Islamic Jews Just Can't Get Ahead in Berkeley: Part Four

So it was a night in Denver. I've always enjoyed grocery shopping in the middle of the night because the night culture is so interesting. It used to be a dream of mine to make a documentary about all those who shop at 3 am...find out who they are, what they do, and why they shop so such hours. The middle of the night at an airport is a different think, there is a sense of frustration and desperation in everyone; people frustrated at not being home, missing meetings, and the thought of sleeping on Herman miller. In aimlessly walking around i ran into a man who had sat near me on the flight. He was on hunt for some food and asked me to join, since I had nothing else to do and was hungry I went along. I also figured that someone to talk to would be nice. We wandered to the only open bar/restaurant in the place...Mesa Verde or something. I got chicken, he got buffalo. Yes, buffalo.

It turns out he leads a much more interesting life than I. He was a law student from California who used to be a contractor (i think). He was also a Jew, and his name was Avi. I learned that he was travelling across the country with a friend and his wife. The plan was that his wife fly home from Chicago while he and his friend drive back. Somewhere along the journey the two friends had a falling out and his friend stranded him in Chicago with a note that he had bought a plane ticket for Avi. Avi, being a proud man descended from Abraham refused to take the blood ticket and bought his own. (He was also skeptical that the ticket even existed.) That is how he ended up on our doomed flight to Denver.

A note on his wife: She is Islamic from Iran which according to him makes it very hard for them to travel in the middle east. When going to Islamic countries they don't like him entering, such as Egypt, he was held in customs for a few days (i think that was how long). When going to Israel and Jewish nations they are skeptical of her. Also, he met this woman while on a scuba diving trip in Fiji when she got caught in a current and he saved her life. When I asked if he uses this as bargaining rights in arguments he said absolutely, but it's beginning to wear thin.

After dinner we went to make sure our luggage had in fact been transferred (more on this next post) and then made our way back to the mesa to have a drink or two before we tried to sleep. I learned that he had six cars that he worked on or owned, and these were not clunker cars, maybe Jews really are all rich. I'm not racist, i promise...that was a joke. Or was it? Well, the most interesting story was perhaps his visit to a whore house in Mexico.

It was on another scuba trip and the instructor and he were the only single one's, the instructor could get to be a little much and all the others on the trip gave Avi $20 each to take him to a whore house to "settle him down" (it's for each to assume how he became "a little much"). They got into a cab, he said he had just the thing (hold your hand as an "L" when reading that wielands) and drove to town. Avi began to get nervous when the cabbie drove through town and out into the night. Ten minutes past town and he knew a mugging and desertion were eminent. However, the cab driver proved to be honest and dropped them off at "Pink". The instructor picked his girl and took the cab back to the hotel, although i have a feeling it was a motel. Avi was not forced to waste a few hours at Pink, being forced to turn down numerous Mexican girls with not too numerous teeth. He eventually found a new cab back to the hotel and drank by himself on the beach waiting for the room to be not so vulgarly occupied. When the whore came out, she offered him a go 'round. No thanks, honored though... He kept the money though, so at least he was paid for the experience. That is the end of my story regarding Avi.

I found a semi-dark, quiet place to sleep. It was looking out the windows of the terminal, in front of me was the main hall of Denver airport, the Glowing pseudo-mountain range of fabric and light. For a second I thought this might not be so bad. Then I woke up 40 minutes later sore and freezing. I slept on and off for a few hours and walked to a place farther from the windows, upstairs. I slept better...which is not say very much at all. I woke up early, got a cup of coffee and a double espresso, and waited once again.

When I boarded the plane, i was asked by the flight attendant to play uncle for a few hours for two kids traveling alone; sure, I mean the kids looked sweet.

End of Part Four.

Steven Jr.

I saw a bald eagle today...cool huh?

Waiting, or I couldn't Think of Anything Clever: Part Three

We pulled in line behind several jets, the pilot came on the overhead and told us that we were 7th in line; something to do with the warm weather, traffic at O'hare, storms out west, and some other shit made it so that at the moment no westbound planes were being allowed to take-off. She would keep us updated. They were so nice as to allow us to watch tv for free while we waited! I'm not sure how to express the slow passage of time, I guess you'll just have to imagine waiting on a plane unless you've been through it. A few hours later she announced that they were letting one plane take-off as a test to see how the weather was. An hour of so she reported that everything has being shut down and we were going to taxi back to the terminal to rest and get gas...they had never heard back from the test flight. i personally was wondering why a search party wasn't being sent out. Once back at the terminal we were told that we were were allowed but highly encouraged not to exit the airplane as any small opening in the storm system would be used to take off...hooray for us though, we were allowed to walk the jetway. As it had been almost five hours i thought i would try to rally some support for ordering pizza to be delivered to the plane. This proved not to be possible, there was plenty of support, but the security was worried we'd order exploding pepperoni or box-cutter bread sticks. The pilot told us that we was working as hard as she could at getting us some food (she failed) and the person at the gate (who was not sympathetic) told us ever three minutes about how we should not get off the plane, and how we would not be paid for a hotel in Denver, and how if we did choose to get off this flight we'd have to wait till thursday to get a new one. She ended every message with, "oh yeah, f#@k you." Not true.

Eventually they rushed us all onto the plane and said that another guinea pig (i swear that's what they called it) had been allowed to take-off. We waited for another hour and finally took off ourselves. I believe it was 8:30. The beginning of the flight was by far the worst turbulence I have ever experienced. I didn't really notice it too much till I realized I couldn't hold my book steady enough to keep reading. I looked across the aisle at a girl who was shaking violently and ready to burst into tears. I couldn't help but thing that she should save some distress for if anything did go wrong. If our engines gave out or wing fell off, she would have been unable to step her hysteria up a notch. We finally cleared the the clouds and the flight normal into Denver.

I spoke with the flight agent and of course, there were no flights to Seattle at 930 at night, thus the airport would be my home away from home. After purposely staying in a few airports in Europe i realized how awful an experience it is and swore never again. I also have said after each time I will never do a repair job for dad, but thus is life.

End of Part Three.

3000 Miles to Graceland: ChapterTwo

Kristina called her sister and as I feared as soon as the word "frontier" was spoken, so was "midway". Two hours till takeoff, chicago traffic...maybe i'm a little stressed now, and even more upset that I didn't print out an itinerary. I called stu to give me directions to midway and to make sure I was right about the flight. It took close to 15 tries for me to give him my correct password, (this was frustrating at the moment but does tell me I did a good job in picking it...also there is no way he would remember which is good because that would access everything) once inside he confirmed it was midway. Awesome. Stu was very helpful in giving directions and checking me into the flight so that they would not cancel my reservation. He told me to exit onto 451 (i made that number up), as we crossed over there was gridlocked traffic going our direction and the confidence that we were going to make it dipped somewhat. As circled the on ramp we saw the problem; a semi had taken the exit too fast and had overturned as it entered the highway...this in effect blocked all traffic before our ramp, thus the road was empty but for us. Thank you Jesus. We made it to midway with an hour to spare, and I got to my gate with 45 minutes till boarding. (Couldn't have made it without Stu, thanks again)

Relax, get on a plane, and enjoy the flight. We boarded and the pilot told us there was a little weather out west and it might be a 15 minute delay with traffic out of o'hare; however, she informed us she had heard that before and she was hoping it didn't turn into a jetblue situation. We taxied out to get in line and wait, it was 2:30 pm. Wait we did.

End of Part Two

I've only been here for 4 days and already have a police record

We ordered pizza last night. After waiting for the pizza for longer than we thought we should, we happened to open the door and realize they were trying to deliver it to our neighbors. Easy solution, we tell them it is ours. We ate, realized we ordered too much, and were watching tv when i get a call from dominos. It is the manager asking for our address as he is going to call the police on us. I ask why and he says that the pizza delivery guy said we told him we didn't order any pizza and refused to pay and take the pizzas. I inform him that we actually did pay and have are eating the pizzas. He refused to believe me and asked if I was just messing with him and trying to waste his time and mine (im not sure how it would have wasted my time, but might have been funny). Once again he asks for the address and talks of calling the police. I finally get to the point that he entered the address wrong but we got it figured out, and probably should have asked him if he thought it strange that the delivery guy showed up back at dominos with money and no pizzas, but unfortunately i simply stuck with cordial comments trying to explain the situation. He got it and hung up without apologizing. After I hung up, I thought of all these comments that I should have said to him but didn't think of, and ended up getting very upset, till i finally convinced myself to let it go. Seriously, who threatens to call the cops on customers? I did get the satisfaction of calling him a name as I hung up that I will not put here since my parent's are reading this...and soon, oh soon, we'll get our due revenge.

Perhaps Red is an Unlucky Color: Chapter 1

My trip to Seattle began in the same fashion as any other trip I take. I pack in the last few hours, thus taking more than I need so I don't have to make decisions, and making arrangements that will get me to the airport in plenty of time. So far so good. I woke up on time the morning of my departure and as I was loading up the van to pick up Jaret, I grabbed my portfolio and noticed that it had somehow been spilled on in my car and was now shriveled and spotted with yellow. Shit, not a good start but there has to be good print shops in Seattle. I shook it off and picked up Jaret when I said I would. Everyone knows that Jaret is a notoriously slow driver so obviously I had planned in some extra time for that. The drive to Merrillville went smoothly with good music and conversation. Nice little Indiana drive for two brothers who don't spent too much time together anymore.

We arrived in Merrillville and waited for half an hour for my friend who was going to take me to O'hare; this delay was fine as I had planned enough time into the trip to compensate for meet-up times and perhaps lunch in the city. The trip to O'hare went very smoothly and there proved to be enough time to stop at a very good deli near the airport that my friend knew about from her time working near there. We ate and then proceeded to O'hare. I was flying Frontier and we scanned the signs to find which terminal I needed to be at; Frontier was not listed on any of the signs. I figured that the primarily western Frontier didn't have many flights from Chicago and thus was trying to remember which larger airline it belonged to. Kristina was in the process of calling her travel agent sister to find out; I was silently cursing the fact I didn't print out an itinerary, as well as trying desperately to keep the word "midway" from crossing my mind.

End of Part One

Duck and Cover

As I prepared to move to Seattle, one of the things that excited me was the mild temperature both in summer and winter. (Although I enjoy extreme cold more than extreme heat) As Indiana crept towards the century mark, Messmann told me of highs in the low 70's. Messmann's a liar, or mother nature hates me; personally I hope it's the former. The beginning of this week Seattle was setting record temperatures, and as many if not most apartments in the area are not equipped with air conditioning people began to panic. I wasn't aware of the extent of the panic till we had the great idea to go to Fry's (If you've never been I can't even begin to explain) and pick up a portable ac. We were debating on the way whether these things even existed, with the logical minds arguing that ac's work by pulling out hot air, so if it sits in the room what could it do. The girl said she knew they existed. Point to Heather; as we left our car an eerie feeling came over us as we noticed every single cart in the parking lot contained a portable ac. I do not exaggerate, or at least not right now.

The feeling only increased as we walking into the store and peered down the 100 cheakout locations and once again saw a sea of ac's. I kid you not the first 40-50 people we saw were pushing these things around. There was a feeding frenzy in the isles as the workers could not bring the units from the back fast enough for them to disappear from the proverbial shelves. For the sake of honesty the others may not have sense the eerie feeling (i almost said "chill in the air" but caught myself) but I did, it felt as though there was an impending doom...flash back to the cold war, natural disasters, or fear of the "big one" when bread disappears from grocery stores and water is stockpiled. I've never been around people who didn't know how to deal with a situation like this. Maybe my imagination is a little bit too active, perhaps we're all doomed.

The cheapest one was $119.00. We went on being hot.

Author's Note

This is the story of my adventure into the pacific northwest, into the land of Palahniuk, Coupland, and Starbucks. I am going to get it out of the way and say that most of my motivation for writing this is so that i can keep those who are most dear to me close, feeling that as long as they know of my each and every action, they are not really that far from me. Except the truth is that the first three days had quite a few events that I felt were calling out to be blogged. I hate to admit that the first way I thought of to tell people was a blog. That being said, if nothing interesting happens, or I find myself blogging instead of writing in my journal...the blog must and shall die.

A second note is that the first and second posts I have planned actually happened in reverse order, but it feel too large a task at present to write about the trip, so I'm going to start with a trip to Fry's. That's it, and it's anybodies guess how long I actually write before I get tired, a wii is just in the other room after all.