Without a Title

When I got to LAX this morning it was still dark, not quite 5 AM. I stood in the line for the skycap service with my two little boys and our luggage, praying that I hadn't left anything truly vital behind. Of course this led to my thinking about my mortality, which is something I always do when I'm about to fly.

There I was, waiting in line,ready to think "deep thoughts" about life and what if it all ended today because of my plane crashing. Instead, my train of thought was interrupted by a woman going off on her husband.

She was seriously cussing him out, swinging her Louis Vuitton satchel around wildly to punctuate the expletives being hurled from her lips. I couldn't figure out what he'd done. Had he looked at her wrong? Had he been telling her to hurry up in a passive aggressive sort of manner? Yeah, maybe it was all one too many, "Walk faster or we're gonna miss the plane," type of statements.

I don't know what it was but from that point on, I could only see the crazy stuff folks were doing.

For example, the youngish white guy claiming he couldn't get his bag scanned because it had medical equipment -- and he couldn't check it because it had medical equipment. He totally got in the face of the TSA officer, but then I had to keep walking up the escalator so I missed what happened next.

Then there was the older black man who grumbled every five seconds about the, "Damn airlines. Next time I'll WALK to New York, tryin' to make me pay for my gotdamn stuff."

Oh, okaay. Good luck with that walking adventure.

How about the woman in the gate waiting area snapping photos of her bare foot with her cell phone? Yeah, wonder who she was sending that picture to.

Anyway, I survived it all and we've had a great afternoon and evening with our family. It's great to see how excited the boys are over seeing all their family. As for me, I'm about to fall over on this computer. I'm SO tired. My brain is so tired I can't even think of a title for this post.

I give up! See you in the morning!

Packing My Stuff

There's nothing like packing a suitcase to help you figure out what clothes in your closet you really like and what you need to give away to Goodwill.

I have two bags and two carry-ons packed. Now I have to decide what else I want to take with me because I have one more bag I can check for free. And no, the two bags and two carry-ons aren't just for me. One bag for me, one for my sons.

Seriously though, the airlines and their insane "charge you for checking luggage" fees are giving me a packing migraine. I don't like dragging a bunch of crap onto a plane with me and I don't mind waiting at baggage claim for my stuff. BUT, this time, I'm going to have to because I don't want to check more than one bag per person because then I'll have to pay $25 for the second bag. Clearly, I don't want to pay an extra $25 each when the tickets were already a bazillion dollars.

If it was a mathematical equation, it'd look like this:

(Three people) (second checked bag) ($25)(roundtrip)= $150 dollars for a second checked bag roundtrip.

No mas.

I used to just manage to put everything in one bag. But if a bag weighs over 50 pounds, I might have to pay $80 in overweight bag fees. That is not an option I'm considering. So far so good though because mine is 44 pounds and the one for the boys is 37 pounds... and we have one more left!

The clothes that aren't in my suitcase are things I really don't wear all that much, things that don't fit anymore, or things I've just fallen out of love with. So I just finished sticking 'em all in a big trash bag and I'm going to run it all over to Goodwill later on this afternoon. I'm sure a few things will be someone else's $5 treasure.

Even though I'm about to be gone for five weeks I'm trying not to take too much stuff, but there are some areas I can't compromise on, namely shoes. There's nothing worse than being all the way across the country and wishing I'd brought the red high heels instead of just the silver ballet flats. So, I'm taking both.

Actually, I'm taking an embarrassing amount of shoes with me: two pairs of red heels, red flip flops, red ballet flats (yes, I have a thing for red shoes) three pairs of black heels, black sandals, pink heels (still in love) silver ballet flats, black and white skimmers, and my running shoes.

Like I said, embarrassing. And if you are wondering why someone needs three pairs of black heels, you're either not female or not a cross dresser, so let me explain: it's because they're all different styles and some look better with certain outfits than others.

But what if I had no choice? What if someone handed me a pair of orthopedic shoes and said, "Sorry, all you're gonna get to wear every single day is this ugly pair of brown, mushroom-looking orthopedic shoes."

Would the world come to an end? Would my friends and family stop loving me? Would I feel less confident? (probably) And why is it that "things" give us such confidence? Why does feeling like I look fly as hell in a pair of pink heels make such a difference, even if I'm not going anywhere but to the grocery store?

Answer that profound question for me, will you?

Anyway, my closet looks so empty and clean now. That's going to be nice to come home to, but gosh, it's hard to believe that this time tomorrow I'm going to be getting off a plane with my sons.

Bye bye to Los Angeles for five whole weeks!

40 Things About Moi

I was visiting Hammer over at When Your Only Tool's a Hammer and I decided to swagger jack this fun meme from him:

What I was doing 10 years ago?
-Roaming the streets of NYC
-Getting ready to move to LA
-Working out for two hours a day (running, rowing machine and weight lifting)
-Listening to a lot of Hot 97 (Busta Rhymes had some hot stuff out then!)
-Going dancing at the Latin Quarter

Five things on my to-do list today?
· Write an article for Divine Caroline
· Revise an article for Anti-Racist Parent
· Go to a school site meeting at 8 a.m. (totally dreading it)
· Go get a chai from Starbucks to help me survive the meeting (I might spike it with some melatonin so I'll be nice and mellow)
· Do this workout (eek!)

Places I have traveled?
· Beijing
· Montreal (not in the winter, m'kay!)
· Catalina Island
· Birmingham
· New Orleans

Five snacks or treats I enjoy?
· Yogurt-covered pretzels
· Twizzlers
· Gummi Worms and Gummi Bears
· Wheat crackers with pickle relish or peach pineapple salsa
· Breyer's triple chocolate ice cream (especially the white chocolate section)

Things I would do if I were a billionaire?
· Start a college prep tutoring non-profit for low-income middle and high school kids
· Buy a place in Villefranche-sur-Mer
· Go live in Villefranche-sur-Mer after I take a trip around the world
· Pay off the bills of everyone in my immediate family and create investment funds for them
· Give money to lots and lots of charities

Five of my bad habits?
-Throwing clothes on floor of my closet
-Procrastination
-Not taking care of myself as much as I should
-Too much multi-tasking
-Inability to spend money on myself

Five places I have lived?
-LA
-New York City
-Guangzhou, People's Republic of China
-Montreal
-Chicago

Five jobs I’ve had?
· Teacher
· Teacher supervisor
· Bank teller (I thought I'd get robbed every day)
· Research Assistant
· Waitress/Restaurant Hostess

Gosh that was fun! Now you know I want to tag some of y'all but I'll refrain. But, if you do this meme, let me know!

Los Angeles On A Plane

There were no snakes on the plane. But LA was in full effect.

After a long overnight flight from LA, and an even longer layover in the Detroit airport (their computers were down), I finally arrived at my parents house at around 11 AM this morning. And I'm exhausted.

I usually like taking red eye flights. I can conk out and sleep through the flight, no problem. Plus, red eye's are quiet, uneventful affairs. Folks don't run their mouths and spill too many of their secrets. I like overhearing all of someone's business, trust me, I do. But a girl needs a break from all that sometimes.

Last night's red eye flight from LA would have been rather uneventful if it hadn't been for two things: the meth addict and the Scientologist.

To start, the window seat I'd selected when I bought my ticket was not the seat I got when my boarding pass was handed to me.

"So sorry, Miss. The flight's booked and we can't change your seat."

Fine. No reason to flip out, right? I'm thinking, no problem. I'm flexible. I'll sit in the middle seat and drift away into dreamland.

Well, my new seat happened to be in the very back row of the plane. In case you've never had the privilege of sitting in those seats, that means that the seats don't recline.

Gosh, I just love sitting straight up on an overnight flight.

Those great seats were also right across from the airplane restroom. To my right was a very healthy-sized gentleman. He got up to use the restroom four times. I began to wonder if he timed his need to go with the exact moment I started to doze off.

To my left was a frail young man who was intently reading a thick paperback book. After about a minute of sitting next to me, he says, "You know they let airplane pilots have a .04 blood alcohol level?"

I did not know that. I had never thought about it before. But, he kept speculating about whether or not the pilots were tipsy. This was not the kind of discussion I needed to have before takeoff. I think he saw that in my face, so he switched topics. He closed his heavy book and turned it over so that the cover faced up.

Great. Just great.

"Have you ever read Dianetics before?" he asked.

"No, I haven't I," I said, snapping open my collection of short stories. I hoped he'd take a hint and notice the lack of eye contact.

Unfortunately, the flood gates were open. He started to explain what a wonderful book it was and how Scientology had changed his life.

And it could change mine too.

Not that I'm not down for changing my life, but I'll pass on transforming it through Scientology. To make that perfectly clear, I decided to take a page from my three year-old's bad behavior book. I looked Mr. Scientology in the eye and said, as coldly as I could, "I don't want to talk about it." Then I majestically swung my body back around and once more picked up my short story collection.

He sort of cowered in his seat after that, reading the book and looking furtively at me from time to time. I felt a little bad, but I just wasn't in the mood to hear his Scientology schpiel.

I suppose it could have been worse though. I could have been one of the horrified passengers seated twenty rows in front me. I could have been seated next to the (probable) crystal meth addict.

Are you wondering why I think this guy was a meth addict?

Well, how about obvious tweaking behavior, uncontrollable scratching, sores on his body...ugh!

I saw him while I was waiting for someone to put their bag in the overhead bin. Meth Man was easy to spot because of the constant twitching and scratching. I prayed for his poor soul. I have empathy for his situation. I just wouldn't want to sit next to him.

From the looks on the faces of the folks seated around him, no one else wanted to sit there either.

Seriously, how LA could this flight get? A meth addict and a Scientologist on the same plane!

The only thing that could have been better is maybe if the Scientologist had ended up sitting next to Meth Man. They could have done a little in-flight "deprogramming". The Scientologist could have surely cured Meth Man of his addiction.

Sigh.

We'll never know the possibilities. But I'm telling you, red-eye rehab could have been born.