Love, As Always, Pete

The Weekly Letters, by A. Pedersen Wood

August 25, 2005

Dear Everyone:

Back from our trip.  Back in the office.  But not 100% because I caught an “airline cold”.  So this week’s Letter will be brief.

The trip went splendidly.  No missed connections.  Everyone in the right place at the right time.  Rather a long drive for “Alice” and “Kelly” every time someone arrived at the Albany airport, which is 90 minutes away from “Upton Lake”.

I flew up to Portland on Monday, the 15th.  So far, so good.  Except that I realized that the flight confirmations from Southwest Airlines didn’t include the rental car that I had reserved through Southwest’s website.  So I walked up to the first rental agency:  “Got a reservation for Wood?”  No.  Moved on to the next agency.

Luckily, at PDX, all the car rentals are in the same central location, rather than being a bus-ride away in each case.  The fourth agency was the lucky one.  And I liked the fact that they gave me the remote access “fob” along with the key, unlike certain other agencies who don’t trust drivers not to lose the “fob”.

I drove to Mary’s Woods and spent the night at Mother’s place.  The next morning her caregiver, “Suzanne”, brought all the medications Mother would need for up to three weeks.  This was because “Alice” was really hoping that she could convince Mother to stay in New York for a couple more weeks.

I packed the meds, plus my “airplane book”, plus two books for Mother into a carry-on bag, got the two of us, plus luggage, into the rental car and got us to the airport a little more than 90 minutes before our flight time.  One thing about Southwest is that you want to get there as far ahead of time as possible.

This is because a whole lot of other people are also taking advantage of the low rates and are ahead of you in line at check-in.  I could preprint my boarding pass from the computer at Mary’s Woods, but we still had to check the baggage, including Mother’s walker, through.  Once that was done, we could relax.

We made our connecting flight in Las Vegas easily; it was only two gates away.  And “Jeannie” was showing up just as we were.  The flight to Albany was uneventful and “Kelly” was waiting for us.

As for the weather, I think it could best be described as… merciful.  It started in the low 80s with very little humidity.  Each day got a little warmer and a little more humid, but never got really hot.

We had a “girls’ night out” when “Frankie” arrived on Friday and “Kelly” took the girls to a swim team pizza party.  On Saturday, “Alice” and “Kelly” treated us to a lobster dinner.  Then it was Sunday and time for us to return to the airport for an early morning flight back to Las Vegas.  Several of us tried to convince Mother that “Alice” really did want her to stay longer, but she was adamant.  She wanted to go home.

So we flew back on Monday.  “Jeannie” split off to Oakland while Mother and I waited another couple of hours for our flight to Portland.  “Frankie” had brought me a new book about Queen Victoria and I had brought two textbooks on management and records management with me.  Then Mother bought me another book at the Las Vegas airport.  So I had four books to pack Tuesday morning along with all the regular stuff.

All the time that we were in New York, my BlackBerry (wireless remote email access) refused to work, so I left it turned off.  When I got home on Tuesday, I finally turned it back on and over 40 email messages started pouring in.

By the time I got into the office this morning, I already had a meeting scheduled for this afternoon.  Situation normal.  I figure I can live through one more day, as long as the “airline cold” doesn’t get any worse, and then it will be the weekend.

Then we have four weeks before we leave for Oregon again, this time for nephew “Gerold’s” wedding.  Anybody got ideas about wedding presents?

Love, as always,

 

Pete

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