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Friday, June 19, 2009

Summer Vacation

Posting here on Stonekettle Station will be sporadic for the next couple of weeks.

We’re on vacation, headed down to Florida for a couple of weeks to drink margaritas and bake on the beach, then we’ll head up to Michigan for a bit to enjoy the Midwestern summer. We’re visiting friends and family in both the Pensacola and Grand Rapids areas.

I grew up in and around Grand Rapids (though I haven’t lived there in 25 years and hardly recognize the place anymore) and spent a significant fraction of my military career in and out of Pensacola (which is where I met my wife) – and we haven’t been back to either city in about two years. So we’re looking forward to it, and looking forward to spending some time with family.

I’ll be blogging and twittering from the road, depending on the availability of access points, time, and motivation – but vacation is my primary goal here, so as I said above, you can expect posting to be sporadic at best.

I’m hoping to hook up with a couple of readers and members of the UCF as I make my way around the country. Dr. Phil owes me a stuffed crust pizza and I intend to collect once I arrive in Michigan, and I’ll meet up with others as I can.

I’m hoping to make this trip without any further drama, these last two weeks have taken a bit out of me, both the hand injury and the bronchial infection knocked the starch out of my sails and I’m looking forward to the time off. Hopefully the guy next to me on the plane isn’t a Ebola carrier or Typhoid Mary or Dick Cheney.

One final note before I head to the airport – I have to fly through the George Bush International Airport in Dallas, Texas where I’ll be surrounded by people with pointy toed boots and big hats who, with a straight face, named their airport The George Bush International Airport. I’m going to try and arrive liquored up enough to be numb to it all – but it is possible that there isn’t enough booze on the planet to keep me from becoming unhinged with a terminal case of the willies. It is a significant possibility that I will spend the entire four hour layover repeating Sean Connery’s line from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, when Henry and Indie are in Berlin:

My son, we are pilgrims in an unholy land…

Just kidding, Texas, you know I love you, mostly.

See you on the beach.

6 comments:

  1. The George Bush Intercontinental airport is in Houston. Locals just call it Intercontinental, which is what used to be it's name. It's a nice airport. I've flown through there many times. Dallas/Fort Worth Airport or DFW is another matter. That thing is a bitch. Be glad you're going through Houston.

    Have fun on your trip.

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  2. just remeber Jim while in texas if they offer you a cowpie it's not desert :) have soe rum punch for me and enjoy the sun, i my self am taking 10 days of leave to be spent on te floor of some bar

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  3. What a wonderfully apt name: George Bush Intercontinental Airport--where an American can get airsick on a Japanese tourist and reenact one of the Bush presidency's most memorable moments!

    Travel safe, Jim, and I hope you and the family have a great vacation.

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  4. I remember when they decided to rename the Houston Intercontinental Airport. Some people were saying, "We need a Texan name for the airport." I didn't see anything wrong with leaving it named after Sam Houston, a very Texan name.

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  5. Then you realize the other Houston airport is the one Southwest uses (or used to use -- don't really get that way ever), and it's called Hobby.

    Bush League International is the full-time professional airport.

    Dr. Phil

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  6. Hobby is the one I use most, because Southwest is my preferred airline. Hobby was named after a governor of Texas, William P. Hobby. The Bush Intercontinental Airport was named after George, the first Bush president, not George W.

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