Camporee

I took my son to the Boy Scouts' "Camporee" last weekend.

It was so much fun!  And so hard, too...  I am *not* a natural camper.  This was a real effort for me.  I love my warm soft bed, flush toilet, and daily shower.  Camping involves none of these things and so I don't do it often.  I love the outdoors, but usually only if I know I can sleep in my own bed at night.

We left Friday after my son got out of school.  Arrived in Pine, AZ, at Camp Geronimo, around 6 p.m.  Selected our campsite and hauled our stuff up from the car.  Set up the tent in the dark (not fun!  Thank goodness the troop leader and his wife helped out!).  Drove the car back down to the parking lot and hiked the mile back up to the campsite.  Had some fried chicken we'd brought along for dinner.  Went to the scout ceremony/ meeting and sat in the increasing chilly-ness.  Slept on the rather uncomfortable camping pads and woke up cold at 4 a.m., added extra blankets and woke up at 5:30 a.m. with the sun...

And then the actual fun started.  Breakfast in the cold-but-warming beautiful morning with birds singing, scout flag ceremony, dressed in the "Class A" uniforms for the "inspection," and then more scout ceremonies...  all done by probably 8 a.m.  Then some scout activities/challenges for the kids --  involving problem-solving, teamwork, and fun.  The theme was "Zombies," so several of the events required completing them within a time limit before the "Zombies" were released.  There was a fellow applying Zombie make-up to anyone who wanted it...  although most of us adults looked like zombies even without the makeup, after a night spent setting up a campsite and sleeping, very little, in the cold!

Then we had lunch, and then there was hiking, crawfish-catching, and lots of unstructured, kid-led games like Zombie tag, "infected," capture-the-flag, pinecone wars, something resembling lord of the flies and pinecone-throwing, and random explorations of the gorgeous, huge wooded camping area.  Meanwhile, the adults supervised some and hung out a lot, getting to know each other and enjoying the birds and the blue sky with pretty little clouds and the trees and the lack of biting insects and the sound of the wind in the trees.  It was awesome.

Later that evening, after dinner, there was another flag ceremony at sunset, and then a camp-wide meeting at which my scout's Webelos den and my scout's host-boy-scout troop tied for first place for the campsite cleanliness and uniform inspection prize -- both groups scored a perfect 100%!  Each group won large portable grill, to be used for future campouts!  Very exciting!

I met a fellow who is the grandfather of one of the Webelos.  I had met the Webelo's mom before, and she is really nice, too.  He lives down the street and around the corner from us, and works in a building two blocks from where I work.  Such a small world we live in...  He loaned me a jacket, because I forgot to bring my warm toasty one.  He is a soft-spoken, kind-hearted, handsome, smart, sweet man about 15 years older than me.  I have to admit to having a small crush on him.  If I weren't married, I'd have been flirting with him...  As it was, we enjoyed looking at all the stars that can't be seen from the Valley of the Sun because of the light pollution and talking about our jobs and kids/grandkids.

Then we had a great big campfire and roasted marshmallows and made s'mores (yes, the boy scouts love them as much as the girl scouts who invented them), cleaned up a bit, put out the fire, and then slept in our tents in the cold again on the hard ground softened only somewhat by thin camping sleep-pads and bags, woke up at 5:00 a.m. with the sun listening to the birds sing, had another flag ceremony, broke down the camp, and headed back to civilization with a new appreciation for our warm comfortable homes, soft beds, heated bathrooms, and showers. 

Life is good.

What Should I Do?

Help!  Which sign should I obey?

I swear, driving in New Orleans can be so very confusing! 

Best. Friend. Ever!

The other day, I posted about my "bestest friend in the whole world" who sent me the wonderful Contigo travel mugs for Christmas.  I have known her for over 40 years (yes, since preschool!), and she truly is an amazing woman.  She has raised / is raising three wonderful boys, while running a successful bankruptcy law practice in South Carolina.  She is smart and beautiful and kind and really just the BEST friend.

Today, I want to tell you that, in addition to my "bestest friend in the whole world," I also have a "best friend ever," whom I have known for over 30 years (since middle school) and who, on a whim and because we haven't seen each other for like 6 years, invited me to come visit her in Birmingham, Alabama, to see the band "Little House" (the musicians are friends of ours) play.

We are planning the trip to coincide with Do Dah Day, which is a fun annual music festival in Birmingham that has been around for 34 years (click the link above to check it out - it's awesome! - and click here for more information about the origins / history of this quirky and fun local event).  It has the usual festival things -- music, food, art, kid activities, a parade (I love a parade!), and lots of fun.  Little House is playing at the festival. 

My best friend ever used to be heavily involved in organizing and promoting Do Dah Day.  I think she has reduced her involvement in it more recently, but still attends every year.  It is a great festival and raises money every year for deserving local charities that benefit homeless animals.

My friend even offered me free plane tickets (using frequent flier miles) and a bedroom in her house so that I would have no excuse to say "no"! 

But here's the clincher, for me: The trip offers the opportunity for me to see my friend's older child, who was a newborn the last time I was there, and to meet her younger child, whose photos I have seen on Facebook but have never met, and who is totally adorable.

Needless to say, it is an offer that cannot be refused!  So I am going to Alabama for Do Dah Day!  I can't wait!

****

And I have to confess that I have at least four other "best friends" who I totally love for various reasons, not all of them having to do with receiving awesome travel mugs or free plane tickets to Do Dah Day in Birmingham.

I am truly blessed to have so many wonderful friends.  :)

Krewe of Little Rascals

I mentioned yesterday that I took the kids to New Orleans to visit family this past weekend. By family, I mean my aunt, my cousin and his wife & kids, and my grandmother. My dad and step-mom also flew in for the weekend. We had a blast visiting with the family.

Also while in New Orleans, we went to see a Mardi Gras parade.

Mardi Gras season is ramping up in New Orleans. It starts early, with a couple of parades in January and early February. There were several parades this past weekend. And then there will be dozens of parades starting this Friday and continuing through Mardi Gras day, which is March 8 this year. Here is a link to the list of parades and their schedules, if you want to see just how many parades there are.

Nearly everyone in New Orleans gets a week off for Mardi Gras. Schools are closed, businesses shut down.... the whole city participates. Of course, the businesses catering to the Mardi Gras crowd and tourists ramp up rather than shutting down, but most folks have holiday time because, really, with several parade routes throughout the city and the corresponding road closures, as well as the gazillions of tourists and their cars clogging up the remaining streets, there would be no way for them to get to work or school anyway.

Each parade is conducted yearly by a specific "Krewe," a membership organization which is in charge of designing the floats, filling out all required paperwork, and organizing the hundreds of people who will ride, drive, or march in the parade. Each year, the floats will have a different theme, sometimes serious, sometimes fun, sometimes satirical in nature. From the link I gave you above, you can click on the name of each Krewe to read some historical information about the Krewe, as well as what their parade theme is for the year, what parade route they will follow, and what sort of "throws" they will have.

The Krewes provide not only the floats and parade marchers, but also "throws," which means the beads and trinkets and other assorted items thrown from the floats during the parade. These are quite varied and can be anything from the standard mardi gras beads (you have to promise to throw a certain number of new ones), to fancier beads with the name of the Krewe, light-up necklaces, insulated lunch bags, commemorative cups, luggage tags, note pads, small flashlights, plastic doubloons, bracelets, magnets, balls, stuffed animals, and so on.

Usually, the throws will reflect the Krewe's theme, and/or the theme of the Krewe's parade for the current year. My favorite "throw" was from a couple of years ago -- a feather boa in green, gold, and purple feathers (the official Mardi Gras colors), with small lights that you can turn on or off, or set to "blinking." Classy, right?! I wear it often.

Each Krewe tries to outdo the other Krewes and their own past parade throws when selecting this year's throws, so every year, the selection gets more varied and interesting.

So, this past Sunday, we went to see the parade sponsored by the Krewe of Little Rascals, which is an all children's parade. Well, of course they had some adults -- someone has to supervise the kids and drive the tractors that pull the floats, after all. But the Krewe members and the float riders are all children, and there were numerous kid groups marching, as well -- dance troupes, school bands, and so forth. This year's "Queen" was Taylor Shelenhamer, and she rode on one of the fanciest floats, handing out white beaded necklaces with a plastic medallion with her likeness in gold. Very cool.

The Krewe of Little Rascals was founded in 1983. Here is a link to the Krewe's web site.

My kids loved the parade. We caught a gazillion beaded necklaces, a green plastic water gun, several superballs, a couple of handfulls of candy, and a whistle.... and probably lots of stuff I've forgotten.

I may forget some of the stuff, but I won't forget how much fun my kids had. What a parade!

Contraband

I took the kids to New Orleans to visit family this past weekend. We had a blast. The kids even got their picture taken with a movie star!

True story.

While goofing around at New Orleans's Piazza D'Italia, the kids saw a dog walking by and went to ask the owner if they could pet her. Turns out, the "owner" was not the owner, but was a trainer / dog handler, and the dog was "Eva," a movie-star dog who portrays a drug-sniffing police dog in the upcoming movie "Contraband," starring (in addition to Eva), Mark Wahlberg & Kate Beckinsdale.

Eva was very friendly and allowed my kids to pet her and hug her. She smiled at them and wagged her tail. However, she declined to sign an autograph.

Here is a link to more information about the movie. Couldn't find anything about Eva on the web site, though!

Las Vegas, in Bullet Points

Here are some strange things we saw on our trip to Las Vegas:

* Leaving town, we stopped at a traffic light. The fellow in front of us, who was driving a 1990's large black sedan of some sort, opened his window and used a whisk broom to brush a small piece of invisible dirt off the side of his car, then closed the window again and drove on. WTF?!?

* 15 men walked by on the sidewalk in front of the Luxor, in a group, each dressed as Mario - red cap, blue overalls, etc. Was there some sort of convention in town?

* Capt. Jack Sparrow and Cat Woman chatting up tourists in front of the Bellagio. What a pair!


Here are some (but not all) of the fun things we did on our very low-budget trip to Las Vegas:

* Checked into our *free* room at Bally's (best possible price, no?).

* Wandered around the strip checking out all the cool stuff in the lobbies and shops at the hotels. The Bellagio and Caesar's Palace are my favorites. The Bellagio, in particular, has beautiful glass flower sculptures hanging from the ceiling in the lobby which were done by Dale Chihuly, whom I've written about here before. They have a gift shop with some smaller pieces you can buy. I don't know how much they cost. I think the rule there is, if you have to ask, you can't afford it.

* Lost a bit of money gambling. Won a bit of money gambling. Lost some more money gambling.

* Took fun and funny perspective photos of us appearing to do unusual things - such as a photo of me seeming to balance the "Paris" neon ball / balloon on my hand, a photo of my husband with his hands on the hood of a parked police car appearing to be arrested, and a photo of me appearing to lick a very phallic-looking sculpture at the Bellagio.

* Drank coffee and watched the other tourists and made catty remarks about their clothes, hair, behavior, and anything else we found amusing.

* Watched the fountain show in front of the Bellagio, choreographed with Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On."

* Gambled some more and drank free drinks and lost a bit more money.

* Listened to the bands at several cafes and bars at Paris and Bally's.

* Checked out of Bally's and moved into our *free* room at the Four Queens downtown (another fantastic price!).

* Ate $1 shrimp coctails at the Golden Gate hotel & casino.

* Gambled and won a bit of money.

* Checked out the vendors on Fremont Street.

* Enjoyed the view of the Vegas lights and casinos from our almost-top-floor hotel room.

* Enjoyed the hippy-dippy "Summer of '69 Woodsdtock TributePalooza" street show (apparently a repeat from August) in front of the Golden Gate hotel on Fremont Street, complete with performers hanging from fabric and/or rings suspended in the air, Cirque du Soleil style.

* Enjoyed the "Fremont Street Experience" overhead light and music show several times (American Pie, Fire and Ice, and Kiss) one night.

* Played slot machines at the Four Queens and won more money.

* Enjoyed a decent buffet meal at the Main Street Station hotel and casino, complete with a darn good prime rib steak, a decent black-bean chili con carne with cornbread, and fresh (not canned) green beans that were cooked perfectly. The fried scallops apparently were fake scallops (like fake crab meat), but the shrimp were real and my husband said the pizza was good, too. The building is done in an old victorian style that is quite charming. I've never seen the rooms, but the lobby and restaurant / buffet area are absolutely beautiful. My husband tells me there is a portion of the actual Berlin wall in the men's restroom, with urinals attached to it. I did not verify this information for myself.

* Played more slot machines at the Main Street Station casino and won even more money!

* Returned home with more money than I took with me to Vegas - a first for me!

And now I have to get back to work. Happy Wednesday, gamblers and fools, happy Wednesday!

The Great Rattlesnake Adventure of 2009

Warning: some of the photos will be a little gross, so if you aren't in the mood for it, come back another day.

Last week, my husband and our friend, we'll call him Jim, took LMS ("LegalMist's Son") camping overnight. It turned into quite an adventure!

They hiked, they fished, they caught crawdads in a trap, they went canoeing, and they killed and ate their dinner. Rather accidentally. Here is what happened:

They arrived mid-afternoon and began setting up camp. Jim had brought his dogs along, and LMS noticed one of the dogs, we'll call him "Dude," looking at something near the edge of the camp site. He wandered a little closer, and then called out, "hey Uncle Jim, what's Dude doing?" Jim looked over and saw that his dog had startled a rattlesnake, which was now beginning to rattle and assume the strike position. Holy crap!

LMS probably saved Dude's life by alerting Jim. Jim called LMS and Dude away. My husband took photos. Here is a photo of the snake in strike position:



They thought the snake would slither away after Dude moved away from it, as snakes usually do. But it didn't. It began moving toward them. They moved to the side. It moved toward them some more. So Jim grabbed his shotgun and shot it.

It didn't die, so he shot it again.

It still didn't die, so he found a large stick to hold it down with, and then cut off its head.

You may not know this, but when you cut off a rattler's head, the head can still move and bite. So now there was this rattlesnake head sort of jumping around on the ground, with its mouth opening and closing. Rather gruesome and scary, like something from one of those cheesy horror movies that you think could never really happen... but it did.

Here is a picture of the snake's head, taken while it was still moving around opening and closing its mouth and trying to bite:



They dug a hole and managed to bury the head without anyone getting bitten.

And, sort of like a chicken with its head cut off, a rattler's body still moves after the decapitation, too, so now they had this rattler body still sort of squirming around.

Here is a picture of the headless body:



Note the large bulge in the middle. Apparently it had just eaten lunch and was lying around digesting when my boys happened upon it.

Jim skinned it and cleaned it (and removed a dead but still intact ground squirrel from the mid-section where the bulge in the photo above was), and they cooked it (cooked the snake - no, not the ground squirrel, too - what are you nuts?!) for dinner along with the steaks they had brought.

At first, LMS declared he did not want any. He was probably grossed out by seeing the whole snake slaughter, skinning, and cleaning process. But after being convinced to try it, he decided he loved it and kept asking for more.

Have any of you ever eaten rattlesnake? I have. They serve it at the "Cowboy Club" restaurant in Sedona, Arizona, among other places. Like chicken or pork or any other meat, if it is prepared well it is quite tasty. I'm sure the guys didn't have any fancy spices or sauces for it, but I also know my husband is a great cook, so I'm sure it was prepared as well as it could have been under the circumstances, and so I'm not surprised that LMS ended up loving it.

Now this all sounds (and probably looks) rather violent, and I am not advocating random killing of rattlers for fun. They are worthy of respect, and they have their place in our ecosystem just like any other wild animal. But I also don't advocate standing around waiting to get bitten by one, and if it's threatening people at a campsite, I have no qualms about killing it. Better it than my kid, that's for sure!

And I am glad that, once they killed it, they made use of it by having it for dinner. No sense wasting perfectly good food.

My son is so proud of his "Steak and Snake" dinner, and of the fact that he saved Jim's dog by calling Jim's attention to the situation.

And he has really enjoyed the shock value of his story when told to his grandmothers.

.

Southwest Airlines Redeems Itself, Becomes LegalMist's New Favorite Airline

Let's start the week's entertainment with a big shout-out for Southwest Airlines. This is a rather long post, so go get yourself a fresh cuppa coffee and a good snack, and settle in a comfy chair.

Ok, are you ready?


Great. Because first, I have to give you a rather long back story about how awful Southwest was 6 years ago. I had a terrible experience with them -- it was so bad I swore I'd never fly them again.

My daughter and I were flying and I wanted to use frequent flyer miles. At the time, Southwest used only a voucher system for the free tickets -- you had to go to the airport with your paper voucher and get your boarding card. They could not send an e-ticket. So they said they would mail the tickets.

A few days before the flight, the tickets had not arrived. So I called the reservations line and they transferred me to customer service, and customer service said, essentially, "oops, we forgot to mail them." To their credit, they agreed to FedEx them overnight at that point. But they wouldn't send the vouchers to my home address because they required a signature for the FedEx and no one would be home to sign for them. They said they would send to my office address so that I could sign for them. But the tickets didn't arrive in Thursday's 3 p.m. FedEx delivery.

The flight was Saturday morning. If the tickets did not arrive by Friday afternoon in the FedEx delivery, I would not get them in time for my flight. I wanted to be sure they had been sent.

So I called the customer service department to ask what happened. At about 3:30 on a Thursday afternoon, Phoenix time. And I got a recording that said, essentially, "We are closed. Please call back during business hours, which are 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern Standard Time."

For my overseas readers, Eastern Standard Time is either 2 hours or 3 hours ahead of Arizona time. (It varies depending on the time of year because Arizona doesn't participate in the ridiculous twice-yearly clock-changing ritual due to daylight savings time -- we have enough daylight in Arizona, thank you very much...). Either way, by 3:30 p.m. in Phoenix, they were definitely closed for the day.

Uh, what was the name of that airline again?

Oh, yeah. SOUTHWEST. As in, "Southwestern United States," presumably.

The last time I checked, the Southwestern United States does not use Eastern Standard Time. They use Pacific Standard Time. Or perhaps Mountain Standard Time. Depending on which state and what time of year it is.

Shouldn't the customer service department at an Airline named "Southwest" be open until 5 p.m. Pacific time?!? At least? (Or maybe they should have named the airline "SouthEAST"?) I was peeved.

I tried calling the corporate office. It was closed, too.

I called the reservations system. They said they didn't know anything and couldn't help with the original tickets, but they could sell me some new tickets -- e-tickets -- at $500-plus per ticket and then I could ask for a refund when my other tickets came. I asked, will they definitely give me a refund? They said they didn't know. Great, thanks, very helpful.

So the next day, Friday, I called the customer service department.

Let me tell you, it is a good thing I have a sense of humor because I was able to laugh at the fact that I was on hold for twenty-five minutes waiting to talk to someone, while listening to their muzak and announcement loop.

What made me laugh about that, you ask?

Their recorded announcement at the time consisted of a soft woman's voice interrupting the muzak occasionally to say things in a "soothing" tone -- things like "Are you stressed out? Annoyed? Angry? Did you know that deep breathing exercises have been scientifically shown to reduce stress and anger? Please... try it with me now.... Breeeathe in ...... thaaat's right, now, hoooold for five seconds..... goooood.... now, breeeathe out sloooowly." I swear I am not making this up.

(Tip O' the Day for you, corporate America: A better method of reducing your customers' stress levels would be to have plenty of good customer service representatives who answer the telephone quickly, during reasonable business hours, and actually help the customers, rather than trying to teach us "deep breathing exercises" with muzak playing in the background.)

I did not do the deep breathing exercises. I was too busy laughing. So I guess, in its own way, the technique worked to calm me down.

But then they answered the phone, and I quickly lost my sense of humor again. I asked what happened to the tickets they promised to send me. They said, "Oh, well we sent the the tickets to [my home address (which was the billing address I had given them for the credit card, not the shipping address)], but they couldn't deliver them because no one was there to sign for them."

I said, "I know no one was home. That is why you promised to send them to my office address!"

They checked their computer notes and said, essentially, "oops."

But, not to worry, they said, surely FedEx will deliver the tickets today, right?

I said, well perhaps, but no one is home today either. And I don't know what time they deliver things at my home address. So, suppose I go home right now and wait around until 5 p.m., and then it turns out they already tried to deliver the package today, or that they don't re-deliver until Saturday? By then, your office will be closed, and then how will I fix the problem of having no tickets?

They said, essentially, "Well, we can't help you."

I asked, can't you email me something, or call your representatives in Phoenix, or fax something to your Phoenix office or to the Phoenix airport and have them issue some tickets, or something?

They said, "No, because those free tickets might still be delivered, and then you would have two free sets of tickets. You can buy new tickets, and then when your free tickets arrive, you can send those in to [corporate address] along with your receipt for the tickets you bought and request a refund." I asked, "If I request a refund, will they give me one?" They said, "I dunno. I think so."

"You 'think' they will? So I'm supposed to spend $1100 and then hope you'll give me a refund?!? When it was your mistake? What if they don't give me a refund? Am I just "out" the $1100?"

They promised to make sure I would get a refund. They would not, however, tell me their name so I could say, later, "but so-and-so promised a refund." I was suspicious, but didn't have much choice, so I bought new tickets at the expensive last-minute price.

Big mistake. The flight was awful.

I was traveling with my daughter who was four at the time.

The flight was delayed, and they did the typical late-flight-routine at the airport, telling us the flight would be delayed "fifteen minutes," and then fifteen minutes later telling us it would be delayed another "fifteen minutes," and then another "fifteen minutes" and then another... If they had said "one hour delay" the first time, we could have gone to the restaurant and had breakfast and come back. Instead, we had to hang around the gate with my daughter getting bored and hungry and thirsty and whiny.

Just when I was starting to think it would have been faster to drive to our destination, they let us board the plane.

The flight attendants were apparently feeling tired and/or they were just mean. My request for a blanket was met with a cold stare and a "We're out of them." (Not even a perfunctory "sorry.")

On our relatively short, one and a half hour flight, they waited until an hour into the flight to take drink orders. To be fair to them, the flight was rather bumpy, so perhaps they were waiting until we got past the turbulence so we wouldn't all spill our drinks in our lap. But meanwhile we were mighty thirsty, having already sat around at the airport gate, far from the water fountains and restaurants, unable to go get a drink of water for an hour past the scheduled boarding time. And they refused to provide more than one "Dixie Cup" sized drink. Usually airlines will let you have the whole can or bottle of whatever they are serving. Not on this flight. One Dixie Cup per person. No more.

And by the time they handed out the drinks, they were starting the descent. So they came around collecting cups less than five minutes after they handed them out. My daughter had barely had any of her water, and I wanted her to keep it so she would have something to sip on during the descent, to help with the air-pressure / inner-ear pressure problem that she always has on airplanes. So the flight attendant said, "May I take your cup?" And I said, "No, thank you."

One would think that would have been the end of the exchange, but not on this flight from H***.

The flight bi... I mean, attendant, said, "Ma'am, I need you to give that to me now."

I asked, nicely, "Can't I keep it so my daughter will have something to sip on, to help her ears during the landing?"

She said, "No, you CAN'T keep it. I HAVE TO collect it NOW!"

I said (trying to address all the possible objections I could think of), "It's just water. It's not going to be sticky if it spills. I promise to throw away the cup after the flight. It's a tiny plastic cup and it won't hurt anyone if the landing is bumpy and it goes flying."

She said, "Ma'am, that doesn't matter. It is a SERVICE ITEM and I HAVE TO COLLECT IT!"

I am not proud of the fact that I took out all my frustration of the past two days on that flight attendant. Nor am I proud that I set such a bad example for my daughter, arguing over something so trivial with a person who was just trying to do her job as she apparently understood it. It would probably have been the right thing to do, to just hand over the cup and say, "fine" after the first time she said, essentially, "no you can't keep it." But something about the flight attendant's snotty tone, combined with the ridiculousness of what she was demanding and the complete lack of customer service over the past couple of days just rubbed me the wrong way. I tried one more time to be nice, but I had already decided that she would get that cup of water back only if she pried it from my cold, dead hands.

So, I said, as nicely as I could muster, "Um, I'd really like to keep it."

She said (face turning red, very angrily), "You HAVE TO give it to me now! It is FEDERAL LAW! YOU CAN BE ARRESTED FOR DISOBEYING A FLIGHT ATTENDANT'S INSTRUCTIONS."

I got angry back and asked, loudly enough to be sure other passengers heard this one, but softly enough so I couldn't be accused of yelling at a flight attendant "Are you really saying you're going to have me arrested for keeping a small cup of water so my kid has something to drink so her ears won't hurt during the landing?!? Please, tell me you're joking."

She said, "Ma'am, I am NOT joking. I need you to GIVE ME THE CUP NOW or I WILL HAVE TO REPORT YOU TO THE AUTHORITIES."

I smiled condescendingly and shook my head and sighed and said, "Knock yourself out, lady. Call the FBI and have me arrested when we land if you like -- I'm sure the press will have a field day with that one! -- but you are NOT getting this cup of water!!" And I turned my back to her and simply ignored her as she repeated, "Ma'am, excuse me, Ma'am, you HAVE TO give me the cup...." (I know, I know. Petty and childish. As I said, I'm not proud of all this.)

Instead of responding further to the flight attendant, I talked to my daughter in a soft tone (so the flight attendant couldn't hear what I was saying) and I told her that I knew I was being silly and obnoxious and that she (my daughter) should *not* act this way, that she should be a better person than her mom was being, currently, but that I felt strongly that the flight attendant was being unreasonable and I was just fed up with this airline after the past couple of days of frustration, and that, truly, I was quite sure they would not actually arrest me for this (she was pretty worried about that), and that I was sorry that she had to see the whole exchange.... (Gosh I set a pretty bad example sometimes. I wonder if she remembers it?)

I half expected an "Airplane" type incident, in which the flight attendants would line up and slap/hit me repeatedly until I complied and/or until they could pry the cup from my cold, dead hands, but thankfully *that* didn't happen!

Instead, the pilot announced that the flight attendants should be seated for landing. The snotty flight attendant left.

As we walked off the plane, the flight attendants ignored us and talked to each other, chatting about their weekend plans. I tried to place the cup in the trash can, but they all ignored me and stood blocking the trash can, so I carried it off the plane and tossed it in a wastebasket in the airport.

The highlight of that flight was that I did not get arrested when we landed.

The return flight was delayed, too, and also had surly flight attendants. I swore I would never fly on that airline again.

But a couple of years later I was looking for flights and the tickets on Southwest were half the cost of the closest competitor, so I broke down and bought tickets and prepared for the worst. But that flight was fine, and the flight attendants were reasonably nice, and so I've continued to fly with them on occasion, and I've had no other major problems -- a couple of late flights, maybe, but nothing major.

And I have to say, Saturday's flight was fantastic (well, as good as a coach-class flight can be, anyway).

They do everything, even free tickets, on the internet and by email these days, so there were no problems getting the tickets.

You can log in online 24 hours ahead of time and get your boarding passes so you don't have to wait in the super-long line at the airport to get your boarding passes.

They have streamlined their "festival seating" process so you don't have to stand in the line for an hour to try to be near the front of your boarding group in order to get a seat in the same row with your kids/husband.

The flight started boarding exactly on time. The staff was friendly.

The plane was full, as airplanes always seem to be these days (remember the "good old days" when you had a hope of having the entire row to yourself, or at least an empty middle seat? Those days are long gone...). But the flight attendants were cheerful and brought everyone drinks quickly, and let you keep the entire can / bottle of whatever you ordered -- and then they came around later and offered more!

They have never offered full meals on Southwest, but these days, for longer flights, you do get crackers and/or cookies in addition to the pack of peanuts, and they cheerfully let you bring aboard whatever other food you want to bring.

They gave me a deck of cards so I could play with the kids on the flight. It's been years since any airline has given me a deck of cards!

The flight attendants had a sense of humor and were friendly, even talking and joking around with me and my son as we waited in line so he could use the bathroom on board.

They didn't demand a return of all "service items" on the descent, so I was cheerfully allowed to keep my little cup of water in case my son needed it.

And they seem to have fixed that air pressure issue anyway, so we didn't even need the water; my ears barely even "popped" on the way down, and my kids had no problems either.

The plane arrived half an hour early at our destination, and they were organized enough to have found an open gate so we didn't waste that "extra" time we had gained in the air by waiting on the tarmac for a gate to open.

They smiled and said "goodbye" and "thanks for flying with us" as we departed. The one flight attendant we had talked to while waiting in line for the bathroom even remembered the conversation and said, "Have a great time at grandpa's house!" to my little guy.

They unloaded the luggage quickly so that we were driving away from the airport less than twenty minutes after landing.

I didn't need to call their customer service department, so I don't know whether they still try to teach their customers deep breathing exercises while they wait on hold... but that was so funny I almost hope they kept that feature!

All I can say is, wow, what a change from 6 years ago. I'm even looking forward to the return flight.

So, kudos to Southwest for solving many of their customer service problems. If the return flight is as nice as Saturday's flight was, it truly will be my new favorite airline. In fact, I'm so confident that it will be a great flight that I'm telling you all right now, you should definitely fly Southwest any chance you get. They are practically always the least expensive airline, and now they actually have friendly flight attendants and good service!

On the other hand, if the return flight is as bad as the one 6 years ago, I'll be sure to let all 21 of you know about it so you can avoid them in the future.

(That'll teach 'em!!)

I'm back, with yet another smarty pants kid story...

Wow. I was gone a while, wasn't I?

I even lost a "follower" while I was gone.

Bummer. I hate to disappoint people so badly.

I'm sorry I was AWOL for so long. It was a busy week. My sister in law had surgery and needed some assistance, then my brother in law was visiting from California, plus it was the week before Spring Break which means we had to attend parent-teacher conferences for the kids, and my husband, who is a teacher, had to stay late at school to conduct parent-teacher conferences for the kids in his class, leaving me in charge of the entire evening routine with our kids. And the kids and I are spending Spring Break in Virginia with the grandparents, so there were loads of laundry to do and lots of packing happening to get ready for the trip.

And I do mean lots of packing.

The average temperature in Virginia in March is, by Phoenix standards, very cold. Which means we had to bring our sweaters and heavy jackets and long pants. But this weekend, it is in the 70's (low 80's today, I think), so we also had to bring some warm-weather clothes. And enough of both to get through the week so we don't have to spend our time here doing laundry.

But hey, I'm back now, and I'll try to provide a little entertainment this week. So if you un-followed me (you know who you are!), I hope you'll come back. I miss you already....

I'm going to start the week off with yet another annoying smart-alec kid story.

(Depending on the level of your interest in these stories, you may feel free to interpret that as "annoying story about a smart-alec kid" or "(amusing) story about an annoying smart-alec kid" Your choice.)

Why another smart-alec kid story? Because my kids have been in rare smarty-pants form these past few weeks. I hope it's not because they are reading my blog and thinking I am amused by their sarcastic and completely disrespectful remarks. (Because I am, but I don't want them to know that!)

And tomorrow I'll move on to other topics for the rest of the week, I promise!

My daughter, despite being a master smarty-pants, has her teachers pretty well fooled. They always seem to think she is a polite, well-behaved child.

So last week, on the way home from yet another parent-teacher conference in which the teacher pronounced my daughter a "delight" to have in class, my husband was teasing my daughter, saying that she really ought to do something bad at school (you know, like she does at home) so we'd have something to talk about at these parent-teacher conferences, because he was bored and a little annoyed with always hearing about her great attitude and great behavior.

She said, "You are so nefarious."

Husband said, "What do you mean, I'm 'nefarious'? I don't sleep late!"

She said, in a tone that implied that she thought, but simply could not believe, that her father wasn't kidding and really did not know what such a "simple" word meant: "No, it's not about sleeping! It means 'wicked' or 'villainous.' It was our 'word of the day' at school last week."

Husband replied, "Ooooh, so now you think you're better than me, with your big twenty-five cent vocabulary words!"

She said, "No, I thought I was better than you even before I started using big twenty-five cent vocabulary words!"

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See what I mean? Smarty pants. I can hardly wait until she's a teenager.

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And honestly, I have no idea where she learned to be so sarcastic... no idea at all...

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Seriously Funny Stuff and a Haunted Ship

We interrupt today's regularly-scheduled program to bring you this special announcement:

I was clicking around the internet this morning and found this (reminiscent of a Seinfeld episode) via a link from today's post from Ramblings of a Green Yogurt (an excellent blogger in her own right). I love this new discovery. This guy, Simon Metz, is seriously funny, rivaling even the famous, award-winning blogger from West Chester, Dr. Zibbs for laugh-out-loud hilarity, although in a slightly different sort of way.

If you haven't already discovered Mr. Metz, you should go there right now and read a few of his posts.

Go ahead, I'll wait.

. . . . .

Oh, good, you came back! I was a little afraid you'd abandon me entirely once you found him.

Now for our previously scheduled program:

A few family vacations ago, after spending a couple of weeks at the beach in California, we decided to add a couple of extra days to our planned itinerary and we booked a room on the Queen Mary in Long Beach, California.

As you may (or may not) know, the Queen Mary is an old cruise ship, a steamer, that was converted to military use during WWII, and was used to transport troops. After WWII, she was put back into service as a luxury cruise ship, even carrying the Queen Mother in 1954.

In her time, she was one of the fastest ships around, which was why she was such a great choice for transporting troops -- her speed kept them safe from potential attackers. She held records for "fastest Atlantic crossing" for many years, up to the 1960's, shortly before she was decommissioned as a cruise ship. She was longer than the Titanic. Heavier, too. And apparently sturdier, as she lasted for over 1000 trans-Atlantic voyages, while the Titanic sank during its maiden voyage. (Then again, the Queen Mary didn't run into any icebergs as far as I know, so there's no way to know whether she would have survived such an encounter.)

In 1967, however, her cruising days ended and she was sold to the City of Long Beach, California, for $3.45 million. In December that year, she made her last ocean voyage, to Long Beach -- and has been docked there ever since.

The City of Long Beach runs the Queen Mary as a tourist attraction. You can book a room there, much as you would at a hotel, and enjoy the luxurious accommodations of an early to mid-twentieth century cruise liner. The plumbing was quaint, but functional. The furniture was sturdy and old (vintage, I guess you'd say). It was fun to walk around the ship and see the historical displays and read about the ship's history. The kids enjoyed it, we enjoyed it -- all in all, it was good family fun.

Quick side note for those of you familiar with the Queen Mary / Spruce Goose combo tickets they used to sell in the '80's: The Spruce Goose (originally built by Howard Hughes, as outlined in the 2004 movie The Aviator, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, who also starred in the 1997 film Titanic) has been moved to Oregon.

Sadly, while the Queen Mary was serving as a troop transport ship during WWII, she was involved in an accident in which she accidentally ran over one of her escort ships, slicing it in two, and causing the death by drowning of (I believe) all 300 soldiers on board the smaller vessel as well as some folks on board the main ship. The Queen Mary was damaged, too, but was later repaired. Because of this incident, they claim, the Queen Mary is haunted.

For a small admission fee, you can take the "Ghosts and Legends" tour, during which they promise you will learn about (and maybe see) the ghosts aboard the ship. They have a sign posted warning that people who have high blood pressure, heart conditions, or who are pregnant may want to avoid this tour. My husband read the sign and cheerfully said, "Woo hoo! This'll scare the baby out of a pregnant lady! Sign me up!!"


So we bought our tickets, waited a short while in line, and began our tour -- complete with creepy tour guide escorts who stare grimly and refuse to speak.

Did I mention that the City of Long Beach runs the Queen Mary as a tourist attraction? Because this tour was all cheesy tourist kitsch, bad video and flashing lights, melodramatic sound effects, and things that suddenly go "boo" -- rather like the fake haunted houses that spring up like pumpkin vines every year around Halloween.

You start the tour in a room where you watch a video (a little like the "Twilight Zone" video at the beginning of the haunted hotel ride at Disneyland) that tells you the history of the crash and the hauntings. It was actually an interesting video, with good historical information. It did set the scene well, too -- after the video I was ready to be scared. Then it's down to the bowels of the ship to see the ghosts. They take you past the first class pool, and through the boiler room, and past some bunks, showing you "ghosts" along the way. They tell you about a boiler room accident that caused some deaths and then, predictably, the lights dim and the pipes start shaking and you hear noises like water hissing and boiling, and the tour guide warns that the pipes might burst -- it is almost funny, it's so cheesy, and indeed I heard a couple of people chuckling.

Truly, I think people with heart problems, high blood pressure, and pregnancy would probably have been just fine... But my little guy, who at the time was 3 years old, was actually scared by it all. Halfway through, he demanded that I carry him. He buried his head on my shoulder every time the lights went down or started flashing. He hugged tight around my neck every time strange noises were heard. He repeated, over and over, "I'm scared mommy." "Can we leave now?" I almost felt bad for bringing him along. I hugged him back, and reassured him we would be fine, and that daddy and I would keep him safe.

At the end of the tour, they tell you about the repairs that were made -- or perhaps not made very well -- to the Queen Mary after the incident in which she ran over the escort ship. The walls then shake a bit, and water sprays into the room, and you are told to evacuate quickly! So you all pile into the elevator for the trip back up to the exit room. The tour guide congratulates you on an orderly evacuation.

The lights came on in the elevator. Everyone was standing there, sort of crammed in, smirking at each other and not saying much. Then my little guy pipes up loudly with, "I've seen monsters on Scooby Doo before, and they weren't this scary!!"

So maybe the tour would scare the baby out of a pregnant woman, after all...

Rattlesnake Bridge

My awesome Dad and Stepmom brought my 7 year old nephew - my (step)sister's kid - to visit us recently. My nephew had read about a "Rattlesnake Bridge" in Tucson, Arizona. He had seen photos of it in his "Highlights" magazine, and wanted to see it in person. He had told his whole class he was going to visit Arizona, and that he was hoping to see this Rattlesnake Bridge. Since it's only a few hours from where we live, I agreed to drive him (and my Dad and Stepmom, along with my two kids) to Tucson to see the world-famous Rattlesnake Bridge.

Last summer we visited the natural bridge at Tonto Creek near Payson, Arizona. It is a very cool bridge formed by water eroding the rock and dirt through the mountains in Northern Arizona. You can walk over the bridge, and then walk down a path and climb around on the huge rocks under the bridge by the creek. If you have not been there before, you should go. It is beautiful, and is a nice, but not too difficult, hike.

So, I was all excited for a nice but hopefully not too difficult hike with the kids & grandparents through the pretty mountains near Tucson, perhaps a picnic lunch near a mountain stream, some cool photo ops near the natural bridge....


We packed up some sandwiches, drinks, trail mix and other snacks. I got directions from MapQuest, and off we went. After a couple of hours, a near collision on the freeway, and a couple of missed turns while we looked for a place to park, we arrived at our destination.

Here is a photo of the head of the "Rattlesnake Bridge" in Tucson, Arizona.







You can see the snake's eye in this photo. You can also see that it is, in actuality, a pedestrian walkover bridge.

Here is a photo of the road below, from "inside" the snake's belly:

Here is a photo of the butt end of the bridge. At the very top, left side of the bridge in the photo below you can see the box that holds the sensor and speaker -- the sensor activates a recording of a rattlesnake "rattle" sound when you walk through it. Oooh, scary!








Here is a photo of the giant rattle at the end of the rattlesnake's tail, which sticks out of the ground on the "butt" end of the bridge:





I did not hear about it at the time, but there was apparently quite a bit of controversy when this bridge was built in Tucon, as there always is for any public art project. On the one hand, it is clearly much more awesome and more fun than a plain old rectangular shaped, fenced-in pedestrian bridge. (That fact alone is guaranteed to send some folks into a tizzy.) On the other hand, what exactly does it mean to walk in through the snake's mouth and walk out through its butt? Are we supposed to have been "eaten" by the snake and then excreted as snake feces? What does this say about the artist's understanding of human nature? About our place in this world? About our ultimate destiny?


The kids were not interested in pondering the bigger implications of humans as snake feces, however. All in all, this was very much like Chevy Chase's trip to the Grand Canyon, in the movie "Vacation." You drive for hours, then look at it and say, "yup, there it is," and then get back in the car....

We decided that as long as we were in Tucson, we should go see some other area attractions. So we checked out the Pima Air and Space Museum. It has an airplane that held the record for "world's smallest actual working airplane," or something like that. The plane was about 3 feet tall and maybe 3 feet long, painted yellow and black, and named the "Bumble Bee." It had room for one smallish person to fit inside it, and it claimed to actually have been flown.


The Pima Air and Space Museum also has a huge yard filled with all sorts of historical aircraft, including the actual Air Force One plane used by Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. Very cool. Here is a photo of the very old and now retired Air Force One:







The Pima Air and Space Museum is near the "boneyard" where hundreds, perhaps thousands, of old, no-longer-used airplanes -- both civilian and military -- are parked in the middle of the Arizona desert near Tucson. It is amazing to see so many old military airplanes just parked out there in plain view. Makes you wonder whether they are real, or are just decoys designed to fool our enemies when they look at their satellite photos of these "military" aircraft. Surely there must be satellites floating up there, photographing every little detail of these old aircraft.


We also visited "Old Tucson Studios," which has been the site for filming many movies, as well as parts of the old "Little House on the Prairie" tv show. It burned a few years ago and has been rebuilt. By the time we got there, it was about to close for the day so we didn't get to see all of it, but we did get to watch a genuine re-enactment of an old-time Western shootout and pan for a little "gold."


All in all, it was a great day. Much more exciting than those giant concrete dinosaurs we visited last summer in California.