Greetings from Washington, DC! I just checked into my hotel a little while ago. It’s 3:45 over here now, and it’s already been a long travel day – but a good one. I’ve now technically been up for 12 hours, although with the time difference it’s just 10 hours, but I woke up this morning at 3:30am, got ready and left the house by 4am. I drove the Mazda down to DIA (which I’m happy to report no problems at all – it’s hard to believe that I just learned to drive the stick 10 days ago!). I caught my first flight to Minneapolis/St. Paul, then my connecting flight to Reagan National Airport. I checked into the Sheraton hotel here not far from the airport, and wanted to take a few minutes to blog before I rest up then head out onto the town.
A few interesting notes about my trip so far:
-Freakin’ everybody who rode the shuttle this morning got up on the wrong side of the bed. I pulled into the shuttle parking lot and in less than 5 minutes I was on the shuttle and we were heading to the airport. Everyone on there was in a really bad mood and took it out on the poor shuttle driver. They were all complaining that they’ve been waiting for a shuttle for 30 minutes (which I find hard to believe considering I drove past 3 shuttles when I got into the parking lot) and then they got mad at the guy for handing out the "you’re parked here" cards. I felt really sorry for the guy. Dude’s just trying to do his job and it’s company policy to hand out those cards. He cant’ help it that you showed up late at the airport. Heck, I showed up 30 minutes late but you don’t see me complaining. If you’re pissed about the shuttle service than don’t park in the shuttle parking lot. There’s a nice covered garage that you can park and walk right into the airport from – sure it costs 3 times what the shuttle lot costs, but you pretty much pay for what you get. Geez…
-Then when I got to my connecting flight that was a little interesting. Originally my flight was supposed to be a 1-stop flight with no changing planes, but they made all of us get out. It turns out that they shifted the planes around so that the original 757 we were supposed to go on got replaced by an Airbus – which had 40 less seats. Talk about a screwed up situation! Luckily I wasn’t really impacted. They didn’t change my original seat and I just had to wait and extra 20 minutes – no worries. They were asking people to take later flights and were offering few round-trip tickets. It was tempting… especially with the NCSC July meeting and the troubles getting everyone out here – but before you could blink they had more than enough volunteers. Oh well!
-I loved flying into Reagan! The last two times i was in DC I flew into Dulles. Aside from the turbulence and someone actually getting sick during the landing (gross!), it was really cool to look out your window. They sure land right in the middle of town, and it’s like the runway comes out of no where. While I was looking out my window seeing the Lincoln & Washington monuments, then the capital I thought "Damn, we’re flying really close to this – something must be wrong", but that thought lasted for a moment. Then appears the runway and things are all good.
It’s freakin’ humid out here and I think there’s a high of 94 degrees! Ugh!
So I’m going to nap for an hour, then make my way down to the lobby so I can get to the Metro (subway) and take it towards RFK Stadium to see the Washington Nationals Game. Somewhere along the way I want to find something to eat, considering I haven’t eaten all day, and I think as I make my way back I’d like to go through the town a bit! No big plans besides the game, but this is just how I like it!