another bohemian adventure!

Snowshoeing on Mount Rainier in Washington state.
Copyright (c) 2005 Wendee Holtcamp

I had a great day! It doesn't FEEL like it's 2am Houston time, but alas it is. I better get to bed but not before a quick update on my latest "bohemian adventure." I left my home about 245, for a 430pm flight. Had a good productive morning and played Gin rummy with the kids right before leaving. When I was at the airport ticket counter, my cell phone dropped on the floor from the check-in kiosk. I have done this before, and it has never fazed it. But this time... it died. Dead as a doorknob. When I got to the gate, I desperately tried everything to resurrect it. Nothing. Not taking the battery out, not taking the battery out for 10 minutes, not taking the SIM card out, not plugging it in… Not prayer. It just got stuck in this endless “loading” loop. I even kept that loading looop on for 30 minutes to see if it would get out of the loop and load up, but no, it just got overheated. Ack! Panic! How can I go on a trip without my cell phone! How can I survive without instant access to email, facebook, and twitter?! But eventually I surrendered, put it in my bag, and took out the battery and flew to Salt Lake City, en route to Seattle.

When I got to Salt Lake City, I did what any reasonable person would do, and I dropped it two feet onto a hard floor to see if that would jolt it into action – sort of the way a defibrillator works on the heart. OK maybe this is not what a reasonable person would do, but I'm telling you this technique has worked for me on various pieces of electronic equipment in the past, so it was worth a shot. I did this in the bathroom stall so no one would see me and report me to the cell phone police. And guess what – it worked!! No kidding!! I’m a genius!

Besides that little excitement, the 2 flights were a wee bit bumpy but nothing bad, and I had some nice conversations with the guys sitting next to me on the flights, and with a guy at the bar in Salt Lake City, who, oddly enough had just dropped his girlfriend off at Texas A&M though he was from California and in Salt Lake City at the time - small world since that's where I went to school. Not that I hang out at bars typically, but I was waiting for my salad and the bartender was charging my phone, because oddly enough after it finally worked again, the battery had gone from totally charged to about 1/4 strength. Maybe all the endless feedback loop drained it, I don't know. And in other news, while on the plane I actually got a lot done on the book chapter I was working on foreevvvveeer, so I feel soooo great about that!

Then I arrived at the Seattle airport, rented a car and drove to my cousin Holly's home where I am now showered and tucked into bed, after a nice conversation with her this evening. Tomorrow morn I am driving to Portland to work on my book and blogs at The Fresh Pot which has wireless, then going to a Wednesday potluck with my dad and Bev at his church in Longview for dinner! So au revoir my friends, catch ya again soon!