And what a week it was, Pt. One
Dec. 9th, 2001 03:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sierciaThe flight out to Phoenix was blissfully uneventful. Despite only having 45 minutes to change plans in O'hare, we made our connection flawlessly, even having time to get coffee and danish. Boston was a bit hairier. The airport opens at 4:30, we got there at 4:40 to find that the lines were completely unbelievable, both for checking baggage and going through security, and we had a 5:55 flight time. We could only think that people with 7:00 or 8:00 flights decided they should get there extra early, and were clogging up the works for the rest of us. But, American Airlines gets kudos for weeding people with early flights out of the lines, and getting us through both check-in and security with plenty of time to spare. And both our flights were close to empty, so we had plenty of space to spread out and be comfortable.
Widget seemed to like flying - she thought the airplane was fascinating, with lots of new things to explore and touch and taste, and a captive audience for her charms. Despite being a little fussy for being overtired, she was overall, quite a good little girl. And she was completely confounded watching the ground come up to meet her when we landed.
The rental car was there, with a car seat, thankfully. That was somewhat up in the air, due to how my Dad made the reservations. We would have ended up going with another company had we not been able to get one, but it wouldn't have been without a large scene, which my Dad excells at creating.
The drive from Phoenix to Tucson was uneventful, and beautiful. I love the desert. I forget how much, since I get to see it so infrequently - it had been 11 years since my last trip out to Arizona. I could completely see myself retiring there. Well, there or the coast of Maine. Obviously, I need to figure out a way to be able to afford both.
As we were flying into Phoenix, I counted at least 8 brilliantly green golf courses. In the middle of the desert. And I was struck by just how blatantly we waste resources here. Maybe it's just me, but it seems close to immoral. I commented as such to my Dad, and his take on it was that it's not surprising, given the population of Phoenix etc. And that if there was sufficient demand, the city or developers could obviously afford the cost of watering all that grass. I just can't believe (or maybe accept) that "they can afford it" is an acceptable line of reasoning for justifying something as wasteful as having huge expanses of grass in the desert. But I kept my mouth shut, 'cause arguing with my Dad about stuff like that is generally just not worth it.
There was a lot of just keeping my mouth shut this week. My Dad's a die-hard Republican, and completely supportive of all that our frightening President is doing in the "war on terrorism" Sometimes I'm not sure how he produced a daughter like me (and he probably wonders that himself). Again, we're both too sure we're right about what we believe in to be able to do anything but just argue, so I found it better to just be quiet rather than get into it with him. It's funny. We're so much alike, even though our viewpoints are so radically different.
Widget seemed to like flying - she thought the airplane was fascinating, with lots of new things to explore and touch and taste, and a captive audience for her charms. Despite being a little fussy for being overtired, she was overall, quite a good little girl. And she was completely confounded watching the ground come up to meet her when we landed.
The rental car was there, with a car seat, thankfully. That was somewhat up in the air, due to how my Dad made the reservations. We would have ended up going with another company had we not been able to get one, but it wouldn't have been without a large scene, which my Dad excells at creating.
The drive from Phoenix to Tucson was uneventful, and beautiful. I love the desert. I forget how much, since I get to see it so infrequently - it had been 11 years since my last trip out to Arizona. I could completely see myself retiring there. Well, there or the coast of Maine. Obviously, I need to figure out a way to be able to afford both.
As we were flying into Phoenix, I counted at least 8 brilliantly green golf courses. In the middle of the desert. And I was struck by just how blatantly we waste resources here. Maybe it's just me, but it seems close to immoral. I commented as such to my Dad, and his take on it was that it's not surprising, given the population of Phoenix etc. And that if there was sufficient demand, the city or developers could obviously afford the cost of watering all that grass. I just can't believe (or maybe accept) that "they can afford it" is an acceptable line of reasoning for justifying something as wasteful as having huge expanses of grass in the desert. But I kept my mouth shut, 'cause arguing with my Dad about stuff like that is generally just not worth it.
There was a lot of just keeping my mouth shut this week. My Dad's a die-hard Republican, and completely supportive of all that our frightening President is doing in the "war on terrorism" Sometimes I'm not sure how he produced a daughter like me (and he probably wonders that himself). Again, we're both too sure we're right about what we believe in to be able to do anything but just argue, so I found it better to just be quiet rather than get into it with him. It's funny. We're so much alike, even though our viewpoints are so radically different.
