The Argument Clinic

So I got into norfolk fine.  Flights were smooth and pretty short (both were less than an hour in the air), forgot how quick they feel on the east coast, last few trips have been to denver, phoenix and san diego…none of which are quick flights. 

Guy in line ahead of me at security at albany airport had just played with billy joel in concert, had his trumpet with him (and what looked like a baritone case as well), thought that was interesting.

First flight into philadelphia was delayed…if you ever fly in or out of that airport, that probably isn’t a surprise to you.  Very rarely go through there without a delay of some sort.  Just more stressful when your layover is less than an hour.  Also, if you have ever flown on a smaller airplane into philadelphia you also know they drop you off at the F terminal.  This is, naturally, nowhere near any of the gates that their larger planes leave through.  So you need to get a shuttle and then basically run to get to your next gate…at least if you are 30 minutes from departure and need to be somewhere in the middle of the B terminal, like I did.  Luckily by the time I got to my gate (out of breath), they hadn’t started boarding yet…though they should have been 15 minutes into it already.  Was relieved about that.

Was nice cause a friend of mine from church, jennifer fisher, was flying through philadelphia on my flight with her parents, so I got a chance to catch up with her while we waited in albany to leave.

Flights weren’t too crowded, so was nice to have some breathing room.  Second flight landed in virginia about on time.  Must not have flown us in over the nice part of the coastline around here, cause all I could see out the windows were old, rusted out navy ships and such.  But I hear if you go down the road a little ways to virginia beach, that its actually nice there.  Unfortunately I won’t have time for that. 

Airport here is pretty though, actually have trees with flowers and GREEN leaves on them.  Considering how depressingly long it is taking for any sign of spring to show up in ny, this was a welcome change for me  

Trip to hotel was fine, but got one of those talkative cab drivers.  I don’t have a problem with people being friendly, its just that I’m an introvert, traveling really takes it out of me, so when my flights have finally all landed and I am on the way to the hotel, I don’t really feel like talking much past saying what hotel to drive me to.  But I do appreciate he drove a lot slower than my san diego cab driver did, so wasn’t nearly as scary.

Had some room service and settled in for a little while before starting work on my term paper, which is how I will be occupying myself for the rest of the evening.  Just as well, never much to do in hotels anyway, especially wednesday nights when no good shows are on.

Ok, back to working on the term paper…applications of biohydrometallurgy (or using bacteria for mining of metals)…is it sad that I find that interesting?  Oh well

Been pretty busy here lately. Work has been busy as usual, plus I have all my end of the semester stuff to take care of…homework, term paper, take home final, ‘in class’ final (or as close as i get as a distance learning student)…plus registering for my summer semester, working out finances for that, and working with columbia to get my current bill worked out (apparently the bursar’s office and the distance learning office don’t communicate much…typical college stuff, but reminds me why I was relieved to graduate the first time around…). After this semester just 7 more classes to go…

Been following the virginia tech tragedy pretty closely too. Not someone who follows the news much, but when things like this happen I become kind of obsessed with finding out about who the victims were, though I don’t know any of them. Not sure why because it inevitably makes me depressed to hear about it. A girl from my church goes there, was relieved to find out she is doing ok…i served as an elder with her mom for more than a year. My prayers are with the families and friends of the victims as well as any other students impacted by what happened, can’t imagine what they are going through.

Yesterday i had orchestra rehearsal at union college, they were holding a vigil there and there were 4 or 5 local news trucks parked outside the building when we left after rehearsal.

Anyway, am traveling to norfolk, va for work today. Though don’t expect to see much of interest because my spare time will be spent doing all the homework and term paper stuff I am bringing along with me. Need to keep at it so I can finish everything by the end of april/early may.

Well, that’s my update for now…back to getting packed and ready to leave for my flight this morning…