And I Guess That's Why They Call it the Butt

Been a long time, been a long time, been a long busy travlin etc. time. I said hey right before West Point, so I will pick up with a brief description of that weekend, In some ways there is not a tremendous amount I can add from my previous descriptions of the beauty that is the Hudson River valley in the fall. I mean, its incredible, the colors are magnificent, the river is perfect at that point, and the campus, despite the occassionally pain-inducing severity of the architecture, is actually quite lovely. This was the first year I have ever actually driven to this tournament, since we rode Rochester's coach bus the past couple years. Thankfully it wasnt snowing, cuz I really got my rented minvan trucking on those downslopes.

OMG I have to make a brief sidenote about the worst minivan in the history of civilization, which, not surprising, I was driving on this particular weekend. It was supposedly, a brand new, Kia Sorento. I can testify that it was indeed a Kia Sorento but it appeared to me to be from somewhere in the mid 80s. Sure it was somewhat shiny and blue and crisp outside, but inside everything was analog, it lit up with a dull green glow and the radio, I swear to God, was slightly less sophisticated than the one in the Corsica I drove in high school. The gray plastic panels just refused to seem new and the fucking shift lever was in the middle of the front panel exactly where my knee rests when I put on the cruise control. The car might, and I emphasize might like a South Dakota novice policy debater on a solvency flow, have been designed by a blind monkey. It was a horrible horrible minivan and I think that the Enterprise Rent-A-Car was taking a chance at my death, but regardless we got back in a reasonable amount of pieces and the like.

We had a fairly successful tournament, clearing 4 of our 6 teams, losing in octos, quarters, quarters, and finals. I judged all but one of the rounds but had Saturday's last prelim off and managed to drive around and find the Catholic chapel on the West Point campus and went to mass on Saturday evening. It was a really pretty old building, not large or elaborate but beautifully done and positioned a level or two above the rest of the campus on the hillside. Perfectly timed to, so I got to investigate, go to church, drive a little bit longer, and was still back in time to greet Ken's arrival and catch the kids coming out of round 6. I was hella tired, we got back hella late, had some nonsense with certain debate programs I'm not gonna mention, but all around a good time. The car ride back featured excessive discussion of laced Eggs Benedict, which was way funnier than it currently sounds.

We got home and didnt have a tremendous amount of turnaround time before Katie and I began our journeys for that particular week. We got to spend Monday recuperating and enjoying each other's company in the absence of hotel rooms, debate rounds, and so on. We had a nice dinner, didn't cook though, and we probably should have tried to break up the monotony of fast and otherwise prepared meals that dominates one's schedule in the abscence of a kitchen. Regardless, it was a very good day, followed by a pleasant evening, and a bright, but early morning.

Andy had booked my ticket through whatever crazy ass travel agent he is required to use by Lane Community College and the ticket she finagled was among the worst itineraries in all of history. At first glance it appeared that I was flying from Buffalo to Hotlanta, and Hotlanta to Portland. Thats not bad, you can't expect to get non-stop flights from an airport as small as BUF to the other side of the country. Closer inspection revealed that the flight from Buffalo to Hotlanta stopped in Detroit. Yep. Not only did they make me fly west, before flying south and east, to again fly north and west; not only did they put a 50 minute break, for no apparent reason, in the middle of my day, they made me get off the damn plane. I was perfectly content to sit with my computer, my Nintendo DS and my enormous novel by Norman Mailer, doing whatever I needed to while waiting for them to reload. I even mentioned that I would be happy to move to a seperate part of the plane if they had to clean row 14 and put new copies of SkyMall in the seat back pockets. Nope, had to literally leave the aircraft and walk around the DTW terminal for 25 minutes before they let me board again. I watched their giant screen TVs and poked around in a shop that catered to cat and dog lovers. Still, it was a bit infuriating.

Had to sit in the Hotlanta airport for closer to two hours, but there was a comfortable bar near my gate where I could watch Sportscenter, the opening moments of the world series, and have nachos and whiskey, a classic combination if ever I've heard one. It turned out that the three people sitting next to me at the bar were all on my flight as well and my initial optimism that the plane might be undercrowded was put in momenary jeopardy. I got pleasantly intoxicated for a reasonable price and hopped on the plane. I should back up to one of the people who was sitting with me at the bar however, cuz she was the drunkest person I have ever seen actually fly on an airliner. When she showed up in the bar she already sounded drunk, but since she was just off a previous plane and wandering into the bar, I decided to assume that this was just the way she was. I should note that my experiences with this woman were fairly limited, between 7:45 Eastern and 10:55 Pacific, so maybe she is like this all the time, but at this particular moment, she was drunk. She hit on our incredibly unattractive bartender. After sitting there for approximately 15 minutes, in a fairly smoky room (since it is also the ATL smoking lounge), surrounded by people sucking down their Marlboro Lights, she exclaimed "I can smoke in here?!?!" This would be a somewhat tolerable thing to do except for the fact that she followed it up by 10 minutes later exclaiming in exactly the same voice "I can drink in here?!?!" Maybe you could write that off as a funny joke or something based on her not remembering to drink her beverage despite its sitting there for however long. Each one, however, was repeated at least two more times, including one while she was holding a still burning cigarette. She had a tall beer, a rum and coke, and two lemon drops in my sight, though I left the bar about 5 minutes before she did. I was certain that this lady would never get on the plane, but about 30 seconds before they closed the aft doors she comes a-stumbling in.

There was no body on the plane, maybe 25 of us for the whole plane. I don't remember precisely what kind of plane it was, but a big one with two aisles and 9 seats per row. No one in the aircraft sat in the same set of seats as anyone else and while I didnt' even attempt to sleep during the flight, it would have been money to stretch out on accross the whole situation. I had decided to characterize my trip to Eugene as a vacation, so I decided that my commencing of drinking signaled the end of my working for the day, so I ordered a beer on the plane and sat back to watch the movie: Batman Begins. I was a little surprised they would show this movie on the plane, though I was totally psyched to watch it again. It was less good on the small screen and even less good given the editing applied by the airline to make it acceptable for all ages. Still, its a decent flick and kept me busy for 2 hours. They followed that up with an episode of Nightline and some other crap that I didnt watch before they got to Bewtiched reruns and the Travel Channel's list of Top Ten Ballpark Foods. The final item was cut off after Wrigley field so we could get off the plane and all, but I appreciated the effort.

The trip has a multitude of stories in itself, but I figure I will convince myself to go in manageable batches. Not to mention, Hippo has been very excitable since I got home and is ready to play with some cat toys. OMG, Katie ordered checks with Hippo's picture on them today. Absent the presence of the fluffy Ms. Hipp herself, they are the cutest things ever.

Peace,

MB-K