THE LAST FIVE ...

Closing up shop
- Wednesday, Aug. 02, 2006

It may be time for a change
- Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Entry in the air
- Friday, April 21, 2006

Still here
- Thursday, April 20, 2006

Music of the moment
- Wednesday, March 1, 2006

Or ... BE RANDOM!


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101 in 1001
American Road Trip, 1998


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Chupatintas
Dancing Brave
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Kitty Sandwich
Mister Zero
Sideways Rain
Ultratart
Velcrometer


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Monday, Oct. 6, 2003 - 11:27 a.m.

The flight home

Well, I'm happy to say what I feared in my last entry is not the case.

Good afternoon everyone and welcome aboard. I'll be your captain on our four-hour, 40-minute flight to Newark. We'll be taking off shortly out of Seattle to the southeast and heading out over eastern Washington and crossing Idaho at the panhandle before crossing the mountains. Our flight path has us continuing across Montana around Helena and eastward over North Dakota. Then we'll dip into Minnesota, passing over the Twin Cities and on into Wisconsin and over Milwaukee. We'll cross Lake Michigan and pass over Michigan on the other side, then shoot just south of Detroit, north of Toledo and skirt the southern edge of Lake Erie, appearing over land again in that spit of Pennsylvania that touches the lake at the town of Erie. Then it's all downhill across Pennsylvania, over Scranton-Wilkes Barre and Stroudsberg, over the Delaware Water Gap into New Jersey and on into Newark from the east. There will be a geography quiz later.

Unfortunately, I was stuck on the aisle in a row over the wing so I could see none of it, save for some lights somewhere over southern New York or northern Pennsylvania about an hour before we landed. I read half of Nick Hornby's Fever Pitch after politely refusing to switch seats so the Brit next to me -- "Would you fancy switching with my girlfriend?" -- could sit with his honey ... who was in the center seat in front of him. I did it mainly because Dave was on the aisle seat across from me but I also didn't really want to sit in the center seat for five hours and they were still near each other and able to converse when needed. I felt bad for a bit, but then I didn't.

It was a packed flight thanks to an earlier flight cancelled because the plane broke. They were offering $300 and a 10:15 flight (and a hotel room for a few hours) for volunteers to give up their seats, but $300 just wasn't enough to get home at 6 a.m. and come into work around 10. Just before we took off, they upped it to $350. I tried to raise them another $50, and then I might've taken it because that would just about get Casey and me to California, but they wouldn't negotiate. I really needed to get home anyway.

Landing was a bit of an adventure. On the approach I could see out our window and got a great, if brief, view of Manhattan all lit up. But it occured to me that we seemed pretty high for a southward landing. We were. We passed over the airport a little to the east, I imagine, and then went into what may have been the steepest turn I've ever experienced in a plane. I was glad I wasn't sitting in a window seat then, because looking to the right, I saw the lights of New Jersey below reflected off the top of the wing. We pulled a tight U-turn and landed -- hard, I might add -- northward. I guess you're able to do that at midnight when there's little to no air traffic.

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