shampoo and such. I said no, then realized that there was a tube of toothpaste in the picture... crap. I surrendered the brand new fullsize tube of Tom's of Maine, which my mom had urged me to grab from the bathroom at the last moment. Nobody told me that toothpaste was on the (absolutely inane) list of "dangerous liquids". Now I can't brush my teeth out here.
After that, I rushed to put my stuff in the big bins (one for my bag, belt, phone, and shoes; I was going to put my laptop in too when a fellow traveler said no, you need another one for that). I got through the metal detector, picked up my stuff, got handed my hoodie by the same fellow traveler (thanks!) and got pulled courteously aside so that my bag could be searched. The guy opened it up, poked a little bit at it ("We noticed all the food," he said), swabbed the inside, and let me go when the machine gave him the all-clear. I had expected a little fuss over the half-mask respirator, or at least the four bags of white powder (rice flour), but there was no problem. Total elapsed time since getting in line: 15 minutes.
One of the guys at the luggage scan looked at me, pointed at my shirt, and said, "I love that comic!" I was too rushed to point out that my hoodie has Pintsize on it.
I tried the wireless at the airport, gave up and shut the computer off again, since I couldn't get an outlet either. I spent the rest of the time reading.
The plane ride was 3 hours 40 minutes, cramped, and boring. I managed to score some peanuts, but drank very little for fear of the result. We flew over what I think was Tahoe early on, and later I spotted an enormous dry lake that, in retrospect, I figure had to be Salt Lake. The weirdest part was after that, flying east of Colorado, when I looked out the window and saw fields stretching literally to the horizon. Farmland as far as the eye can see, all flat as a pancake. There's no place in California like that -- there's always the hills or mountains bordering it on one side or another. I can't imagine the world being that flat.
We rolled into Midway on time, and I checked in with home. I had an hour of sitting around, part of which was spent socializing with a lady from Lafayette, IN. The plane boarded late, and we were told we had to sit there, waiting for a flight plan that didn't involve the traffic being routed northward because of thunderstorms to the south of us. An hour late, we taxied out, and sat for another half-hour on the runway. At least we had a witty flight attendant. She continued to crack jokes ("Please stow your bags completely under the seat in front of you, leaving absolutely no leg room"), sing silly songs, and refer to the pilot as Captain America until the pilot came on at the end, after some applause, and said stoically, "Attention passengers, please do not encourage the flight attendant; I still have to work with her for two more days."
As a result of the delays, I didn't reach Indianapolis until midnight. Poor Emily had gotten there before we left the gate in Chicago, but patiently picked me up and drove the hour and a half to her place, despite occasional flashes of lightning. I unpacked the artichokes and avocados, went up the steep narrow steps to the attic, and got acquainted with the guest room. Then she gave me the grand tour, and we spent a little while listening to the thunder and watching the lightning getting steadily closer. The thunder was quite something -- sometimes like the crack of a rifle, sometimes like giants falling down the stairs. I fell asleep to that and the patter of the rain on the roof just overhead.
I woke up at noon local time and had some breakfast -- mushroom, cheese, and spinach omelet with toast and tea -- then figured out the shower and got dressed. I potted up the four seedlings I brought with me, then wandered around looking at their yard (OMG the size of the lilac tree!). The place looks good, though things are just starting to pop up from the ground, and it's hard to tell what's going to be where by summer.
We decided to rent a car, given that we wanted to go to Cincinnati with three people and come back with groceries, which would be hard enough in the truck without rain in the forecast. So we managed to score a Dodge Stratus for $25/day for the weekend, and drove it and the truck back here. After quite a bit of dithering, we got on the road.
The architecture out here is quite something -- I normally don't notice it much, but between the trees being barren and the striking gothic style of many of the public buildings, I can't help but admire it. The stone arch of the railroad trestle over the river is quite something as well. The river itself is in flood, brown and roaring, and we have a flood warning for tonight.
We got into Cincinnati around 5:30 or 6. Jungle Jim's turned out to be a sprawling complex, like five or six import stores, a Trader Joe's, a Whole Foods, and a supermarket megastore rolled into one. We grabbed a little something to eat, munched it there, and went out to explore a bit more.
I got a bag of Black Pepper Jack Doritos (not available on the West Coast), a couple of Zero bars (ditto), a couple of Cow Tails, and a passionfruit (which I can't find at this season in California). We decided to try a kiwano jelly-melon, and had to figure out how to determine whether it was ripe. I bought some mandarinquats, which look like enormous kumquats (and basically are, including the extreme tartness of the inside and the edible rind; I'll have to keep an eye out at the nurseries now). And I got boxes of gluten-free wafer-cookies, both the kind that is long and thin and crispy, covered in chocolate, and the kind that is broad and flat and has oreo-like filling inside. I knew they had to exist... but apparently they have to be imported from England. Sigh.
They had what looked like fresh curry leaves, and salsify root, and sugarcane. We bought a 4.5-pound slab of wild Alaskan salmon for $18. They had green-tea Pocky. They also had packets of frozen kaffir lime leaves; the sign underneath said $39.99/pound. Yow! I bought my kaffir lime tree for $35!
They have a ten-foot tall talking Campbell's soup can on a swing over one of the aisles, and a seven-foot cartoony wolf playing the guitar in a corner. The soup can was definitely the creepier of the two.
Three hours later, tired and footsore, we checked out. I had gone across the way to the garden department and souvenir shop (I did say sprawling, right?) to pick up a couple of miniature African violets and a self-watering pot; one of the plants will go home with me. I got to the checkout line just in time to pay the $140 bill for Sandra and Emily, and pay for my own stuff as well. Then we went home, past the church that used to advertise "Java for Jesus", through the slight fog and the open stretches of land between towns.
I'm in Windows right now because my linux wireless drivers are being pissy again. At least they do have wireless here. I figured I'd rattle off this huge long post before it got longer, try to catch up on lily (ha! 1641 lines, of 2500, still to go) and touch my Friends list before I go to bed.
It's fun out here. I get lost without having some sort of hills on the horizon -- Richmond has the hilliest terrain around, and it's not more than slight swells -- and it's raining a lot, but at least it's warm. I'm feeling pretty good.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-03-24 05:25 (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-24 07:00 (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-24 11:20 (UTC)Glad you're having a good time. Tell Emily I said hello.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-24 06:47 (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-24 07:01 (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-24 15:57 (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 03:27 (UTC)Then again, my view on the world isn't much different than this one...
no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 16:09 (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-24 16:59 (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 16:10 (UTC)