Back and better than ever (sort of)

Usually I like to say to people that “I’m back and better than ever” when I see them or speak to them after an absence. The problem is that right now I am not feeling “better than ever” and I attribute it solely to the fact that E and I were sitting on planes going nowhere for hours on end (literally) during our trip to and from Chicago. I have a cold, and I never get sick, so I needed to find something to blame this on! I’m a little cranky right now.

(I also have a lot to say about my trip to visit LC and Darryl, which also occurred over the past week, but I’ll focus on Chicago here since that trip came first.)

We flew United and let me tell you that they have never been good to me in terms of timeliness. At the gate were told that the flight out to Chicago was on time. We all got on the plane and once we were seated and belted in we were told that our “wheels up” time was not for another hour and 20 minutes. If anything good was to be gained from us sitting in stale air with no ventilation or circulation all that time, was the fact that E and I were given the gift of a new catch phrase. We now use “wheels up” to refer to something good or cool behavior. On that flight, at least E and I were across the aisle from one another so we could talk and whatnot.

In Chicago, we stayed at a great hotel downtown. We had some light dinner and then we went out. E had researched where to go on a Wednesday night so we had some good leads. The first place we went to was closed. The second was dead, but the bartender there was very cool and he told us where we should go instead. He was Lithuanian, so E and he spoke a little bit of Russian to one another. We went to a place he told us about and we had a really good time. The next morning, we walked all around the downtown area and I really realized for the first time that they don’t call Chicago the “windy city” for nothing!

Our meeting went well, and then we were heading back to the airport. The same fellow who picked us up from the airport also drove us back. We were in a lot of traffic, so he and E spoke at length about music and it turns out that our driver was a pretty well known DJ named Lee Farmer.

Going home we ran into delays due to weather trouble back in Philly. Again we were trapped sitting on the still plane. This time, I was sitting behind E, so couldn’t speak to him. A Protestant pastor sat next to E and the two of them spoke almost literally without stopping, the entire way home. E wonders why he prays to God for a Jewish wife and all God gives him are Christians.