So to answer the first question, “My phone was on the desk across the room.” That is a fairly inconvenient place to put your alarm, but I needed the one open electrical outlet near the bed for my bipap machine. Like I said, there is nothing quite like a good night’s sleep and that works better when I remember to breathe. Consequently the bipap won out over the phone. The General won’t believe it. She has me pegged as the guy who’d rather die than have his phone out of reach. Did I mention the General doesn’t always get it right? At times she can be a little overdramatic.
In terms of the second question: “My phone was making that sound because it wasn’t my alarm that was ringing”. It was the phone signaling an incoming call. I don’t know when or how the phone setting for the sound got changed, but it definitely was not the sound of Sherwood Forest and it wasn’t a French horn that I was hearing. It was an irritating noise.
When I finally located my phone in the dark and answered it, I discovered it is really difficult to talk with a bipap facemask still covering your face. I simply unplugged it from the air-supply and was attempting to carry on a conversation though it. My mind was racing. Who was calling and what did they want? The sound of the guy’s voice was unmistakable and I immediately connected the dots in my head.
It was a colleague and board member. I had missed his call around 9:00 p.m. Apparently, my phone was on silent and I didn’t hear the vibration from across the room. I didn’t discover the missed call until around 10:00. As a rule of thumb, you generally don’t initiate a telephone call to anyone after 9:00 p.m., but this guy had traveled across the country to get to D.C. Instead of calling him, I texted: “I just found your message. If you’re still up, give me a call.”
It never occurred to me that he’d wait until 11:00 p.m. to return my call. Thankfully, it wasn’t yet morning and I could get the sleep I perceived I needed before my meeting the following morning. Did I mention I almost never went back to sleep and when I did I awakened on my own accord at 3:15 a.m.? I’ve heard the line: “Early to bed-early to rise.” I went to bed early because I had awakened the previous morning at 3:15 a.m. I didn’t need to duplicate the experience again. I may not have needed to, but I did.
So what did I think about for the next hour and forty-five minutes before I got out of bed? I had the thought, air travel isn’t as much fun as it used to be. I’m resistive to the notion that I’m getting older, but there is nothing restful about being loaded into a flying bus like a can of sardines, settling for one lousy miniature package of peanuts that you had difficulty opening and wishing you had a handful because you’re still hungry.
I haven’t noticed that airfares have dropped and it wasn’t that long ago that you got two packages of peanuts and they were easier to open. In fact, once I had the good fortune of flying from Austin to Dallas and they gave me and the other two passengers on the plane a large plastic bag filled with packages of peanuts. I guess that was the bonus for making it through the fog to the airport. Like I referenced, “It was a plane loaded with three passengers and a crew of twice as many”. The crew wanted to get back to “Big D”. Of course the plane sat on the runway for well over an hour-to- two hours before the tower gave permission for takeoff, but we were on our way and the extra peanuts were a real treat. Just for the record, I didn’t eat them all before we arrived in Dallas.
I left for the airport in Austin yesterday morning at 4:30 a.m. and it was twelve hours later before I arrived at my hotel in Washington. I had only had two packages of peanuts (one for each leg of the flight) and no time in between flights to do it differently. I was tired and I was hungry.
What was true for me was also true for a colleague from Amarillo who was on the same flight from Dallas. Travel is more fun when you have someone with whom to talk. I’ve been known to have some interesting discussions with folks sitting on either side of me on the airplane, but that is not always the case. Sometimes you read the body language and intuitively know that conversation is off-limits. Sometimes, I probably communicate the same silent message. Strange isn’t it how we can be on either side of the coin?
Trust me, when I have the good fortune of visiting with folks and learning their story, I always emerge from the flight feeling I’ve been given a gift. Actually, the gift of meeting people and knowing something about them is even better than being gifted with two small miniature packages of peanuts.
When I got to the hotel late afternoon, I asked the clerk: “May I have a room near the top?” I added: “I promise I will stay inside.” Normally that line garners a laugh, but she didn’t crack a smile. She looked at the computer screen and said: “We have you in an accessible room. Do you need it?” They had me in a what? Just for the record, I’m the guy that passes up the close-in parking spaces. There is nothing wrong with my mobility and I take none of it for granted. I didn’t need a handicap accessible room.
I guess I was so tired yesterday that I didn’t notice I’m in an “accessible room”. Apparently they have one on every floor. Simply noticing it this morning filled me with a sense of thankfulness that I can function without that amenity. A lot of folks can’t.
The late lunch/early dinner was at a restaurant very near the hotel. In addition, introducing the restaurant to my colleague from Amarillo who had not been there before was also a nice experience. The food is exceptional. It is a Mexican cuisine, but it isn’t Tex-Mex. Seriously – quail and duck are on the menu. I opted for fish tacos. They were delicious.
Okay, so it is about 6:30 and my musings of the day are completed. I’m ready for my meeting and may even arrive early.
All My Best!
Don