1/13/99

What to do...what.to.do.

Arrived at the Phoenix airport and quickly learned that the flight to
Columbus was delayed due to inclement weather.  The flight was on call
until 11:00, but the last thing I felt like doing was hanging around and
waiting, especially since I could see how beautiful it was outside. 
Fortunately, Steve had come in with me, so I wasn't stranded there.  We
decided to look into changing my ticket, even if it meant paying another
fee.  As we were talking to the ticket agent, a line formed behind us.  The
Columbus flight had been cancelled.  Damn.  Not.

I rescheduled for Friday, figuring Thursday would probably still be bad,
and thinking there was no great reason to go back to work this week. 
(Although I felt some guilt pangs leaving a message on my boss's
voicemail.)

Well.  Suddenly I had two additional days.  After scanning the map, we
chose to go back to Tucson to check out the Pima Air and Space Museum and
Colossal Cave, with our ultimate goal being White Sands (both the dunes and
the museum).  And yes, I know I was just there, but I'm really looking
forward to going there again and not being in such a rush.

The Pima Air and Space Museum was well worth going back for.  It was 65
acres of all different varieties of old airplanes, including such cool
specimens as a Super Guppy and an SR-71.  And, fortunately, I was
accompanied by a most knowledgeable companion.

From there, we took the short drive to Colossal Cave.  Not a bad tour; not
one of the best.  The cave is dry, and many of the formations were
destroyed prior to the cave becoming protected.  Still, there were some
interesting things to see.  Worth the stop, I suppose.

Rather than going all the way to Alamagordo, we thought we'd stop in Las
Cruces to find a place to stay and to see if we could catch a movie.  En
route to Las Cruces, Steve got to have his first Taco Bell experience.  I
also insisted he have a Cherry Mash, which is a fairly overwhelming
regional candy bar.

With the assistance of the handy AAA travel book, we chose the Comfort Inn
and asked the woman at the front desk where we could find a movie theater. 
She sent us to the Cinema 8, which happened to have...um...4 movies
playing, none of which we wanted to see.  Fortunately, she'd also told us
about the new theater, so we searched it out and decided to see the 10:06
of "A Civil Action."  This left us about 45 minutes, which we used to go
buy clean socks and underwear at Wal-Mart.

"A Civil Action" sucked.  Don't go see it.  It never ends, and nothing
happens.  To make things worse, we had the Non-Stop Talkers behind us to
the left, the Heavy Breathing Man behind us, and the Noisy Popcorn Bag
Crunchers next to us.  Steve was lucky; he managed to fall asleep for 10
minutes.

We followed that 2 1/2 hours of hell with a late-night dinner a the local
Applebee's.

Back in our luxurious home away from home at the Comfort Inn.

Tomorrow will be White Sands, then a long drive back to Phoenix.
 

To Next Day               Steve`s Version of Today                Index