Rantings of the Herald

Bought a used Nikon D100 a couple of months ago.  I have been enjoying the experience.  I have never really explored photography seriously.  My latest favorite (Lake Eola - Orlando Florida):

Occasionally we have the good fortune to meet a person that is completely without guile. Does that lower our estimation of them (in a modern 21st century citizen of the world kind of way)? We know it shouldn’t….

But what a concept! To be without suspicion or deception….

The risk of emotional pain would be enormous.

But the people who fit in this category seem both happier and sadder than the rest of us. Is it based on the emotional investment value with which you choose to live your life? The bigger the investment, the more extreme the highs and, conversely, the deeper the lows….

Questions that warrant answering since they dictate how we craft our experience….

OK - I have about three posts half-written about travel in general however the events of this last week pretty much put things into perspective…

Even though my clients pay for my weekly airfare I have to keep costs down.  This means a lot of hours (combined) that I have spent hunting down airfares.  It gets faster as you get better at it but it still is a time-devourer.

A couple of ground rules here:

Frequent flyer miles - It pays to plan these. For those of you that have lives, I will highlight the details here. Frequent flyer miles have two main advantages - one, they get you free flights and two, enough of them gets you special treatment everytime you fly with that particular airline. The idea though is to concentrate on two main airlines to maximize the effect of your miles. 50,000 miles spread between three airlines will get you magazine subscriptions. The same 50,000 miles at one airline will get you two round-trip flights, a gold medallion status which entitles you to free luggage on flights, free space-available upgrades to first-class (this is huge), discounted membership at the airlines executive lounges, an increase in the rate at which you earn miles, reduced fees for using miles, a faster line at the airport (also huge), and a small amount of ass-kissing.

The benefits of concentrating your miles in one or two baskets are obvious. You need two main airlines though - for one thing one airline may not go to every destination, also, there’s the pricing thing. Sometimes, you just can’t afford your regular airline. Through the vagaries of yield management, your first choice airline will price itself out of the running so badly that you won’t even be able to defend it to clients with deep pockets.

Destinations/Size of chairs/Drink price/Upgrade policies - These are the secondary considerations. They are not inconsequential however. Some or the considerations for this category that I have learned over my years of travel:

Flight attendants and airline staff in general - Southwest is the best, US Airways the worst, everyone else somewhere in between.

Airtran has the narrowest seats on 737 and larger aircraft (disregarding the regional airlines Embraers and CRJs). Continental appears to have the widest (this is a little subjective - I haven’t flown Continental in about a year).

Drink prices - Southwest has always been the least expensive and still is, Most of the other airlines used to charge $5 per beer/spirit/wine but everyone except Southwest recently raised drink prices to a minimum of $7

Upgrade policy - Delta/Northwest probably has the best upgrade policy in the industry. Southwest has no first class but will recognize you by allowing you to get on the aircraft first…mmm…

So in honor of the two above considerations I select Delta for my trip to verdant, lush and tropical Fort Smith, Arkansas.

I usually like to arrive at the hotel Sunday night. This is a trade-off. I detest having to leave my family earlier than necessary however I hate having to work a full day after flying. I prefer to show up Sunday night, check in, unpack (by which time the general manager has been awoken from a sound sleep by the front desk clerk - “the auditors are here”), relax, get a good night’s sleep and wake up fresh and ready to work Monday.

However, these days it has been proving more cost-effective airfare-wise to fly in Monday morning.

I have a draft of another post that discusses my propensity to fall asleep during ascent and descent of aircraft. Let’s just summarize here by saying that my body reacts to these altitudinal transitions like the body of a two-year old in the baby seat in the family’s mini-van during the summer family road trip.

I become the silver snooze-master.

Monday April 13th, 10:45 am - I slowly wake up to bumping…turbulence…a fairly common phenomena in my life…back to sleep…the more I sleep the shorter the flight is…

Monday April 13th, 10:50 am - Hmmmm…it’s 10:50 am…that’s strange…I took off at 8:30 from Orlando Florida bound for a connection in Atlanta Georgia… a one-hour flight give or take…I seem to remember an announcement about bad weather in Atlanta and circling…that sucks - but not as much if I stay asleep…as I drift off I vaguely note that at least three people near me are vomiting into plastic bags and flight attendants are busy disposing of the bags…interesting - I wonder how long before the airlines start charging for the bags?…

Monday, April 14th, 11:00 am - descending…ok wake up - we know our connecting flight is long gone…time to deal with the world…

A casual remark to the guy in the seat next to me - “Well it looks like I missed my connection…”

His reply - “You don’t know the half of it, you were asleep…”

…? thought I.

“What half did I miss?” I politely enquired.

“We are descending into Huntsville, Alabama.” he replied, “The rain won’t stop in Atlanta.”

So I thought: Alabama, Huntsville, the largest city in northern Alabama. Renamed Huntsville from Twickenham after the war of 1812.

Well,…..actually it was more like:  Fuck I never wanted to go to Alabama…..

The story emerges. A storm over Atlanta has made landing impossible there.

From Wikipedia: ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hartsfield-Jackson_Atlanta_International_Airport ) “Hartsfield-Jackson held its ranking as the world’s busiest airport in 2008, both in terms of passengers and number of flights, by accommodating 90.0 million passengers and 978,824 flights. Many of these flights are domestic flights from within the United States where Atlanta serves as a major transfer point for flights to and from smaller cities throughout the Southern United States.”

So the fact that Delta and Airtran route 90% of their flights that even come near that part of the country through this particular piece of real estate means it has to stay open….

Or the world grinds to a halt and communism/terrorism/socialism/scientology wins…

So here is the deal - this totally fuck-busy airport closes and the nearest place to land is Huntsville Alabama. A huge facility arming up to handle the extra traffic - right? No - quite a small airport - so all you Atlanta refugees sit there on the tarmac while we refuel you and not let you into the airport….But don’t worry - here are free earphones we are showing “Marley and Me”…

Just kill me now…

Let’s pause here for about 2 hours.

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Ok - takingoffgetthefuckinyourseatyouthinkwehaveallday!!!!!!

Atlanta’s Hartsfield Jackson Airport - Lines at the Delta customer service desks are huge - in every terminal. Get in one - use one of the most useful Blackberry travel applications to find alternate flights - a well deserved plug - WorldMateLive. Nothing direct to Fort Smith - I missed the only direct one. Have to go through Memphis. I call Delta customer service on my cell phone while waiting in line. I get lucky and get an answer. After initial resitance, the agent re-books me and I hand the phone to a hasidic couple with a small child who haven’t had the telephone luck I have.

Now four hours to kill in Atlanta….

Just kill me now….

Chinese food - three and a half hours to go…

Flight delayed 20 minutes while we are standing at the gate…

Just kill me now….

Get on the flight to Memphis - sleep and arrive.

I realize that my business partner waited too long to book the flight I did and had to take a later flight on Monday night. I had laughed at the time but I am no longer laughing as I realize the last leg of my flight is the same as hers. She left Orlando Monday evening, I left early Monday morning - we will get to Fort Smith at the same time - who’s laughing now?

Get to Fort Smith at a little after 9:00 pm. Fort Smith by the way is a tiny airport but their restrooms were last year named the nation’s best public bathrooms by Cintas, a company which sells bathroom supplies. A view:

Note the high-backed chairs in the background are also what equip the departure lounges.

Now the flight back:

I get the word from Delta the day before my flight that I have been upgraded to first class for the Atlanta - Orlando leg. This happens sometimes and gives you a generally warm and fuzzy feeling about the trip.

But the first leg is the CRJ. If I haven’t mentioned this before it stands for Canadair Regional Jet. It is used for the smaller routes and has two narrow seats on one side of the aisle, two narrow seats on the other.

The flight seems to go smoothly. Until the landing. I fell asleep during takeoff and landing. I must have also slept alot of the flight time as well….

When I fly in the mornings I drink lots of water. We are now descending slowly and I have to go…

I mean I really have to go….

Now flight attendants hate this - so I wait…

Landing - every bounce is an invitation let loose…..

Regional flight - of course we have to taxi the last 50 miles ….

We stop to let other planes pass - ohmygod ohmygod ohmygod….preteens are supposed to get in this situation…not adults…

Another stop to let another aircraft by - can’t take it anymore - seat belt off, moving towards the restroom….

“SIR!!!!!!!” “SIR!!!!!!” as I shut the door to the bathroom.

Arrive at jetport as I stand over blue-water sighing like a teen getting his first oral sex….

As I move up the aircraft aisle with my carry-on, I know it is coming - the lecture that they all feel we need to be better people….

“Sir you can’t just jump out of the seat like that you have to ring the call button….”

“Sorry beautiful, what I needed to accomplish - you couldn’t help me with….” and I dashed for the airport.

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta Airport….

Just kill me now….

For my first post I wanted to republish one of the posts that motivated me to blog again…bear in mind that it was written almost three years ago…

People generally like to keep their insides private.

This syndrome ranges from the tame internal exposures (such as blood drawing) to the extreme cases (surgery). People are very squeamish when what is on the inside of their bodies chooses through circumstances to travel outside of, or be visible from, the outside of their bodies.

To make a massive generalization, women on the whole seem to be less tolerant of these things than men. This is probably due to early childhood conditioning. Boys watched Arnold bleeding from a dozen places in his movies - didn’t slow him down a bit (”It’s just a flesh wound”). Girls get the slightest scratch and it is cleaned, bandaged, kissed (there’s a sanitary practice) - and done - out of sight, out of mind. Boys, by nature of their “approved” pastimes (skateboarding, football and other assorted mayhem) get used to seeing their own blood. Most get to the point where they won’t even clean a good knee-skinning.

I was no different. Early on I decided that it was a sign of weakness to turn your head away when you got a shot. I would grit my teeth and stare maniacally at my arm as the needle went in.

The behavior we cement in place as children is damn hard to shed as an adult. I remained fascinated about my innards. If any of my friends get a decent wound, I want to see it. My acquaintances who have had the misfortune of kidney stones eventually collect the stone (strainer - ugh) and hand it over to the doctor for testing/disposal/voodoo without a second thought. They are invariably horrified when I ask them why they didn’t keep it. “You grew it, went through all that pain, and when you finally got it - you gave it away??!!!!” I usually get the look that people reserve for dealing with the seriously disturbed.

But really, isn’t anyone curious about the inside of their body? Women spend hours staring at their face in the mirror. All of us spend at least a small amount of time looking at our exterior each day as we perform our ablutions. I’ve spent a damn long time nourishing, exercising, massaging my insides and I want a peek.

(The really squeamish should stop reading here)

I had to have some surgery on my testicles 2-1/2 years ago (that’s right, you read it correctly). Local anesthesia, awake for the entire procedure. At one point my doctor (he was a peculiar one) asked if I wanted to see and handed me a mirror. “Hell yeah!” I said as I commenced my VST (Visual Surveillance of my Testicles). I was curious for all the reasons stated above, plus, I (like most other people) had taken especially gentle care of that particular area of my body. Based on their main function (and that of their close neighbor) we had become good friends in fact.

I won’t try to describe the spectacle. But I have seen a part of myself that 99% of all males will never see. I find it curious that my doctor tells me that most people will never look. Why not?

I had a fight with my wife the other day. As is my habit, I went out to indulge in one of my hobbies, woodworking (that’s an entire post in itself). Power tools require respect. It is not a good idea to use a table saw while fuming about something your spouse has said. As I was ripping a particularly small piece on the tablesaw, my wife yelled something especially irksome from the back door. Lose concentration for one second….

Now I know what my knucklebone looks like, how it feels against the tip of my tongue, and what more than a half a cup of blood tastes like.

I wonder what internal revelations await me in the future?