SAN DIEGO 2005
Wednesday, March 9 @ 5:04 AM
In keeping with growing tradition, I am documenting another trip with minute details, because someday they will surely be quaint, interesting, and humorous.
Nimsay gave me this journal as encouragement toward my dream of traveling Europe someday. I thought this would be a decent opening act, since vacations with Bri tend to be unusually eventful. We are flying on dirt-cheap fare (hence the dirt-cheap-level service) to San Diego to visit with Bri's old roommate Panda and her fianc� for four days. We've planned beach time, whale watching, the zoo, and possibly clubbing. (After we get back I'm going to sell my kidney on the black market to pay for this week.)
5:30 AM: The two women sitting behind us at the gate are talking in Spanglish about tacos (seriously, in-depth discussion of the cheese), and Bri and I are listening and being snarky under our breaths, because I am cranky over staying up all night so that we could pack, get breakfast, buy disposable cameras, and be at the airport at fricking 4:45 in the morning.
Note to self: Kill Bri later for booking a 6 AM flight.
7:13 AM: I insisted on the window seat, as recompense for the pre-dawn liftoff, and while she filled her side of the journal with "pout mope whine" about it (punctuated with stars and smiley faces), I have decided (from my window seat) that babies should always be drugged before getting on airplanes. And I can't find my tray table.
8:20 AM: I don't know why she whined about the window seat, she slept the whole way, due to Dramamine. I drank my free soda sans tray table, watched the sunrise, and wanted to hop out and bounce around on the whipped-potato clouds below us.
10:05 AM: Ha. I have decoded the location of super-secret foldy tray tables. Just in time to fold it back up for landing.
10:02 (8:02 Pacific Time) PM: The zoo is HUGE. Five hours, and we still didn't see everything. Once home, there was an attempt at thesis-writing, then tacos for dinner and a plan to play board games until I all but fell asleep headfirst in the oatmeal-and-chocolate-chip cookies. I decided that perhaps I should get some sleep, so that the heroin-chic circles under my eyes will fade somewhat.
Thursday, March 10: 8:03 AM
Woke up at 7:30. Oy. Nothing like 12 hours of sleep to restore my naturally bouncy demeanor. Today we're helping Panda shop for a wedding dress in ritzy ritzy San Diego shops, then writing down designers and searching for the dresses on E-bay.
6:40 PM:
Panda's favorite costs $1200. So not going to be afforable. Waiting on pizza. We bought $3 flip-flops, since no one has beach shoes, and decorated them to go with our swimsuits. Mine have little jewels along the sides with purple and green foam butterflies.
Friday, March 11, 8 PM:
Bri was vilely sick during whale watching. Panda, her fianc� and I took pictures of the whales, drank cocoa, Bri and I shared a muffin and some gummi bears. A kind passenger offered Bri some dramamine, and she perked up just in time to return to shore. Then we went to see the seals who usurped a wealthy portion of La Jolla beach.
The seals managed to enchant hundreds by merely lying there, and occasionally whomping on their bellies to a more comfy spot for yet more lying around.
We managed to ruin our beach couture (complete with artsy personalized flip-flops) within seconds when we went wading in the water. I collected clam shells for souvenirs. The water wasn't that cold, maybe 45 degrees; people who complain about the Pacific are wimps.
We opted not to go out to dinner with soaking wet cuffs and sandy toes, so drove to check out Coronado Island, then went home, ordered Chinese, and played Scrabble. Panda and I managed to iron out a lot of details for the wedding music, which I'm providing.
Oh, Chinese is here.
Saturday, March 12, 2:00 (PST)
This has been a very nice, relatively low-key vacation. I liked evenings in and cheap fun with goofy people. I also enjoyed taking a touristy number of photos (3 disposable cameras worth), something which irritated Panda's fianc�, who grew up in a family of brothers, and perhaps is just unused to sharing his home with so much estrogen.
7:00 PM CST (middle of layover)
People are very aggravated in airports. Someone actually came over to the luggage cart designed to take disabled people from one end of the airport to the other, tried to shove Bri over, and squeeze on so that he could get to his flight, which he said left in two minutes. As the seats on the cart accommodate a maximum of 2 people, and we also had our luggage with us, bringing him along was rather impossible, something that he irately just could not accept. We advised him that walking would probably be faster, since we moved at the speed of a sleepy snail. He took off marching, and beat us there.
8:30 PM CST:
Now we've decided to make the entire last leg of the flight an Accent Flight. The Accent du jour is British, so Bri and I have spent every minute from boarding to departing talking in completely nonchalant Britspeak. People keep trying to stare surreptitiously. The man who drove our luggage cart asked if we'd come in from London. He's so convinced that now I'm lying awkwardly. Perhaps should rethink this idea in future.
Four days, five thesis pages, and $400 later, I am home. Back to normal.
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