From Stormy Boston to Sunny El Paso

The view from the Hertz parking lot.

So, today I traveled to El Paso. What a long day. Don’t get me wrong I enjoy traveling, for the most part. However, today was a rather sucky travel day. Last night I got a call from American Airlines to tell me my flight was canceled and they had re-booked me. No big deal, in fact it was nice. They asked me what I preferred for seating window or aisle. I prefer aisle. So naturally I ended up in the middle seat for the two legs of the flight

Oh the dreaded middle seat. I can always tell when the person in front of me will recline their seat. The telltale sign is someone who sits in the seat too hard initially and then rocks it back a bit or even checks the distance of the recline. I can tell a recliner because that is the person who sits in front of me.

As you can tell today wasn’t the best day of traveling however it could have been worse. I could have been the lady who was sitting next to me on the flight from Boston to Dallas who was headed to Hawaii. She wasn’t going to make her connection and fretted over that the entire three hour flight. Three hours of a huffing twitchy, fidgety person is my idea of a good time. When the plane landed she had 5 minutes to make her next flight. I can tell she doesn’t travel often because she hopped out of her seat and started down the aisle. Anyone who has traveled more than once in their lives knows that when the flight ends and the doors open the aisle turns into an artery clogged with slow moving human cholesterol chunks.

So, now I’m in the state of Texas, things so far are going well. Check out the nice weather I am having. So glad to be out of the fun New England weather. However I am looking forward to returning home at the end of the week.

My current reading selection is Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code. I’m pretty much almost finished with it. I started it this morning. So you can imagine how much of my day was on the plane and waiting. The book is a great read. You can find out more about this book at www.thedavincicode.com. I’ll have more to say once I finish it.

Ellis at Stone Soup

Ticket to See Ellis Paul at Stone Soup

Last night Allison and I went to Stone Soup to see Ellis Paul. Rachel Davis opened for Ellis and she was quirky and fun. She had a good voice but I couldn’t always make out the words. We got her CD so we could listen to her more.

While waiting in line we met Audra and Patti.

Audra owns Mad Hatters Bakery in Newport. It is not on main street but you can get muffins there for half of what the main street shops get. So, if you find yourself over by the police station and homeless shelter in Newport look for Mad Hatters and grab your self a muffin and say hello to Audra. We’ll certainly be stopping by there when we get a chance to go to Newport.

Another chance meeting while at the concert was Steve Donohue from Saint A’s. Steve and I graduated together and worked at Saint A’s at the same time. He was in Admissions and I was in Public Relations and Residence Life. It was nice to see Steve and Kristen Skoglund, who is also a Saint A’s grad from the class of 1996. It is nice to find out that people are Ellis Paul fans and find out other folk singers that we should go and see.

I think we will be back at Stone Soup again real soon. And its wicked easy to get there from North Attleboro. About a 15 minute ride.

Oh yeah, the reason we were there, Ellis Paul. Last night Ellis Paul was a lot of fun. I felt that the show was even more of an intimate one than the other night at Club Passim. Not for nothing, but both shows were very good. I guess I just got more excited about this one because Ellis played ‘Roll Away Bed’ for us. It is a cute little song about sharing the sleeping arrangements with someone who, and I’m not naming any names, is an active sleeper.

Ellis also played ‘3000 miles’ which is my personal favorite song, especially with the travel that I do. Sometimes I feel like I’ve been living out of a suitcase for 14 days. And airplanes are nothing but buses with wings anyway, so it may as well say Greyhound on that American Airlines plane.

Can you tell that someone has missed Platinum status 2 years in a row and is a little miffed about it? But anyway, Ellis Paul was great, he invited Rachel Davis and a guitarist Brett, I think his name was, up to play on and unplugged rendition of ‘Let it Be’. What a fun evening.

One Family's Adventures in the World