A'ight, kiddies, so it’s been over a month since my last post, so I’m thinking I’m MORE than due for about 50 updates in the next few days. And I’m a-be honest with you, comrades, because honesty is the foundation of a good relationship, I really don’t know what exactly I should write about as there’s approximately an infinite amount of things that should be blogged about. Whoa, wait a minute. My phone’s ringing. Hold up. *answers phone* *returns* Ok, looks like I’ve got myself a stay of figuring out my topic here as I’m a-go be a nerd for a bit and rock some Halo with my bros. *wipes sweat off brow* Whew, dodged that bullet. Y’all know how I am about commitment. I just need some time, my friends :-) Anyways, I’ll continue this later. Not that you’ll really be affected by this as it’s all going to get posted together at the same time, and the only person who reads this thing is my sis, but whatevs, you guys know what I’m talking about. Paz afuera for now.Ok, so it’s several days later, and I’m back. Still not fully sure what I’m going to write about. Heck, yeah, I’m going to write about the flight back home. So yep, I’m basically just going to skip over the last month or so. Weak sauce, I know. Entonces, I’m a-drop a brief synopsis of said time. Just hit the highlights, if you will.
November 25: Lauren’s birthday and the talent show. HOLY FRIGGIN’ CRAP!!! Besides the bullfight, defs the best day in Spain. I’ll see if I can get the vid of our sick dance from said talent show up here. Hm... turns out I can't after a brief attempt. Just go to my facebook, check the videos of me, and then rock the talent show one. Or just go here (assuming you have facebook and are a friend of mine): http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=116507819#/video/video.php?v=710501661935&subj=1278120053November 27: Celebration of Lauren’s, Keiko’s, and Satomi’s birthdays. Tight.
November 28-30: Portugal. Sweet trip with the vast majority of my favorite peeps. Lisbon = the most beautiful city in the world.
December 3: Gospel presentation in lit class. Awesomeness that in no way can be contained in a can!
December 5: Granada, kiddies! Reppin’ it up at the Alhambra and such. The stars align and we somehow manage to get there and back by literally taking the LAST spots on the buses. Craziness.
December 8: Danika’s birthday. Heck. Yes!
December 1-14: Fully and completely forgo sleep in the most absurd manner I’ve ever done. Spend most of these nights up mad-late with the ridiculously awesome Laura. Yay!
December 11-13: Christmas shop and do up the last few nights in Spain. Enebro, O’briens, dance clubs, chill-age. Greatness.
December 14: Get the heck up out of Spain, son!
Dag-nab, I REALLY want to write about each of these little journeys, but in the interest of time and not embarrassing my drunken peeps, I’ll keep it on the DL. But there’s no way that I can just start at the flight and leave everything else as is. Ergo, I’m going to write a bit about the previous night and the graduation ceremony thingy a bit. Oh, and just so you know, I’m typing this on the family desktop because I can’t get an internet connection at home with my laptop. Thus, my picture library is severely limited (yeah, I have almost all the pics I put up here saved on my laptop), so we’ll see what I can do here… Anyways, let’s take a look at December 13, 2008 at the graduation ceremony for a bit.
I walked up out of my room and down the steps toward the lobby at approximately exactly 7:58 to meet up with the chums for the graduation ceremony. As I rounded the last curve in my downward descent, I was greeted by basically EVERYBODY in the program. Tight. Problem, though. Said EVERYBODY was dressed up. Nicely. All looking very studly. I looked down at my Batman shirt and wet jeans (it had been raining all day and I’d spent the majority of it outside) and instantly felt inadequate and out of place. Fracaso on my part. Well, let me take that back. Inadequate, no; I’m the man, let’s be honest here :-) But yeah, out of place. The girls were all makeup’ed up and the guys were rocking nice dress shirts and the like. Somehow Batman didn’t seem like quite the appropriate attire. But whatevs, right? It’s all hood.
Oh snap! Tangent time! Speaking of “hood,” that reminds me of some stuff that’s gots to be dropped here. So sometime in October (I imagine, perhaps really early November) I was eating breakfast with the peeps and having a little conversation about the concept of hood. It occurred to Laura and I at this meal that we had no idea how to say this word in Spanish. Such things had to be rectified. Thankfully, the loveable character that is Marisol heard our convo from a different table and decided to help us out… or so we think… The following is my recollection of it (please excuse the lack of accents and such throughout this post as this desktop computer has a wicked old and sucky version of Word):Aaron: Como se dice, “hood” en espanol?
Marisol: Casucha
Aaron: Como?
Marisol: Casucha
Aaron: Cabucha?
Marisol: Casucha
Aaron: Come se escribe?
Marisol: C-A-S-U-C-H-A
Aaron: Ah, “casucha,” gracias!
Marisol: Casucha
Aaron: Como?
Marisol: Casucha
Aaron: Cabucha?
Marisol: Casucha
Aaron: Come se escribe?
Marisol: C-A-S-U-C-H-A
Aaron: Ah, “casucha,” gracias!
Thus, “casucha” was added into mine and Laura’s Ganglish (yeah, not Spanglish, but rather Ganglish, kiddies) repertoire. We used this word up until early December when I saw my linguistics teacher use this word in a context that made absolutely no sense to me at all given my understanding of it. I reported this knowledge to Laura shortly thereafter. Obviously, this left us both baffled, so I decided to look up the word for “hood” on my favorite translation website. Hm… “capucha.” Interesting developments. Knowing that, I then had to check out what “casucha” actually meant. Now wait for this, my friends. This is really something right here. The word “casucha” translates to “dump.” As in like a house or something similar that is to be described as such. Whoa, espera. You’re saying that for maybe as much as two months, Laura and I went around not saying that, “It’s all hood,” but instead saying, “It’s all dump”?! Are you kidding me?! Holy crap, chalk one up for the two idiot, blonde, Americans trying to speak Spanish and be gangsta. Good gravy, I hope no legitimate Spaniards heard us say that. Apparently, it turns out that I’m deaf as well, as I’m sure Marisol told us the correct word for “hood” as well. Either that, or she’s some sort of evil genius who completely and fully owned Laura and I. In which case, props to her. But dang.
Moving on, so we filed into the theater kind of area place who’s name I forget in order to do up the ceremony. It opened with a little speech given by the program directors about the semester and how awesome we were (well, probably not so much about how awesome we were given as how about halfway through the semester we were called out as being the WORST group ever in terms of amount of Spanish spoken. Not going to lie, I’m kind of proud of that). One thing I did notice, though, was that Rosa Almoguera (one of the directors) speaks pretty weak Spanish. I mean, it’s not her native language, but dang, it wasn’t very good at all. Like, her grammar, conjugation, and everything were spot-on, but she was very slow in her speech, and not in a deliberate dumbing it down way done for us stupid kids. Like, it was actually just really slow. It seemed like she had to translate from English to Spanish in her head before she could speak. Anyways, that’s irrelevant but something that was interesting to me.
Moving on, so we filed into the theater kind of area place who’s name I forget in order to do up the ceremony. It opened with a little speech given by the program directors about the semester and how awesome we were (well, probably not so much about how awesome we were given as how about halfway through the semester we were called out as being the WORST group ever in terms of amount of Spanish spoken. Not going to lie, I’m kind of proud of that). One thing I did notice, though, was that Rosa Almoguera (one of the directors) speaks pretty weak Spanish. I mean, it’s not her native language, but dang, it wasn’t very good at all. Like, her grammar, conjugation, and everything were spot-on, but she was very slow in her speech, and not in a deliberate dumbing it down way done for us stupid kids. Like, it was actually just really slow. It seemed like she had to translate from English to Spanish in her head before she could speak. Anyways, that’s irrelevant but something that was interesting to me.So after these little talks and a fun little slide show of the semester, we jumped right into the graduation deal. So here’s how that went down. Rosa was flanked by a total of like six or so teachers/people of authority (three per side) who acted as her bizzles while she read off each students name from their respective diplomas. After she read the name, she passed the diploma to one of her flanks. As your name was called, you were to get up, walk down to the front, and receive said piece of paper from whomever controlled it. Upon snatching of this absurdly unofficial document, you either shake the hand of or do the double Spanish cheek-cheek kiss thing to whoever hands you the diploma (guy-guy handshakes, everything else = kiss-kiss). Pretty standard stuff, I’d say.
Things were going off without a hitch when my name was called. As was customary, I stood up and wandered my way down to the front. Of course, I flashed the “gangsta” sign on my way. Rosa had passed my diploma off to my Econ prof. Funsies. My least favorite teacher. Whatevs, it was all capucha (which is NOT to be confused with “casucha,” kiddies. Careful there, because if you do confuse said words, you’re going to look like a complete fool. Maybs not as a big of a fool as I’m about to look like in this story, though…).
Things were going off without a hitch when my name was called. As was customary, I stood up and wandered my way down to the front. Of course, I flashed the “gangsta” sign on my way. Rosa had passed my diploma off to my Econ prof. Funsies. My least favorite teacher. Whatevs, it was all capucha (which is NOT to be confused with “casucha,” kiddies. Careful there, because if you do confuse said words, you’re going to look like a complete fool. Maybs not as a big of a fool as I’m about to look like in this story, though…). *WARNING* Epic fail coming up.
I got down there, took the document in my left hand, and went in for the cheek-age… and promptly missed. Wait. What do you mean, you “miss[ed]?” you ask. Well, I mean that I went for the kiss and we both hit glasses and kind of struck air with the kiss. Yep, swing and miss. Twice, as it occurred again on the other side. Douche. Being the smooth person that I am, though, I played it off as I looked back at the other students, tapped my glasses, and dropped some sort of stupid-looking, joking facial expression. As I walked back, I pulled on the collar of my Batman shirt (yep, double tool) in an attempt to make a some sort of chiste out of the whole thing. Friggin’ smooth as butter… assuming that the butter was in fact, sand paper.
In my defense, though, this girl is literally like (yep, “literally like”) five feet tall. Given my height of like 6’3” or so, there was a great distance between us, then couple that with each of our glasses, and the fact that she was probably shooting for my lips instead of my cheek for obvious reasons, and perhaps there’s some excuse there. Or maybe not. Either way, pretty weak, I guess. *sighs* I swear I’m better than that..
Anyways, so that was that. After it finished up, we rocked some dinner, headed out to O’brien’s for a bit, and returned not too long after. Then Danielle, Laura, and I finished out our last night together in Spain doing the only thing that made any sense considering how the semester had gone up to that point: we watched High School Musical. Tight.
I awoke the next morning off about 2 hours of sleep ready to get my self up out of Spain. Repped up a quick shower, ate FOUR donuts and a couple of those little cookie packs that I’d been jacking from the dining hall since the beginning of the year, grabbed my bags, and headed down to the lobby to walk it out. I then headed over to the receptionist desk to give back my keys and to prove just how much Spanish I’d learned over the last 100 days. The dude asked me what room number I was (in Spanish mind you), and I responded with a solid “twenty-nine.” Yep, 100 friggin’ days in Spain, and apparently I still don’t know my numbers, nor am I capable of having a rudimentary conversation in said language. Wow. Impressive. Awesomely enough, though, after turning in my keys, I was given a sandwich and a little juice box for the journey. Sweetness on a boat!I quickly found out that there was a truck waiting for our bags at the end of the street leading up to the Fund. Nice. Unfortunately, the bags had to be lugged up about seven or so steps leading out of the building and then like another six (maybe five) long, mini steps (if that makes any sense) down the street. I later found out that my bag weighed 51.7 pounds (assuming my metric conversion of 23.5kg holds up). But still, this bag wasn’t really the problem. It was the other ten or so bags of other people that I dragged up the stairs and down the street. Most fun of which was the haul with Laura’s bags. Took both at the same time. Both weighed in at over seventy pounds each. Combine that with lifting the bags up into the truck, and I’d already gotten my workout in for the door by like 6:30. Not to mention that this whole process gave me the idea for my current lifting program that I’m rocking these days. Dinero: conozca el banco (money: meet the bank).
So after we got all the bags finally loaded into the truck, we started our pilgrimage to the buses to get the heck up out of Toledo. It was at this point that I remembered that I didn’t have my passport. Smurf! I sat in the bus talking to the ever-so-awesome Jenn as I pondered this situation. I knew where it almost certainly was located within my bag, so I didn’t think it’d be too much of a thang to procure, except for the fact that my bag was packed to the rafters, and might be an issue to close again. I didn’t have too much time to think, though, as some dude told us to unload our bags from the truck (which had been driven to where the buses were stationed) and into these autobuses of which I write. Again, I shouldered the load and brought these maletas and such down to street level for all the peeps. Sometimes it’s hard to be such a strong, strapping stud (wicked alliteration, no?) :PI set my bag off to the side, though, so I could snag mi pasaporte up outta dere (dair? What I’m trying to get at here is the hood version of “there”…). Turns out that was a miniscule problem at best as within 52 seconds of sleuthing, I had the documentation in my hands with the bag closed up and was literally ready to fly. I then headed my way back onto the bus to play the waiting the game. Several people that morning were complaining of hangovers and feeling like they needed to expel from the previous night’s festivities. Lana, especially, was feeling bad. Not so much because she was super-hungover, but because she just has motion issues in general… Even though at this point we weren’t even moving yet… The always clever Tom turned to me at this point and told me that if anyone ever asks me again why I don’t drink that I should just cite this situation. Good call, sir, good call. I did my best to tune it all out, though, as I’d planned today to be for sleeping.
Turns out the bus ride was pretty successful in that respect as I eventually lost consciousness on the ride. And apparently was REALLY out as I had no idea that Lana actually THREW UP in a bag of some sort not more than ten feet from me. That’s comforting to know. That someone can be legitimately sick, puke, and possibly be in need of help not more than two body lengths from me while in a confined area and I could just sleep through it /sarcasm.
I woke up to the glorious sight of the Madrid airport. Heck yes! Of course at this point, I was more concerned as to the whereabouts of my sandwich and juice than leaving the country. I wanted to be sure to pound those down before I got to security just in case they decided that I was carrying C4 and some sort of liquid explosive with me. I searched around my seat for this sustenance for a solid some amount of seconds before I realized that I had actually been sitting on it. Nice. As much as it killed me to do, I figured throwing out the sandwich was the best way to go after that. Not that I was overly concerned about the high probability that I farted on it whilst asleep, but the sandwich itself looked a bit sketchy to me upon closer examination. And not going to lie, after eating four donuts (and two the previous night right before bed - yay my heart!) I was a little concerned about raising the “I need to take a dump” quotient before flying all day. Entonces, I tossed the sandwich. I did, however, pound down the juice box. And if this liquid drink was any indication of the sandwich’s level of safety, I made the right choice in throwing it out.
Here’s where the goodbyes were to start. Sadsies. The Notre Dame peeps were all on a different flight as were the Japanese kids and most of the Puerto Ricans. Thus, that had to go down. I was hugging just about everybody that I knew wasn’t coming with me to Philly when I realized that I had no idea where my roommate Luis was. I asked the other Luis, and the good man pointed me back inside the bus. So I quickly subired it to peace out to him.
Here’s where the goodbyes were to start. Sadsies. The Notre Dame peeps were all on a different flight as were the Japanese kids and most of the Puerto Ricans. Thus, that had to go down. I was hugging just about everybody that I knew wasn’t coming with me to Philly when I realized that I had no idea where my roommate Luis was. I asked the other Luis, and the good man pointed me back inside the bus. So I quickly subired it to peace out to him.*FLASHBACK*
T’was Thursday, December 11and a bunch of us had gone out to chill. I was talking to Ashley at the time (who may or may not have been inebriated - I’m not at liberty to say), and somehow we got to talking about my roommate Luis and how he’s a shy guy. It was at this point that she told me that he was actually scared of me. Obviously, this was baffling to me. Granted, he and I never hung out or anything, but I genuinely liked the kid and had always thought that we were chill. I probed further into this situation, and she told me that I talk in my sleep. Now this wasn’t news to me as I was already well aware of that, but the next thing she said was mind-blowing. She told me that I make fun of him while sleeping. AND that I tell him to “[Smurf] off!” and such. WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!?! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!?!?!?!?!?! I can’t imagine doing that, and my head seriously exploded upon my hearing of it.
Now flashforward within this flashback to the next day. I had just gotten back to my room after having done some Christmas shopping and was greeted by Luis. Here’s how our convo went down:
T’was Thursday, December 11and a bunch of us had gone out to chill. I was talking to Ashley at the time (who may or may not have been inebriated - I’m not at liberty to say), and somehow we got to talking about my roommate Luis and how he’s a shy guy. It was at this point that she told me that he was actually scared of me. Obviously, this was baffling to me. Granted, he and I never hung out or anything, but I genuinely liked the kid and had always thought that we were chill. I probed further into this situation, and she told me that I talk in my sleep. Now this wasn’t news to me as I was already well aware of that, but the next thing she said was mind-blowing. She told me that I make fun of him while sleeping. AND that I tell him to “[Smurf] off!” and such. WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!?! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!?!?!?!?!?! I can’t imagine doing that, and my head seriously exploded upon my hearing of it.
Now flashforward within this flashback to the next day. I had just gotten back to my room after having done some Christmas shopping and was greeted by Luis. Here’s how our convo went down: Aaron: Hola
Luis: Hola. Alguien te llamo.
Aaron: Quien?
Luis: No se, una muchacha.
Aaron: Una muchacha?
Luis: Si.
Aaron: Esta bien. Gracias [11 second pause] Pregunta.
Luis: Que?
Aaron: Hablo cuando yo duermo?
Luis: Quien te dijo?
Aaron: Ashely me dijo anoche. Que digo?
Luis: Me insultas
Aaron: Si?!?!
Luis: Si, en ingles y espanol
Aaron: Lo siento. You know we’re cool, right (beautiful Spanish)?
Luis: Esta bien.
Aaron: Si?
Luis: Si
Aaron: …Como es mi espanol cuando estoy durmiendo?
Luis: Mejor.
Aaron: Es mejor que ahora?
Luis: [laughing] Si!
Aaron: Que bueno.
Luis: Hola. Alguien te llamo.
Aaron: Quien?
Luis: No se, una muchacha.
Aaron: Una muchacha?
Luis: Si.
Aaron: Esta bien. Gracias [11 second pause] Pregunta.
Luis: Que?
Aaron: Hablo cuando yo duermo?
Luis: Quien te dijo?
Aaron: Ashely me dijo anoche. Que digo?
Luis: Me insultas
Aaron: Si?!?!
Luis: Si, en ingles y espanol
Aaron: Lo siento. You know we’re cool, right (beautiful Spanish)?
Luis: Esta bien.
Aaron: Si?
Luis: Si
Aaron: …Como es mi espanol cuando estoy durmiendo?
Luis: Mejor.
Aaron: Es mejor que ahora?
Luis: [laughing] Si!
Aaron: Que bueno.
A’ight, so that’s the convo as I recall. The short of it is that I actually DID insult him in my sleep, in both English AND Spanish. And my Spanish is apparently substantially better in my sleep. Fan-friggin’-tastic. Given all this, it’s no wonder that we didn’t become really good friends this past semester. Although to be fair, when I introduced myself to him at the beginning of the semester I shook his hand and told him my name (in Spanish) and he just walked away in silence. So yeah… maybe it just wasn’t meant to be. Nonetheless, I wish I would’ve known this, you know, more than 13 seconds before the end of the term. Still, though, on Saturday (the day after this convo with him took place) he asked to take a roommate picture with me and such, and everything seemed chill. 
Anyways, I still had to say goodbye to the kid. So I ran into the bus to do such a thing. I slid past some people en route to his spot in the back.
Anyways, I still had to say goodbye to the kid. So I ran into the bus to do such a thing. I slid past some people en route to his spot in the back.Aaron: Luis!
Luis: [stands up]
Aaron: Gracias, buen semestre. [we hug]
Luis: Si, [laughs and seems in good spirits] [says something that I forget]
Aaron: Hasta luego, tio
Luis: [laughs and probably says “bye” as that was his traditional leaving salutation when in a good mood]
Aaron: [heads back out of the bus]
Luis: [stands up]
Aaron: Gracias, buen semestre. [we hug]
Luis: Si, [laughs and seems in good spirits] [says something that I forget]
Aaron: Hasta luego, tio
Luis: [laughs and probably says “bye” as that was his traditional leaving salutation when in a good mood]
Aaron: [heads back out of the bus]
Another tangent, the word “tio” in Spanish translates to “dude” in colloquial terms, but in literal terms, it means “uncle.” Thus, I’d never used to for anybody prior to this moment because calling someone “uncle” just seemed stupid to me. I mean, seriously, what? But apparently I’d been wanting to do so for sometime subconsciously, and I decided that this was the time to do it. Weird. But either way, it appears as if Luis and I ended on a positive note. He very recently had his birthday too, so I posted on his facebook wall, and he responded with something nice, so everything’s seemingly money, so yay for that! 
Anyways, back to the matter at hand. It was at this point that the waiting game commenced. I said some more sad goodbyes to many a person and then found myself a spot in line to go through baggage check. After about forever, I finally got up to the front of said line and began the stupid process of actually checking a bag. I was greeted by a short-statured Spanish man decked out in a suit that was about a size too small who a fair grasp on the English language. Although, his impressive bilingual-ness was nullified by his high-pitched Mike Tyson-esque accent. As such, all respect for him went out the proverbial ventana. Point is with this story, is that there is no point. I’m just explaining the setting of my story for to give my reader, Amy, a better and more accurate perspective into my world. Son.
So where I’m going with this is that the questions that we’re asked while having a bag checked are completely ridiculous. Now I know everyone gets these same questions and knows exactly what I’m talking about, but hey, let’s delve into them anyway in an orderly fashion complete with my responses and the optimum ones as well.
Anyways, back to the matter at hand. It was at this point that the waiting game commenced. I said some more sad goodbyes to many a person and then found myself a spot in line to go through baggage check. After about forever, I finally got up to the front of said line and began the stupid process of actually checking a bag. I was greeted by a short-statured Spanish man decked out in a suit that was about a size too small who a fair grasp on the English language. Although, his impressive bilingual-ness was nullified by his high-pitched Mike Tyson-esque accent. As such, all respect for him went out the proverbial ventana. Point is with this story, is that there is no point. I’m just explaining the setting of my story for to give my reader, Amy, a better and more accurate perspective into my world. Son.So where I’m going with this is that the questions that we’re asked while having a bag checked are completely ridiculous. Now I know everyone gets these same questions and knows exactly what I’m talking about, but hey, let’s delve into them anyway in an orderly fashion complete with my responses and the optimum ones as well.Question: “Did you pack your own bag?”
My Answer: “Yes, sir.”
Ideal Answer: “No, I had an Pakistani guy named Abdullah Jihad the Terrorist do so for me in exchange for the blueprints to the White House, you tool!”
My Answer: “Yes, sir.”
Ideal Answer: “No, I had an Pakistani guy named Abdullah Jihad the Terrorist do so for me in exchange for the blueprints to the White House, you tool!”
Question: “Do you know what’s in your bag?”My Answer: “Yes, sir.”
Ideal Answer: “Nope. I decided to blindfold myself and put on several pairs of mittens while I stumbled around taking random things the house of my neighbor Adolf Hitler. Odds are good that there’s several vials of small pox, some dinosaur DNA, and a copy of Twilight in there.”
*note* I've never read Twilight, just so you know :-)Question: “Do you have any electrical devices in your bag?”
My Answer: “Yes, sir, I have an electric shaver and a broken alarm clock.”
Ideal Answer: “Well, good sir, I’d love to tell you about the electrical device in my bag, but I think having you experience it at all its variable speeds would do more justice for you.”
Question: “Do you have anything that could be used as a weapon in your bag?”
My Answer: “Yes, sir, I have a dagger that I bought as a Christmas present.”
Ideal Answer: “If I were you, I’d be far more concerned with what’s strapped to my chest right now than what’s in my bag.”
So yeah, that’s what it do with that. Such stupid questions. But after working through this little obstacle, I was told to go talk to someone at the actual baggage check thingy. I headed over to some genial-looking woman to drop off my maleta. After making brief small talk, I placed this maleta of which I write on the weighing station item. 23.5kg. Nice. That’s 51.7 pounds. 1.7 pounds over the limit. In theory, I should’ve had to pay some fee, but apparently I either charmed the frigg out of the girl (very possible) or she just hates her job and didn’t feel like charging me anything (more possible). Either way, money. Literally.
Of course, after this was done, I talked to Erik and realized that I hadn’t been given a baggage receipt so I went back through the line backwards in order to procure one. Mistake. That turned everyone toward me. I’m sure I was seconds of away from being shot right there. Apparently it turns out the woman at the check point, unbeknownst to me, had stuck it to my boarding pass. Smooth. Almost got me killed. Well, not really, but you know what I’m talking about.
After this, the whole lot of us on the flight to Philly went through to security to get our carry-on bags and everything checked. More fun. At least they didn’t make us take of our shoes or anything like in the states. And because I’m such a rebel, I left my belt on. Yeah, I did. Take that airport security. Well… ok, I just forgot to take it off, but nonetheless I made it through that without any problem and continued on my way. Granted, my way involved just sitting around for a few hours in the airport with the peeps. I did eat a sweet sandwich, though, that’s for sure. Kind of makes everything worth it, I’d say.
So we spent the next forever just basically sitting around. A couple of times I got up and wandered around for some random purpose. I procured for myself a pretty legit sandwich as well during this time. But for the most part, we all just chilled. Which, not gonna lie, was quite awesome because I’m kind of missing some of those peeps right now as I sit here back in frigid, snowy Minnesota. But we’ll save the emotional stuff for later.
I was pretty psyched about the concept of actually being able to see stuff on my journey back to the states as I hadn’t been able to see jack-shiz from my seats on my flights to Spain. I was quite excited specifically for to view the Atlantic. And I must say that it turns out that I wasn’t disappointed with what I saw. It was really cool to get a prolonged vision of the Spain countryside as well. The amount of snow I saw was quite surprising too. I mean, we were flying over mountains and such for a bit, but it still threw me because yeah, not so much on the snow in Toledo. And just going to throw this out there, the Atlantic = beautiful. Granted, it’s just blue and such, but there’s way more to it that’s hard to describe. It’s just an amazingly vast sight. It’s stuff like that that really just strengthens my faith. How could all that be an accident? Gorgeous.
Beyond the sweet view, though, I definitely took a lot of looks around me. I’m a bit of a big people watcher. I love ‘em, not going to lie, and they’re just so interesting. I didn’t speak at all to the dude sitting next to me, but he seemed like a nice enough fellow. I snuck a peak at the boarding pass he pulled out and he was heading over to LA for some reason. Good to for him. There was a couple stationed immediately in front of me as well; the man quite interested me as he was reading some sort of ridiculously intellectual piece of literature encased within a binder. Something about time, intervals, thresholds, and such. Some complex appearing equations and derivatives made themselves known as well on the pages. I tried to read it over his shoulder, but his head was always somewhat in the way (not that I could’ve anywhere nearly understood the writings fully). Seemed like pretty legit stuff. My favorite group of people, though, by far was the family sitting two rows in front of me: a father, mother, and a small child of some sort. Both parents looked like lumberjacks all decked out in their wranglers, belt buckles, and flannel. The kid from what I could tell, was pretty much adorable. The flight attendants were basically loving the young-in and trying to be all cute with it and make it at ease. The whole family just seemed like an extremely happy and personable clan of blood relatives.
I wasn’t fortunate enough to sit anywhere near anybody that I actually knew, so obviously I had to gander around at all my peeps from time to time to see how they were all doing with the whole infinity hour flight. The two people who stuck out to me most were Tom and Laura. Both were completely different in their mannerisms. Tom appeared like he wanted nothing more than some sleep, but was sadly being thwarted in his efforts. As a result, he just looked pissed off in his always cool manner. Laura, on the other hand, (when she wasn’t sleeping or reading) was seemingly completely enthralled by the movies that were playing in her cute little way. I swear I’m not a creeper like that, but you gots to find things to do, ya feel me?
Speaking of viewing stuff, as opposed to the flight to Madrid that had individual TV screens on the back of each seat so one could choose what they wanted to watch, this flight had just one large screen at the front of the plane. Again, though, because I’m a cheap bum, I chose not to buy the headphones. The first movie played was Mama Mia. Thankfully, I was asleep for most of that flick… I say that just to protect my manhood, which has apparently already been damaged in the eyes of many due to my love obsession with High School Musical, as I actually kind of have a desire to see that movie. That desire is quite contrary to the second movie that was shown, however. Journey to the Center of the Earth. I was unfortunate enough to have seen that garbage in the theaters this past summer and was in no hurry to see it ever again. I should’ve known that it was going to suck something fierce based on the fact that it was in 3D. That’s usually a pretty big indication that something’s trash if they have to try and cover it up with cliched and stupid visual effects. *coughStarWarsEpisodes1-3cough* I must say, though, that the movie was far more enjoyable to watch without sound. I didn’t have to stomach the hackneyed and ridiculous dialogue in what was surely the worst Brendan Fraser movie ever crafted ever in the history of ever. Ever. *shudders*
Fortunately enough, though, I was able to catch a bit of shuteye during the flight, and I have to say that at one point I was woken up in the coolest fashion that I’ve ever experienced in my life up to now. Now obviously, there’s a lot of horrible ways to be awoken and only a few good ones, but I can certainly say that this one was nothing short of fantastic. I awoke to someone (a flight attendant) handing me a sandwich. Ho. Ly. Crap! Phenomenal. AND it was a good sandwich! Dreams do come true, my friends, dreams do come true. On that note, I can certainly say that the food they served on this flight was quite superior to that on the way to Madrid. I had basically the same thing (chicken, salad of some sort, and such), but this was actually edible. Cool beans (pun). Hm… now that I think about it, this flight was tons better than the original. Noice.
Eventually, though, the flight mercifully ended. I mean, a 9 or so hour flight can’t really be that great no matter how you slice it. After circling the Philly runway for about 25 minutes, we finally landed and my feet touched American soil again. I felt just like the exasperated Robin Hood (played beautifully by Cary Elwes) in the hilarious major motion picture “Robin Hood: Men in Tights” after he swims home to England after escaping from prison. “Home! Home! England! Ahhh.” Replace “England” with “America” and you got yourself a pretty accurate picture of what I was thinking at that point. I didn’t go as far as to kiss the ground, though, because let’s be honest, Philadelphia? Yeah, not so much. Laura and I happily sauntered off away from the plane into the airport quoting another pertinent movie at this point in “Team America: World Police” by yelling “America! [Smurf] yeah! Coming again to save the mother [surfing] day yeah!” Good to be back.
We all made our way through customs to baggage claim seemingly in good spirits. After pretty much forever in actually getting our maletas, we headed back through the declaration zones. It was at this point that I more or less provided alcohol to a minor as I had to kind of took responsibility for the wine that Laura had bought as a gift for some of her peeps. Apparently, since she’s under 21, someone had go with her through the declaration jumble to ensure that she wouldn’t do something stupid with it, or something to that effect. I don’t really know, I’m not a doctor. All I really know is that it was a largely unofficial and pointless process. Point is, alcohol saved. Solid.
Again, we had to go through security and all that mess just for funsies. This time I decided/remembered to remove my belt, but as per usual, the whole thing went off without a hitch. After this, it was with great happiness that I turned on my connected cell phone for the first time in months. I was almost instantly greeted by a text message and a voicemail, both from my dad. I can’t even begin to describe how great it was to just hear his voice again. The only means of communication I had with my family whilst overseas was through email (and facebook, but yeah, my parents = not so much on that one), so I was really looking forward to just talking to my parents again. 
He and I both knew that the weather forecast for the day looked less-than-stellar, so I was aware that there was a fair chance that they weren’t going to be able to pick me up that day. The voicemail prognosis wasn’t promising, but whatevs, I just wanted to talk to him. As such, as I stood on the conveyor belt like thing being taken through the Philly airport while holding my absurdly heavy carry-on bag (which I swear weighed as much as my checked-bag - 51.7 pounds, mind you - good gravy, that sucked to carry) I called my dad. Here’s how our initial exchange went down:
Larry/my dad: Hello.
Aaron: Holy crap, I’m talking to my dad! What’s up?!
Yeah, I was a little excited. The forecast wasn’t too good for the night, but he said he’d keep me updated on it and such. I didn’t really care at that point. I knew in the back of my mind that I wasn’t going home, but I just ignored that suck-age as I continued on my way.
Eventually, we made our way to our gate for to chill and wait for our flight to Minneapolis. We were sure to check often for delays due to weather, but none ever showed up surprisingly enough. We had a little phone number party as we all exchanged numbers in our downtime. Yay for cellphones again! T’was more or less at this point that my dad called me and said that they weren’t going to be able to come up to get me that night. Not going to lie, that was pretty disappointing. There was literally nothing I was looking forward to more over the previous 3 ½ months than seeing my parents at the airport when I got back. Having that taken away from me didn’t feel the best, and thinking about that still gets me a little bit. Thankfully, I’ve got some great friends. Angela said that I could’ve stayed at her place had it come to it, but I didn’t want to impose on her first night back like that. So I called my broheim and suitemate from last year Geoff. Friggin’ love that kid. He said that he’d take his awesome girlfriend Joyce’s car, come get me, and that I could stay at his apartment that night. What a stud.
After getting this somewhat figured out, we were told that our flight was, in fact, going to be delayed. Not because of weather, though, but because they didn’t know where the plane was. WHAT?!?! How the SMURF does one lose a friggin’ plane?! They said it was out of range or some BS like that, but I’m not buying that at all. Makes NO sense. As such, Laura and I used this time to go buy ourselves some fruit from some place near to our gate. Money, indeed.
By the time we returned, we’d been told that we still had a long wait. Apparently, they’d found the plane, but it was circling the runway. And of course after this went on for about a million years, we were told that we had to wait for maintenance checks on our plane. Friggin’. At this point, I started my exasperated and pissed off texting to Geoff about the whole situation. *shakes head at the mess that was this flight* I was getting ready to throw down at this point.
h some football during all this! I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed it up until this point. Turns out I did. A lot. But FINALLY we were allowed to board the plane and hopefully to get the heck up out of Philly. We all entered into the small, little pop can that it was with the hope of being home shortly. That wish was quickly dashed as we were told we still had to wait for some more maintenance to be done. And of course after that was completed, we were told that there was only one runway as the other one was being blocked by some plane that apparently needed some work done on it. Now that just seems odd to me. I mean, I no nothing of airports, but it seems to me that there should be more than two runways for a major international airport… Perhaps not, I guess, but that just seems stupid. But anyway, the pilot said we were in line behind 40 other aircraft and we’d have ourselves a good wait. *continue pissed, exacerbated, and apologetic texting to Geoff* Frigg, I hate Philly.
I dozed off thankfully and was at some point awoken by the pilot saying that there was still going to be a long wait. I busted out my Bible because… well… seemed like the right thing to do at that point. I knew the Good Lord would guide me to whatever it was that I needed to read at that time, so I just opened to a random page. As usual, God showed just how great He is as I flipped right to John 14. The heading for this little part in my Bible reads “Jesus Comforts His Disciples.” Wow. John 14:1 reads, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in Me.” Obviously, it continues on with more awesomeness (you know, just like the Bible does in general), but that’s the first thing that I read. You may call it chance, I call it the Lord. I smiled at this, read for a bit, and then went back to sleep. God’s got my back. No doubt.
I awoke again to the pilot saying that we were just getting ready to take off. Heck yes! Apparently, this awake period lasted only briefly as I went out again. The next time my eyes opened we had taken off and were ascending into the night sky. I was fortunate enough to have another window seat, but due to the dark, clouds, and snow I wasn’t able to see much of anything, sadly. Thus, I drifted in and out for the next couple hours and some change before eventually hearing the pilot say that we were only about 30 minutes out. Tight. What I was able to see of Minneapolis and the surrounding area while we flew over it was definitely quite a beautiful sight. Not going lie, it might not be as aesthetically pleasing as Lisbon, but for my money right then, it was the most gorgeous thing I’d ever seen.
Through the crappy snow and all, the pilot made a money landing, and I was back in Minnesota. Yes! I called my boy Geoff to let him know that I was there, and I headed off to get my bags. I stood around the baggage claim spinning dealy waiting for my stuff as I watched everyone interact with their families. Not going to lie, I was a wee-bit jealous and definitely somewhat sad at my sitch, but it was really cool to see all these friends of mine super-happy with their families. I eventually procured my bag and then just kind of stood around talking to people whilst doing my best not to interrupt any family time with anybody. Geoff still hadn’t arrived yet, so I had nothing to do but to say some sad goodbyes to my peeps and to watch them slowly walk out the door with their families.
Moving on, it was just a few minutes after this that my man Geoff showed up. Heck yeah! I lugged all 100 plus pounds of my bags over to his car, tossed them in, and was off. Frigg, I’d missed that kid. Hadn’t seen him since late August. Too long. Turns out my parents were wise in not coming up as we slid out and blew one stoplight and two stop signs. Couple that with the ridiculous cold (mind you, I was only wearing a thin zip-up sweatshirt as my parents were going to bring up my parka) and yeah, good call on their part.
Geoff and I got back to his Melrose apartment at like 1:45 or so in the morning. He gave me a hat to wear as I struggled in the cold to the door of the complex. He brilliantly quipped as he was walking in front of me, “You know, this is the kind of weather people die in.“ Indeed. Nonetheless, we made it inside. Almost 24 hours since I’d first boarded the bus in Toledo. Long day. Course, he and I stayed up talking until like almost 4:00 just hanging and such like the good old days last year. Eventually, I found myself a place on his couch and dozed off to sleep.
I was awoken by a text and a subsequent call from my parents at 6:58. They told me that they were going to leave Olivia at about 8; thus, in theory they should’ve arrived a bit before 10:00. Thus, I went back to sleep for a bit. Shortly thereafter, though, the “I need to take a dump quotient” hit its limit. Unfortunately, the bathrooms in the apartment were all inside the rooms of the inhabitants. Thus, I had to quietly sneak into Geoff’s room and destroy his bathroom without his noticing. Not quite sure how I pulled it off, but he didn’t wake up, thankfully. After finishing this epic poop, I meandered back to the couch.
Apparently, the roads weren’t overly horrendous as they showed up at about 10:30 or so. I walked over to Geoff’s room, woke him up, shook his hand (decided against the hug as he was shirtless and in his bed), thanked him several times and headed off. After asking some dude how to get out of this crazy building, I found the door and entered into the cold Minnesota air. I looked both directions once I got outside like I was Tom Hanks at the end of Castaway (gosh, what a crappy movie that was) to find the street my dad had said he was on. I noticed the beautiful little sign that said “26th St.” Money. I turned to my right and sauntered over in that direction. I instantly noticed our silver Chevy Impala even through my fogged up glasses. My dad must have seen me at the same time and jumped out of the car to greet me and to help get my bags in the trunk. I moved as fast as I could muster over to him, just as I was about to reach him I saw my mom smiling in the car at us, I smiled as I turned my attention back to my dad and hugged him. It might not have been the airport, but damn it, it was good enough for me.
*Epilogue*
My Answer: “Yes, sir, I have an electric shaver and a broken alarm clock.”
Ideal Answer: “Well, good sir, I’d love to tell you about the electrical device in my bag, but I think having you experience it at all its variable speeds would do more justice for you.”
Question: “Do you have anything that could be used as a weapon in your bag?”My Answer: “Yes, sir, I have a dagger that I bought as a Christmas present.”
Ideal Answer: “If I were you, I’d be far more concerned with what’s strapped to my chest right now than what’s in my bag.”
So yeah, that’s what it do with that. Such stupid questions. But after working through this little obstacle, I was told to go talk to someone at the actual baggage check thingy. I headed over to some genial-looking woman to drop off my maleta. After making brief small talk, I placed this maleta of which I write on the weighing station item. 23.5kg. Nice. That’s 51.7 pounds. 1.7 pounds over the limit. In theory, I should’ve had to pay some fee, but apparently I either charmed the frigg out of the girl (very possible) or she just hates her job and didn’t feel like charging me anything (more possible). Either way, money. Literally.Of course, after this was done, I talked to Erik and realized that I hadn’t been given a baggage receipt so I went back through the line backwards in order to procure one. Mistake. That turned everyone toward me. I’m sure I was seconds of away from being shot right there. Apparently it turns out the woman at the check point, unbeknownst to me, had stuck it to my boarding pass. Smooth. Almost got me killed. Well, not really, but you know what I’m talking about.
After this, the whole lot of us on the flight to Philly went through to security to get our carry-on bags and everything checked. More fun. At least they didn’t make us take of our shoes or anything like in the states. And because I’m such a rebel, I left my belt on. Yeah, I did. Take that airport security. Well… ok, I just forgot to take it off, but nonetheless I made it through that without any problem and continued on my way. Granted, my way involved just sitting around for a few hours in the airport with the peeps. I did eat a sweet sandwich, though, that’s for sure. Kind of makes everything worth it, I’d say.In the midst of our boredom, a few of us starting busting out remedial magic tricks on each other in the attempt of blowing everyone’s minds. Mission accomplished. As per usual, I tried my favorite trick. And again, as per usual, it failed. Basically, I ask someone to pick any card out of the deck, memorize it, show it to everyone, and then put it back. At that point, I shuffle the deck several times and eventually just grab a random card and hope for the best. Yep, 1 out of every 52 times it works like a charm! Not this time, though. But I did pull it off (to an extent the other night). I grabbed a deck that was being used for Schnozzle. Wait. Hold up. What’s this “Schnozzle” of which I speak, you ask? Don’t worry about it. It’s a stupid game. Point is, I had a 2 in 48 chance of snatching the correct card (9 up through ace, each suit, twice). I just picked up the deck randomly, announced “ace of spades,” and the BAM! Ace of spades. Money. But yep, that’ll be my last success with that one for a while. Although, since each event is independent, perhaps not. Meh, screw probability in that sense. Math sucks. We all know it.
So we spent the next forever just basically sitting around. A couple of times I got up and wandered around for some random purpose. I procured for myself a pretty legit sandwich as well during this time. But for the most part, we all just chilled. Which, not gonna lie, was quite awesome because I’m kind of missing some of those peeps right now as I sit here back in frigid, snowy Minnesota. But we’ll save the emotional stuff for later.Eventually, t’was time to board the plane. Hurrah! Now I’m not a very experienced flyer by any means, but it seems to me that the whole concept of flying is nothing short of a Cal Clutter buck (what a fantastically hilarious last name, no?). For example, upon boarding of the aircraft, oftentimes zones are called out (which are found on one’s boarding pass) in order to get everyone on in a systematic and controlled fashion. However, this always seems to just be an epic SNAFU as people don’t listen for such zones and typically just bumrush to the front of the line. I mean frigg, if I want a mosh pit of a bunch of immature girls, I’ll go to a Taylor Swift concert. Seems like the airline could maybe do something about that… But whatevs, I got on the plane safely without having to throw any ‘bows, stowed my bag, and found my seat. My window seat, that is! *Score*
I was pretty psyched about the concept of actually being able to see stuff on my journey back to the states as I hadn’t been able to see jack-shiz from my seats on my flights to Spain. I was quite excited specifically for to view the Atlantic. And I must say that it turns out that I wasn’t disappointed with what I saw. It was really cool to get a prolonged vision of the Spain countryside as well. The amount of snow I saw was quite surprising too. I mean, we were flying over mountains and such for a bit, but it still threw me because yeah, not so much on the snow in Toledo. And just going to throw this out there, the Atlantic = beautiful. Granted, it’s just blue and such, but there’s way more to it that’s hard to describe. It’s just an amazingly vast sight. It’s stuff like that that really just strengthens my faith. How could all that be an accident? Gorgeous.Beyond the sweet view, though, I definitely took a lot of looks around me. I’m a bit of a big people watcher. I love ‘em, not going to lie, and they’re just so interesting. I didn’t speak at all to the dude sitting next to me, but he seemed like a nice enough fellow. I snuck a peak at the boarding pass he pulled out and he was heading over to LA for some reason. Good to for him. There was a couple stationed immediately in front of me as well; the man quite interested me as he was reading some sort of ridiculously intellectual piece of literature encased within a binder. Something about time, intervals, thresholds, and such. Some complex appearing equations and derivatives made themselves known as well on the pages. I tried to read it over his shoulder, but his head was always somewhat in the way (not that I could’ve anywhere nearly understood the writings fully). Seemed like pretty legit stuff. My favorite group of people, though, by far was the family sitting two rows in front of me: a father, mother, and a small child of some sort. Both parents looked like lumberjacks all decked out in their wranglers, belt buckles, and flannel. The kid from what I could tell, was pretty much adorable. The flight attendants were basically loving the young-in and trying to be all cute with it and make it at ease. The whole family just seemed like an extremely happy and personable clan of blood relatives.I wasn’t fortunate enough to sit anywhere near anybody that I actually knew, so obviously I had to gander around at all my peeps from time to time to see how they were all doing with the whole infinity hour flight. The two people who stuck out to me most were Tom and Laura. Both were completely different in their mannerisms. Tom appeared like he wanted nothing more than some sleep, but was sadly being thwarted in his efforts. As a result, he just looked pissed off in his always cool manner. Laura, on the other hand, (when she wasn’t sleeping or reading) was seemingly completely enthralled by the movies that were playing in her cute little way. I swear I’m not a creeper like that, but you gots to find things to do, ya feel me?Speaking of viewing stuff, as opposed to the flight to Madrid that had individual TV screens on the back of each seat so one could choose what they wanted to watch, this flight had just one large screen at the front of the plane. Again, though, because I’m a cheap bum, I chose not to buy the headphones. The first movie played was Mama Mia. Thankfully, I was asleep for most of that flick… I say that just to protect my manhood, which has apparently already been damaged in the eyes of many due to my love obsession with High School Musical, as I actually kind of have a desire to see that movie. That desire is quite contrary to the second movie that was shown, however. Journey to the Center of the Earth. I was unfortunate enough to have seen that garbage in the theaters this past summer and was in no hurry to see it ever again. I should’ve known that it was going to suck something fierce based on the fact that it was in 3D. That’s usually a pretty big indication that something’s trash if they have to try and cover it up with cliched and stupid visual effects. *coughStarWarsEpisodes1-3cough* I must say, though, that the movie was far more enjoyable to watch without sound. I didn’t have to stomach the hackneyed and ridiculous dialogue in what was surely the worst Brendan Fraser movie ever crafted ever in the history of ever. Ever. *shudders*
Fortunately enough, though, I was able to catch a bit of shuteye during the flight, and I have to say that at one point I was woken up in the coolest fashion that I’ve ever experienced in my life up to now. Now obviously, there’s a lot of horrible ways to be awoken and only a few good ones, but I can certainly say that this one was nothing short of fantastic. I awoke to someone (a flight attendant) handing me a sandwich. Ho. Ly. Crap! Phenomenal. AND it was a good sandwich! Dreams do come true, my friends, dreams do come true. On that note, I can certainly say that the food they served on this flight was quite superior to that on the way to Madrid. I had basically the same thing (chicken, salad of some sort, and such), but this was actually edible. Cool beans (pun). Hm… now that I think about it, this flight was tons better than the original. Noice.Eventually, though, the flight mercifully ended. I mean, a 9 or so hour flight can’t really be that great no matter how you slice it. After circling the Philly runway for about 25 minutes, we finally landed and my feet touched American soil again. I felt just like the exasperated Robin Hood (played beautifully by Cary Elwes) in the hilarious major motion picture “Robin Hood: Men in Tights” after he swims home to England after escaping from prison. “Home! Home! England! Ahhh.” Replace “England” with “America” and you got yourself a pretty accurate picture of what I was thinking at that point. I didn’t go as far as to kiss the ground, though, because let’s be honest, Philadelphia? Yeah, not so much. Laura and I happily sauntered off away from the plane into the airport quoting another pertinent movie at this point in “Team America: World Police” by yelling “America! [Smurf] yeah! Coming again to save the mother [surfing] day yeah!” Good to be back.We all made our way through customs to baggage claim seemingly in good spirits. After pretty much forever in actually getting our maletas, we headed back through the declaration zones. It was at this point that I more or less provided alcohol to a minor as I had to kind of took responsibility for the wine that Laura had bought as a gift for some of her peeps. Apparently, since she’s under 21, someone had go with her through the declaration jumble to ensure that she wouldn’t do something stupid with it, or something to that effect. I don’t really know, I’m not a doctor. All I really know is that it was a largely unofficial and pointless process. Point is, alcohol saved. Solid.Again, we had to go through security and all that mess just for funsies. This time I decided/remembered to remove my belt, but as per usual, the whole thing went off without a hitch. After this, it was with great happiness that I turned on my connected cell phone for the first time in months. I was almost instantly greeted by a text message and a voicemail, both from my dad. I can’t even begin to describe how great it was to just hear his voice again. The only means of communication I had with my family whilst overseas was through email (and facebook, but yeah, my parents = not so much on that one), so I was really looking forward to just talking to my parents again. He and I both knew that the weather forecast for the day looked less-than-stellar, so I was aware that there was a fair chance that they weren’t going to be able to pick me up that day. The voicemail prognosis wasn’t promising, but whatevs, I just wanted to talk to him. As such, as I stood on the conveyor belt like thing being taken through the Philly airport while holding my absurdly heavy carry-on bag (which I swear weighed as much as my checked-bag - 51.7 pounds, mind you - good gravy, that sucked to carry) I called my dad. Here’s how our initial exchange went down:Larry/my dad: Hello.
Aaron: Holy crap, I’m talking to my dad! What’s up?!
Yeah, I was a little excited. The forecast wasn’t too good for the night, but he said he’d keep me updated on it and such. I didn’t really care at that point. I knew in the back of my mind that I wasn’t going home, but I just ignored that suck-age as I continued on my way.Our group was breaking up more and more as people went separate ways so there were only I believe five of us (me, Laura, Tom, Danielle, and Angela) who decided to go rock it at the McDonald’s which I mentioned in my first blog post. Again, there was a lack of double cheeseburgers and I didn’t even attempt to use my gift card there, but meh, I’d missed greasy American McDonald’s. Not that Spain’s version was healthy at all either, but it was way different.
Even cooler than that, though, was the fact that on our way to this establishment, we ran into someone dressed up as Santa Clause who offered to take a free picture with him! Heck friggin’ yeah! Tom apparently decided he didn’t want in on that, but the rest of us happily took some time to chill with Jolly Old St. Nick. Awesome picture/thing and a great bright spot to the day.
Eventually, we made our way to our gate for to chill and wait for our flight to Minneapolis. We were sure to check often for delays due to weather, but none ever showed up surprisingly enough. We had a little phone number party as we all exchanged numbers in our downtime. Yay for cellphones again! T’was more or less at this point that my dad called me and said that they weren’t going to be able to come up to get me that night. Not going to lie, that was pretty disappointing. There was literally nothing I was looking forward to more over the previous 3 ½ months than seeing my parents at the airport when I got back. Having that taken away from me didn’t feel the best, and thinking about that still gets me a little bit. Thankfully, I’ve got some great friends. Angela said that I could’ve stayed at her place had it come to it, but I didn’t want to impose on her first night back like that. So I called my broheim and suitemate from last year Geoff. Friggin’ love that kid. He said that he’d take his awesome girlfriend Joyce’s car, come get me, and that I could stay at his apartment that night. What a stud.After getting this somewhat figured out, we were told that our flight was, in fact, going to be delayed. Not because of weather, though, but because they didn’t know where the plane was. WHAT?!?! How the SMURF does one lose a friggin’ plane?! They said it was out of range or some BS like that, but I’m not buying that at all. Makes NO sense. As such, Laura and I used this time to go buy ourselves some fruit from some place near to our gate. Money, indeed.By the time we returned, we’d been told that we still had a long wait. Apparently, they’d found the plane, but it was circling the runway. And of course after this went on for about a million years, we were told that we had to wait for maintenance checks on our plane. Friggin’. At this point, I started my exasperated and pissed off texting to Geoff about the whole situation. *shakes head at the mess that was this flight* I was getting ready to throw down at this point.
h some football during all this! I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed it up until this point. Turns out I did. A lot. But FINALLY we were allowed to board the plane and hopefully to get the heck up out of Philly. We all entered into the small, little pop can that it was with the hope of being home shortly. That wish was quickly dashed as we were told we still had to wait for some more maintenance to be done. And of course after that was completed, we were told that there was only one runway as the other one was being blocked by some plane that apparently needed some work done on it. Now that just seems odd to me. I mean, I no nothing of airports, but it seems to me that there should be more than two runways for a major international airport… Perhaps not, I guess, but that just seems stupid. But anyway, the pilot said we were in line behind 40 other aircraft and we’d have ourselves a good wait. *continue pissed, exacerbated, and apologetic texting to Geoff* Frigg, I hate Philly.I dozed off thankfully and was at some point awoken by the pilot saying that there was still going to be a long wait. I busted out my Bible because… well… seemed like the right thing to do at that point. I knew the Good Lord would guide me to whatever it was that I needed to read at that time, so I just opened to a random page. As usual, God showed just how great He is as I flipped right to John 14. The heading for this little part in my Bible reads “Jesus Comforts His Disciples.” Wow. John 14:1 reads, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in Me.” Obviously, it continues on with more awesomeness (you know, just like the Bible does in general), but that’s the first thing that I read. You may call it chance, I call it the Lord. I smiled at this, read for a bit, and then went back to sleep. God’s got my back. No doubt.
I awoke again to the pilot saying that we were just getting ready to take off. Heck yes! Apparently, this awake period lasted only briefly as I went out again. The next time my eyes opened we had taken off and were ascending into the night sky. I was fortunate enough to have another window seat, but due to the dark, clouds, and snow I wasn’t able to see much of anything, sadly. Thus, I drifted in and out for the next couple hours and some change before eventually hearing the pilot say that we were only about 30 minutes out. Tight. What I was able to see of Minneapolis and the surrounding area while we flew over it was definitely quite a beautiful sight. Not going lie, it might not be as aesthetically pleasing as Lisbon, but for my money right then, it was the most gorgeous thing I’d ever seen.
Through the crappy snow and all, the pilot made a money landing, and I was back in Minnesota. Yes! I called my boy Geoff to let him know that I was there, and I headed off to get my bags. I stood around the baggage claim spinning dealy waiting for my stuff as I watched everyone interact with their families. Not going to lie, I was a wee-bit jealous and definitely somewhat sad at my sitch, but it was really cool to see all these friends of mine super-happy with their families. I eventually procured my bag and then just kind of stood around talking to people whilst doing my best not to interrupt any family time with anybody. Geoff still hadn’t arrived yet, so I had nothing to do but to say some sad goodbyes to my peeps and to watch them slowly walk out the door with their families.I eventually found myself a seat while I chilled. I was the last person to left to my knowledge. I kicked my feet up onto my bag and just played the waiting game (which is not NEARLY as cool as Hungry Hungry Hippos, mind you). Of course, I resorted to what I was best at: people watching. There was a couple sitting a few seats to my immediate right who appeared to be waiting for some people to land. They were being entertained by what appeared to be perhaps a friend or cousin/more distant relative of the husband. There’s no way that I can do justice to this man. He was, in short, ridiculous. Just complaining about everything while at the same time making himself about to be some sort of absurdly important person. No one who reads this will get the reference I’m going to make here, but he reminded me greatly of Jonathan May III, who happens to be a local crazy man around Olivia. Just to give you an idea of this cat, he was once seen in a gas station talking on what was clearly a fake cellphone saying, “I need six trucks to bring in seven loads of dirt.” What? Yeah, I know. Anyways, the woman was doing her utmost to not just completely burst into laughter at the whole situation. And as a result of this, I was doing my best to keep from doing the same. After the man walked off, she and I made eye contact and exchanged one of those “Holy crap, for real?” looks as we started laughing. Not going to lie, that made my night right there.
Moving on, it was just a few minutes after this that my man Geoff showed up. Heck yeah! I lugged all 100 plus pounds of my bags over to his car, tossed them in, and was off. Frigg, I’d missed that kid. Hadn’t seen him since late August. Too long. Turns out my parents were wise in not coming up as we slid out and blew one stoplight and two stop signs. Couple that with the ridiculous cold (mind you, I was only wearing a thin zip-up sweatshirt as my parents were going to bring up my parka) and yeah, good call on their part.Geoff and I got back to his Melrose apartment at like 1:45 or so in the morning. He gave me a hat to wear as I struggled in the cold to the door of the complex. He brilliantly quipped as he was walking in front of me, “You know, this is the kind of weather people die in.“ Indeed. Nonetheless, we made it inside. Almost 24 hours since I’d first boarded the bus in Toledo. Long day. Course, he and I stayed up talking until like almost 4:00 just hanging and such like the good old days last year. Eventually, I found myself a place on his couch and dozed off to sleep.I was awoken by a text and a subsequent call from my parents at 6:58. They told me that they were going to leave Olivia at about 8; thus, in theory they should’ve arrived a bit before 10:00. Thus, I went back to sleep for a bit. Shortly thereafter, though, the “I need to take a dump quotient” hit its limit. Unfortunately, the bathrooms in the apartment were all inside the rooms of the inhabitants. Thus, I had to quietly sneak into Geoff’s room and destroy his bathroom without his noticing. Not quite sure how I pulled it off, but he didn’t wake up, thankfully. After finishing this epic poop, I meandered back to the couch.
Apparently, the roads weren’t overly horrendous as they showed up at about 10:30 or so. I walked over to Geoff’s room, woke him up, shook his hand (decided against the hug as he was shirtless and in his bed), thanked him several times and headed off. After asking some dude how to get out of this crazy building, I found the door and entered into the cold Minnesota air. I looked both directions once I got outside like I was Tom Hanks at the end of Castaway (gosh, what a crappy movie that was) to find the street my dad had said he was on. I noticed the beautiful little sign that said “26th St.” Money. I turned to my right and sauntered over in that direction. I instantly noticed our silver Chevy Impala even through my fogged up glasses. My dad must have seen me at the same time and jumped out of the car to greet me and to help get my bags in the trunk. I moved as fast as I could muster over to him, just as I was about to reach him I saw my mom smiling in the car at us, I smiled as I turned my attention back to my dad and hugged him. It might not have been the airport, but damn it, it was good enough for me.*Epilogue*Ok, now if I were actually a good writer, I’d make that whole thing well… you know, good like a writer, but that’s what I got for you. But here’s that little retrospective and emotional section that I somewhat but not really mentioned earlier.
I realized after I got home just how amazingly lucky I was to be in Spain for so long. I mean, I had an idea of what I had while I was over there, and I was never in a bad mood, but looking back it’s crystal clear. I was soooooo blessed to meet the people there that I did. There were some amazing people that I’m going to be friends with for life. I can say the only real regret I have from the whole experience was that I didn’t get to know some people until too late. Heck, there isn’t one person that I can say that I wouldn’t have liked to have befriended earlier than I did and gotten to know better. That sticks out for some people more than others, but it’s a constant for everyone. I could mention a lot of things in terms of the opportunity, the education, and whatever else, but the only thing that really matters anywhere is the people. I know that basically none of you are going to read this thing, but nonetheless I’m going to write like you all will because… it’s easier that way :-) I’d like to name you all, but I know I’d forget someone and feel super-bad about it, but y’all know who you are. I can only hope that I had even a fraction of the effect on you that you guys had on me. Hugs and hand-pounds to all of you. Hope to see you soon. Much love and God bless.
1 comment:
Very nice!! Although it took a smurfing long time to read the entire thing!! This is why you keep up with your blog, dude! Have to say I particularily (yeah, spelled that wrong) liked the Homer/Sandwich pic and the fantastically awesome Robin Hood Men in Tights photo! "We're men, manly men--we're men in tights!"
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