But that's okay, because now they have an awesome cozy house on 6-ish acres in Charlotte, NC!
I had nothing much going on at work during the last few weeks of April, and I was tired of the weekly snow showers in CO, so I booked a flight to Charlotte to spend a few days with mom and dad. Hotwire was offering a 'Hot Deal' for about a hundred bucks less than the next cheapest fare, but the catch was that you only see the details of the trip after you book, and then you can't change anything or get a refund. I figured, how bad could it be?
Well, Hotwire put me on a 5:30pm flight out of DIA and only gave me a 30-minute layover in Atlanta. I hoped it would turn out okay, because I didn't recall ATL being a very large airport.
But then, of course, the weekly snow shower started in Denver and, though we boarded the plane on time, we had to spend an hour getting de-iced before taking off.
During the flight, I kept looking at the image of the little plane centimetering its way across the middle of the US, silently urging the pilot to put the pedal to the metal, because the estimated arrival time was only 5 minutes before the departure time of my connecting flight. Once we landed, the plane seemed to take FOREVER to taxi to the gate, and even though the flight attendants had requested that the people whose final destination was Atlanta stay in their seats so that the folks who had connections could attempt to sprint to their gates, as soon as they seat belt sign went off everyone stood up. I pulled my duffel from the overhead compartment, booked it down the aisle and up the tunnel (only sending four or five old ladies and small children flying), found my connecting gate on the departures screen, hauled ass the 50 yards or so, and rolled up to the gate just as the jetway was being pulled back from the airplane door...
A couple of douchey-looking middle-aged guys that were on my flight ran up after me and started waving frantically through the window at the pilot (like he was going to open the door back up for three random people) and then, when the gate agent came through the door to the jetway, immediately began berating her for not waiting for them before closing the door. I made a token attempt at standing up for her ("Guys, it's not her fault") but they appeared to be merely warming up, so I went to the Delta help desk to find out what to do next.
The gentleman at the desk seemed perfectly nice, but there were two problems: one, he was a low-talker, and I had just spent two hours mere feet away from a very very loud jet engine; and two, he had a completely indecipherable accent. I eventually gathered that I was already booked on the first flight out to Charlotte the next morning, but when I asked where Delta would be putting me up for the night, he said (I think) that they weren't getting me a hotel room because "the de-icing was out of our control." I said, in a sad but nonconfrontational tone, that the de-icing was not in my control either, but ultimately all I got was a voucher for a special rate of $50/night at whatever hotel I preferred.
The stay was uneventful, as was the flight, and at 8:30am I found myself in Charlotte! The warm weather was a very welcome change from stupid cold Denver, and we took advantage by heading over to the US National Whitewater Center, where we could do some rock climbing and rafting and biking and ziplining:
It was cloudy when we first arrived, so we saved the whitewater rafting for when it warmed up a little more. Everyone who signs up for the WWR has to sit through a little orientation thingie, and the particular raft guide leading ours looked like this guy:
Dad and I did four laps of the whitewater course while Mom spectated, and we both managed to stay inside the raft, but we got thoroughly soaked. After that I checked took out a bike which was much too big for me, because a middle school class happened to be visiting the center that day and they had already taken all the bikes for smaller people.
Besides being much too big, the bike also had an alarming rattling noise coming from the fork, so after doing a quick loop on a 'blue' trail, I decided to just cruise down some of the smooth, flat trails to the south of the center. Almost immediately, I ran over a big beautiful king snake that was doing its best imitation of a stick across the middle of the trail. I don't think it was mortally wounded, but I completely lost my motivation for biking and rode (carefully) back to the stable, relinquished the bike and walked over to the restaurant to meet my parents. I scared the bejesus out of them by bursting into tears--they thought I had hurt myself--but I eventually calmed down over a pint of some tasty Belgian trippel-style beer. I still feel bad about the snake. Freaking go figure, that it would happen to me, probably one of like ten people in the world who just wants to pick snakes up and make friends with them. Jeez.
On our way back to the house we picked up some Chinese take-out and a box of brownie mix, and had a pleasant evening of tofu and conversation before I zonked out on the La-Z-Boy 15 minutes into an episode of Project Runway.
The next morning, I was walking from the back yard to the front, and when I looked down, there was a nice conspicuous four-leaf in a patch of clover in the grass, and when I bent to pick it my eye caught another one, then another, and pretty soon I had a whole mess of them:
I've still got the mad four-leaf finding skillz!
Then I went for a walk around the property while Mom did something or other. I investigated an old falling-down shed on the edge of the neighbor's yard which had a big opening on one side of the foundation, and while I took an amateur-artsy picture of a raptor feather I found on the ground, I heard some scuffling coming from the shed. I took a step toward it, and all of a sudden a big old buzzard came running out of the foundation, took a look at me, and flew up to a branch of the big oak tree next to the shed:
I was so startled.
I also discovered a specimen of a very expensive fungus near the shed, and as I explored further I saw more of them here and there, so now Mom and Dad can sell morels by the road if they want some extra income:
They're real morels, not false ones, the internets told us so.
I also took some pictures of the wildflowers about the place, found a puddle of water with some tadpoles, and may have tracked down the nest that the hawks circling the area and generally being noisy had as their home base:
I also saw and heard lots of birds, but it's been long enough since Ornithology at UW that I couldn't identify all of them.
But in all my travels, I did not encounter a single snake! What a terrible disappointment.
The rest of the visit was terribly pleasant and relaxing. Mom and I got pedicures, saw a movie, and drove by the house that we lived in for a few years in Matthews:
It sounds very cliche, but the trees in the neighborhood were much taller than I remember them being.
We also visited some local breweries, and then had a really wonderful dinner at Mimosa in downtown Charlotte. It happened to be prom night, so we got to see (i.e., judge) the myriad styles of formal dresses that teenagers are into these days. Things haven't changed much in ten years, it seems: bright colors and satiny fabrics are still the rule, with one or two vintage or unusual styles sprinkled around. One girl looked like a cross between Barbie and Glinda the Good Witch, right down to the blond hair and the sparkles. I asked lots of questions, found out some very interesting things about Gmom and Gdad in their younger days, and enjoyed the decidedly non-vegetarian short ribs. I also had a glass of stupid-good pinot noir...if I'd been paying attention, I would have written down which one it was. Then, to top it off, when we couldn't decide which dessert to share, the waiter just went ahead and brought us both! The weird free-dessert streak continues! You're welcome, guys ;)
And then I returned to Denver, where it snowed the next day and I was very cross. But now it's finally warm here, so yay!
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