Areas of Unrest

QOTD: "We can see California coming, and we're scared." - James Brady

Reading: just finished Paul Theroux's The Kingdom By the Sea

Listening to: a mix tape

Decluttering accomplishments: sorting out more books

10 August 2003 - Tired of Airplanes

Short coast to coast trips completely wear me out, as evidenced by my screwing up the date of last week's entry. This week's trip was two nights, which is slightly less stressful than last week's one-nighter. Except that I caught a cold on the way out, so the flight home was moderately miserable. It was helped a little by a cute movie. "Down With Love" is a pretty unremarkable romantic comedy, except that Ewan McGregor is wonderful eye candy. He even has a thin line of hair down his chest.

I was in California to hear of the latest people throwing their hats into the ring in this gubernatorial fiasco. Personally, I think recalls are appropriate only for gross misconduct, not mere incompetence. So I'm glad it's nothing to do with me. My mother did, however, suggest that my brother ought to run, as it's merely one more job he has no hope of getting.

I also did get down to Long Beach for storytelling, which was fun. There was a good turnout and it was pretty lively. And, of course, it's always nice to be spending an evening doing something other than just sitting around a hotel room. People who think business travel is so great forget that most of the time you're so exhausted after a day of meetings that you just want to sit around and watch TV or read, so you rarely see much of the place you're visiting.

I'll also note that LAX continues to be a completely irritating airport. United has brilliantly moved their Premier area to Terminal 6, which would be okay except for that terminal having particularly screwed up security screening. There's a special, shorter line for Premier, which you can't see when you go up the stairs, so many people end up waiting in the longer line needlessly. And this was a line that was too long to fit within the ropes they have set up. It's not quite as bad as Terminal 1, which often has a line that's backed up all the way to Terminal 2, but it's pretty pointless. On top of which, the screeners are needlessly rude. Screaming at people doesn't help them get laptops out of cases any faster, for example. At least it's a while before I have to go to L.A. again.

I'd hoped to do something interesting to write about this weekend, but I spent it with cough lozenges, tissues, and chicken soup. Sigh.