Reading: Desmond Seward, The Hundred Years War: The English in France 1337-1453

Moving: just stressing

Watching: "Erin Brockovich" was the inflight movie, even though today was the 16th and "Mystic Pizza" was listed as running through the 15th.

Listening: planes, trains, and automobiles

15 June 2001: Leaving

CLH called me before I left for work to...doublecheck my flight number? ensure I had a dress for supper before the concert? Something, and a good thing she did because I had intended to wear overalls to the concert, what with none of my dresses having pockets.

I didn't have time before work to empty the camera chip, so I sat at the dining table deleting photographs until my batteries ran out and charged them at work. I guess I had it in my head that they take four hours to charge, but they must need longer. They weren't done when I had to unplug them and go on my merry way.

My way was not merry. I wasn't as much of a basketcase as I often am before a flight, but merry was I not. As soon as I got out of the building, I turned on my phone to check my messages. I had asked Haitch to bring Blake to the vet early enough in the afternoon that I would know he was there before boarding my flight, and here on my phone were two new messages. Two. Clearly, something hideous had happened. I dialed the number for my messages, but it wasn't picking up! My phone wasn't working! I panicked on the pedestrian mall shuttle bus, and as I dialed, my phone indicated three new messages! Finally I realized I wasn't giving the number enough time to pick up, so the extra three messages were from me. Ah. I figured this out before I reached Market Street Station, where I listened to Haitch's two: "The cockatiel has landed." He chattered and commented on the ride down to the vet, and once there the staff made much of him. Good. The next message was a marquee Haitch had passed that read,

Imagine a world without hypothetical situations

so when I voicemailed her, I said, "Imagine a world where lisa doesn't have nine metric cows every time she has to catch a flight.

I'm not even afraid to fly--isn't it ironic, don't you think--but I am always worried about traffic jams, even though on this occasion I wasn't already late. (And I didn't start listening to Jagged Little Pill until Monday; writing about Friday after Monday means I write with Monday's musical allusions.)

I had brought Can Jane Eyre Be Happy?, The Golden Notebook, and a book on the Hundred Years War. I read all the literary puzzles from the books I knew--the single footprint Robinson Crusoe finds, as if his island is inhabited by Dufflepuds, how Magwitch swims any distance at all in leg irons--by the time I got to DIA. The most interesting was the eponymous one. I had never considered the Bluebeard elements in Jane Eyre before, but they're there: the previous wife in the locked room, the dangerous man. Also the author suggests that debating the sex of the pug in Mansfield Park is where worthwhile literary debate ends and needless nitpicking begins. (When the young people set out for Sotherton, pug barks in "his mistress's arms," yet later Fanny is promised one of pug's next puppies if she marries Henry Crawford. First, it's nitpicking, and therefore I like it; two, the stud's owner is paid in puppies, so it's a moot point. So on the plane I started The Hundred Years War.

I don't recall that I've taken SkyRide to DIA from downtown in three years. I've lived in Denver for almost six now, and I am pleased to report that while in 1998 I had no idea where the bus was going, how it intended to deliver me to the airport, this time the bus followed my internal map and all was well.

I was disappointed to see that the inflight movie would be "Erin Brockovich," especially since that was supposed to be the eastbound movie in the second half of the month, which the 15th isn't except in February. I have been craving to see "Mystic Pizza" again, for reasons that elude me. Oh well, I comforted myself; the westbound movie will be either "Pretty Woman" if United messes up or "Notting Hill" if it doesn't. There's always the one scene in her movies: in "Pretty Woman," it's the shopping scene; in "Notting Hill," the sister's birthday party; in "Sleeping with the Enemy," the backstage scene; in "Mystic Pizza," the pool game; in "Erin Brockovich," how she got all the signatures. (How: "Sexual favors. Six hundred thirty-four blowjobs in three days," aside to her boss, "I'm really quite tired," so that he offers her a chair." United accepts "sexual favors" but replaced "blowjobs" with "people," which at least made it more gender-neutral--she needed women's signatures too.) Yes, I like Julia Roberts. Say it loud and say it proud.

The flight landed 40 minutes late, which gave my sister enough time to finish up at work and fetch the car and wait for me at the passenger departure area. She's so bad. Tsk tsk. Driving away, crawling through the tunnels, she told me about her miserable day. My sister has little patience for vegetarians to begin with, but absolutely none when they a) make reservations at her restaurant and b) only then ask what type of restaurant it is (steak and cigars) and c) once seated--when the approach to any table is past the glass locker where haunches of cow are ageing in plain sight--ask if isn't there anything vegetarian on the menu. I don't think that place even serves fish. Maybe lobster. I have a lot more sympathy for vegetarians, but even less for stupidity than she, so we ridiculed this point thoroughly.

Haitch, you might want to skip this next paragraph. We made up the most appalling menu we could--it included koala--and she suggested dolphin, and I continued, "Yes, and the reason our dolphin is so expensive is that we don't use the tuna-net dolphin. Those animals are what we feed our cattle on. Our dolphin we have to hunt separately, so it's fresher for you!"

And so home to her apartment.