Vacation Commences

I’m glad we decided to go down to the airport Friday night instead of early Saturday. It was far more relaxing to book the room at the airport hotel and then only have to cross the bridge to get to our check-in counter than it would have been to get up extra early, drive to long term parking and then wait for the shuttle to show up to take us to the airport.

I was amazed at how busy the airport was at 4:00 am. I had expected the ticket counters to be closed, but The Professor’s airline was open for business when we arrived, and mine opened at 4:30 (and already had a line that extended well past the cordoned-off areas in front of the counter). By the time I made it to the counter, my airline had a line that was literally out the door and onto the sidewalk!

Security to the departure gates didn’t open until 6:00, and it was shortly before 6:00 that I completed check-in and headed for that line. As luck would have it, The Professor was already up there in line, and saw me approaching. I was able to wait in line with him, and then wait at the gate with him until he departed. I then had two hours to wait myself.

I slept on the first leg of my flight, and watched “Pay it Forward” on the second leg of my journey. I enjoyed the movie, but it was one of those half-box of Kleenex numbers. The poor teenaged girl in the seat next to mine was bawling her eyes out at the end of it. Unwilling to be seen crying at a movie in public, I simply sat there and acted like the choking noises I was making were just me clearing my throat.

By the time we arrived in CA I had a throbbing headache, and was desperately glad to see The Professor waiting for me as I descended the escalator towards baggage pickup. My bag showed up early (for a change), and there was only one person ahead of us in the car rental line, so we were out of there rather quickly. By the time we were in the rental car I was seeing little spots in front of eyes, and was grateful I could palm the driving off onto The Prof.

First stop was to line up a motel room. We already knew of an inexpensive place in town not far from his folks, and they (fortunately) had a room for four nights, which was (unfortunately) a smoking room. It was the only one they had available, so we did the “beggars can’t be choosers” routine and took it. Fortunately, after a huge airing out the room no longer smelled of nicotine after the first day. It did my headache no favor that first day, though.

Then on to The Prof’s folks house. He was raised by his grandparents, who are getting on in years. His grandmother has been diagnosed as very early stage Alzheimer’s, and his grandfather is currently on chemo for prostate cancer (although he’s doing well and looking remarkably fit). The Professor hadn’t told them we weren’t staying with them, and they’d gone to a lot of trouble getting TWO rooms ready for us (so we’d have a choice of which room we’d want). I gave him a dirty look over that, but it was too late to have done anything about it.

We stayed for a nice long visit, which ended up with The Prof talking with his grandmother in the den while his grandfather (the ex-Marine) cornered me in the kitchen. There is apparently an expectation that we will be moving out to California sooner rather than later, and STAYING WITH THEM! His grandfather must have found about a dozen different ways of telling me that it was too much for him to take care of his wife while he was undergoing chemo. While I was being pumped on how my job hunt in California was coming along, and how long did I think it was going to be before we could move out, all I could think about was how many different ways could I broil The Prof once we made our escape.

Upon later questioning The Prof said that he was aware of his grandfather’s expectations and that nothing The Prof said ever seemed to sink in. My private feeling is that The Prof tends to not deal with anything that deals with a contradiction between his wants and his grandfather’s plans. Which also explains why his grandparents weren’t told we weren’t staying with them at Christmas. Fortunately, The Prof’s grandparents have three grown daughters on the West Coast, two of whom are within ten minutes drive. My unwillingness to move out and move in will in no way undermine their ability to remain in the house and continue to live as independently as possible. Gods help me, I don’t think I want to get into the middle of this one, though I can see that eventually I will be sucked into it if I’m not exceedingly careful/lucky.