Delta sucks

Awful experience Thursday night. Our evening flight was inexplicably delayed, then delayed again and again. No information, of course. We finally boarded for what was now a 7:40 flight and sat on the runway for hours. And by"we" I mean the 11 passengers and small crew. After a long time with no information the captain announced that there was a minor mechanical problem, but not to worry -- it was a quick fix. He actually said it would be 5 minutes. A half hour went by. THen he announced he'd be essentially rebooting the entire plane, and that was sure to work. It didn't. This went on and on, with t-shirt-clad maintenance guys coming up the stairs and into the cockpit, shaking their heads and doing whatever they did but with absolutely zero result. By now hours had gone by. Finally finally finally they said that this plane was going out of service but good news! They had another aircraft, and a bus would take us there. And we waited. No bus. The next bit of news was that we were to disembark and agents would redirect us. No agents had any idea what we were talking about. We wandered the airport, ran into another lost soul and the three of us asked various gate agents, customer service reps, anyone (I was about to ask a maintenance guy) where our plane was. We were all told that that flight left in its original aircraft. We continued to walk through the airport (no mean feat for me), listened but heard no announcements and finally found the group from our original flight. There was a plane at last, and we boarded, but were shocked at the lack of info, the complete absence of customer service and the feeling that no one really gave a rat's ass about this flight (excepting the very nice flight attendant named Jeff.)

At that point I took 2 atavan and dozed through the flight. We arrived in Charlottetown at nearly 2 a.m.

Swirling through my mind were several things: the recent Frontline I watched about the problems of regional airlines (this was Comair, Delta's regional carrier) and some of the issues raised in Dan Ariely's new book "The Upside of Irrationality" in which he talked about some of the customer service nightmares he's had, and what they say about human behavior and expectations.

San Mateo

The Peruvian cooking class was amazing -- great food, great chef, amazing cocktails (Pisco Sours). Nick cut himself while shucking corn, but it's a typical cooking-related injury and it was dealt with quickly and effectively. We had a blast.
Jamie came over Sunday afternoon. We rode in the morning (20 miles) and it was great. Then the four of us hung out and made a huge dinner. Nick and I went to bed after, and the girls went off to the movies (Toy Story 3.)

Right now I find myself at a cafe in San Mateo, waiting for Laur. We'll hang out and have some wine and snacks before I leave for San Jose. Then back on the redeye tomorrow night, which means I'll be uselesss Thursday. So I'll stay home, do what work needs to be done, sleep a little and pack -- we leave Thursday night for PEI till early Monday morning, when I'll either come straight to the office if I'm up to it or back home for a few hours.

Next set of injections for this piriformis/sciatica situation 7/6, and I'm hopeful. I'm definitely moving better, and more of the pain seems mechanical than nerve-derived. Always an adventure.

Wedding plans continue. More decisions made, others still to be hammered out. For the kids readings we've identified three of the four (all but Nikki) so progress is most def being made (I may have been watching too many episodes lately of "The Wire.")

Peruvian cooking

our class is tonight! 4 and 1/2 hours of Peruvian cooking and eating, at ICE. Very psyched. Tomorrow we'll ride in the morning, and then Jamie's coming over to spend the day and sleep over. She and Liv will do the Austin Street shuffle looking for wedding-appropriate dresses (if that doesn't pan out the failsafe is a shopping trip with Nick Monday.)

Looks like a gorgeous weekend. Our day today is pretty unplanned so we'll do the usual (and we love the usual.) Tried to watch a documentary last night called "American Meth" but I fell asleep 9 minutes before it ended. I pretty much got the point anyway.

Looks like Thomas and Sara are joining us up north for the July trip; maybe also Gena + beau (still haven't met him.)

Joe Barton! What a gift to the Democrats. Many thanks.

Which sonnet?

Liv wants her wedding reading to be from Shakespeare. Currently choosing among:

• Sonnet 18
• Sonnet 29
• a really beautiful passage from "Love's Labours Lost"

We're saving Sonnet 116 for the wedding officiant to read as part of the ceremony. Pretty much decided on Matt's reading (the only appropriate Decemberists song -- red right ankle.) Still need readings for N & J. Checked out Sonnets from the Portugese but don't think they'd be comfortable with any of those readings. More research...

Nerve pain

It's different from all the other kinds of pain I've been having since this whole mess began. It's a disturbing pain because you feel it far from and removed from its source. It's caused by my back but I feel it in my ankle and leg. And it's harder to find a comfortable position -- with my hip and back I could find a neutral position. The mechanics were easier. But when I feel the nerve pain it's harder to find neutral. The doc changed up the drugs and I'll try them as soon as we fill the prescriptions, and I remain hopeful.

on a beautiful June Saturday

a lovely weekend is here. Matt is back from Montreal and now in NJ. Liv is in the Hamptons. Both back Sunday. Seeing T&S tonight, which we're really looking forward to. Our rings are ready, yay! Liv and I made giant strides on dresses for the wedding (3/4.) Couple more trips and we'll be done. Holly (heart of a lion) off to the park shortly. Narrowing down some wedding readings and taking care of some other wedding details. Liv took the SAT's last Friday (fingers crossed); now we wait and hope this round is good enough so that she doesn't have to take them again. Great tutor for this round, but still hoping for her sake that she's done. Matt's finishing an online class and it turns out he's not much of a fan of online learning -- the lack of interaction and discussion is alienating. Not surprising. Looking forward to a great weekend.

Wedding readings

so far the best choice seems to be Shakespeare's sonnet 116. Still need readings for the kids, and reading Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Sonnets from the Portuguese for ideas. Looking for memorable evocative readings that the kids will be comfortable with, and solving for all 4 should be interesting. Still deciding if we want to include the Apache blessing in the ceremony (I'm ambivalent but undecided.) The officiant put together a beautiful ceremony, and we're really only tweaking -- it's so good.