Senior tripping

So it's time to blog the senior trip. We're currently on the bus on our way to Ocean City, MD. I've never been to this place and am very much looking forward to it.

Ocean City was not our original destination, and our path to that location twisted and turned through bedbug reports, careening between no options and too many options, and finally landing in the OC, thanks in part to an offpeak travel time and a lousy economy.

My job here was to plan and organize the trip. I think most people know that me and the word 'organize' have a relationship that's uneasy at best. Planning is fine, and I can keep a lot of things going simultaneously, but not in a way that anyone would call precise and organized.

As the trip goes on I can pass along some more of the backstory, but today we arrived at school to find that we had 3 few kids than anticipated, due to illness and mysterious doings. Most of the kids were here on time, as was the bus, so everything proceeded and we were ready to go when I realized we were lacking our lunch. This is the perfect example of why I hate being in charge. If we ended up in Maryland with no food, it was all on me.

The caterer had said that we were going to have sandwiches for lunch today because he couldn't get to the hotel in time to prepare a meal. Beyond that, I had no information. I didn't know if he was bringing them or if we needed to load it on the bus. Once I found out that we were bringing it, I had to go down to the school kitchen, bang on the door until an extremely put out (though totally helpful) young woman let me in.

Upon entering, I could see that our food was in a state of semi-readiness. This was not what I'd anticipated, but we were able to fill a cooler with ice, add sandwiches, and then...stare at this big heavy thing and wonder how we were going to get it to the bus. There was no handtruck or proper dolly anywhere, so we lifted the cooler onto one of those wheeley (wheelie?) things you use to pile up a bunch of folding chairs. This was okay as long as we didn't hit any kind of irregularity on the ground, which worked better inside than out. Any time we hit even a small bump, the wheelie stopped and the cooler kept going (that's physics, folks). Eventually, we gave up and started carrying things.

The end result of this was my getting completely soaked and more than a little irritated, but ultimately we made it onto the bus with everything and we're off! More to come.

Life gets in the way

Isn't that a song lyric or something? Life gets in the way of living? If it's not it should be because it's catchy and it's true.

My case in particular has me dealing with a houseful of people who aren't feeling well. I've often lamented the pain of being the least sick person in a house full of sick people. You always have to do all the stuff because you're the least incapacitated. I'll tell you, walking the dog on a winter night with a fever is no fun at all, but someone's gotta do it.

I'm not actually sick at the moment, but I sprained my right thumb a few weeks ago and it has refused to get better, leading me to try to keep it immobilized. All I have to say about this is, try getting through a day without using the thumb on your dominant hand and see how that works. Try buttoning something or even putting that thing on in the first place. Try holding a glass. Try preparing, eating or ridding your body of food. Try washing your hair. Try typing. Or writing. And remember that I essentially write for a living.

And you know how when you hurt one leg the other starts to hurt because you're favoring it? Guess what? Some thing with hands!

I went to Hamilton College in upstate New York. Snows a lot there. Snows so much that there that the idea of a snow day was just silly. Every day was a snow day.

I had a Shakespeare professor who was, shockingly, a theatrical sort. He spoke with a pseudo continental accent (I have no idea where he was from, probably Nebraska or something). I am now going to use dramatic license and relate and perhaps embellish a story that my friend told me as if it actually happened to me.

One day I come to class on a bright clear morning through a couple of feet of freshly fallen snow that had stuck to absolutely everything, turning the campus overwhelmingly white. The professor walks in and grumpily says, "So I get up this morning, go to the kitchen to get coffee, and I look out the window and what do I see? A g-damned winter wonderland."

I kind of feel the same way about spring. Spring is wonderful if you like green and if you like mud, bugs and itchy eyes. Yes, it's nice that the temperatures are warmer, but lousy weather comes in all sorts, and I personally prefer winter.

Adding to the fun is our temporary houseguest. Well, a houseguest in that she resides at the house, but not in that she's inside. We have a light fixture outside of our back door that has a gracefully curved brass tube leading up to the light itself. A few years ago, a robin decided that that would be an ideal place to build a nest, and the nest has remained ever since, occupied each year by some robin or another (they're so darned difficult to tell apart!). In general, this is fine. It's up too high to see into the nest, but once the babies are born you can see their beaks sticking up when they're waiting for food. The only downside is the neighborhood cat camping out down below, hoping for a snack.

This years robin, however, is an overly nervous sort who bolts the nest every time someone walks near it. I know this is normal bird behavior, but this particular robin has acute insomnia and I can tell you that there are few things more alarming than coming home late and tired in the dark, and having something suddenly fly right past your face. I've already told my wife that if she finds me sprawled out in the back yard dead that I've suffered a heart attack at this bird's hands (wings?).

Complete freak out

I was about to go to the Phillies game last night and as I always do, I checked to see which of my tickets I had sold on Stubhub, because those tickets won't work. I saw that I'd sold seats 15 and 16 so I went to my file to get 13 and 14 and saw that those were the only 2 tickets there. 15 and 16 were gone. I suddenly thought, "Holy S--t!" I had accidentally sold two of the tickets that I'd given to the school on Stubhub. I had given them two pairs, one for 5/3 and one for 5/5, one for a senior class silent auction and the other for an athletic department raffle. I had no idea which was which and did not know who had won either the raffle or the auction. 

I completely freaked out. This meant that these people would show up and their tickets would not work. And I didn't even know who they were but knew I'd find out eventually and it wouldn't be pretty. The only thing I could think to do was run down to the ballpark and try to find two unidentified people wandering among the 45,000 showing up for the game.

So I rushed out the door (it was about 6:15 at this point with a 7:05 game time) and flew down to the ballpark (20 minutes!), went to the third base ticket window and then the first base window (as in all the way on the other side of the park) looking for a couple of pissed-off people. Then I asked one of the attendants if there had been anyone show up and have their tickets not work. He said that if that happened they'd be sent to the Stubhub booth which was back at the 3rd base window.

. 

I ran back over there and the Stubhub people said that yes, someone who had bought tickets at a silent auction had been there and they'd sent them over to the season ticket office where they were going to try to contact me. This office was next to the first base ticket window back on the other side of the park. 

So over there I run and I go in the office and there's nobody there except Phillies employees. I say, "Oh no, I'm too late" so they ask me what I mean and when I explain a woman behind the counter said, "You're not too late. They're standing at my ticket window, number 21." So I go out to window 21 and there are my school's principal and her husband, shocked as all hell to see me there. It was just game time. So after a short explanation they took the two valid tickets and in they went. 

I was able to get a ticket for myself, I drank 2 beers as quickly as I could to calm myself, and then sat and enjoyed the game.

Thank goodness for research!

Otherwise we would not have conclusively known this:

Facebook photos

I could wax eloquent (or at least write lots and lots of words) about how societal trends have left us with a generation of exhibitionists, but I wouldn't want to call attention to myself.