Day 3 of Southern Road Trip and Houston Makes a Final Stand

Waking up in New Orleans on what turned out to be a relatively calm street, we played tourists and got beignets at the famous Café du Monde. Every employee appeared to be angry and Vietnamese. We asked for four beigets and the lady yelled at us and said, "No! Two! For you two!" and promptly stormed off to put in our reduced order. It would not be the first time that someone on wait staff attempted to convince me that I should be eating less than I'm asking for, but she seemed so assured of herself, I was taken aback. Perhaps she was trying to tell me I'm fat.

After our beignets, we left the hotel and found that my parent's car was still intact with no broken windows. We parked it on the street for $2 so as to avoid the $48 parking fee at the nearby lot. From New Orleans, we proceeded to drive for over 300 miles until we got to Buc-ee's where we had oversized meals and a delightful banana pudding and completed the remaining 20 miles into Houston.

If you recall, I was fairly certain I would not be assigned any trips due to the fact I had only two days remaining in Houston before transferring to LA. But of course with that confidence came an unexpected trip to humble me one final time. Around 11pm, I discovered I had been assigned a pairing that would be going up to Cleveland, O'Hare, and Milwaukee, then back down to Houston on the following day and over to Pittsburgh for an overnight followed by a deadhead back to Houston on May 1st when I was supposed to be in LA. Oy vey! I called to make the correction, but I would still be stuck flying on those final two days (including my birthday!).

Poor Nicole was left behind to bond with my family and sister who had just given birth to a ten-pound sack of potatoes. We finally met up on the 30th and flew together from Houston to LA on what would be my final commute. It had been a very long day that began early morning in Milwaukee and involved two legs just to commute home from Pittsburgh, but with that effort came an increased sense of accomplishment. This called for donuts! And perhaps Randy's Donuts knew that it was my birthday. I asked for a dozen and was given 15. What a day!

Second Day in the Dirty South

After eating a very southern-style breakfast of grits, andouille sausage, and beignets, we walked a little bit around Mobile. We saw a shipbuilding yard for what can only be described as stealth boats for the navy. There were about as many people out and about during the day as there were last evening. At one point I walked by a cafe where I swear I saw a woman stirring her drink with a strip of bacon. If it wasn't bacon, I'm not sure what I saw. Around 11:30, we left Mobile and drove through Pascagoula for a bit just to see what it had to offer. It offered nothing other than perhaps the inspiration for the name of the Sassagoula café at DisneyWorld's Port Orleans resort. We stopped off in Biloxi, Mississippi for lunch. We ate at a quirky place that looked like someone's house. Nicole and I played checkers while eating sandwiches. Nicole won at checkers and chose our next destination. I am not sure how she even found out about it, but our next stop was a giant rocking chair in Gulfport, Mississippi.

Here you see her running toward the giant rocking chair with more excitement than my four-year-old niece seeing Anna & Elsa at DisneyWorld. After she discovered she couldn't actually sit and rock in the world's largest rocking chair, (and accordingly couldn't discuss how it was good to have land while sipping on a lemonade and venting about the oppressive southern heat), she returned to the car. Within about 30 seconds, the sky erupted with extremely intense rain. This slowed our progress a bit because I was unable to drive the speed limit even with the wipers on full blast. By the time we crossed the border into Louisiana, it had calmed down a bit and we drove across the Lake Pontchartrain causeway and finally into New Orleans. It was a bit of a battle with traffic, horses, and middle-aged folks drunk in the middle of the day, but we eventually found a place to park.

Nicole and I are fairly calm individuals who don't fancy large crowds or drunkards, so when we saw large crowds of drunkards we were a bit overwhelmed. Fortunately, we were able to find a place to eat that was a bit removed from all the craziness. We were able to eat on a balcony above the action. I had an alligator po' boy. Nicole had some red beans and rice and a salad. It was a gassy evening. After dinner, we walked around a bit more and made the obligatory trip down Bourbon Street. There was a surprising amount of folks pushing sixty (or more) getting drunk.

I was almost hit by someone driving a rascal . . . twice. It was time to get the hell off Bourbon Street. We bought a pair of Abita Amber cans at a liquor store, where Nicole had a run-in with a man wearing a cape and headed back to drink our beers and relax. We are staying at a very unique place with a very large balcony on a relatively calm street. It is a nice escape from the insanity that is New Orleans. Tomorrow is our last day of the road trip and we should be back in good ol' Houston by evening.

Day One of the Great Southern Road Trip

Due to the unpredictable nature of flying standby, I successfully made it to Orlando from Houston, but Nicole found herself in an oversold situation on the only United flight from LAX to Orlando for the day. After her unsuccessful first attempt, I routed her through Atlanta and on to Daytona Beach, where I picked her up around 9:00pm and we drove up to Savannah, Georgia to spend the night. The following morning, we walked around the historic district for a bit, snapping a few pictures along the way.

The last time I visited Savannah was during my winter break in grad school. During that period of time, a severe cold snap hit the south and the warmest it got when I was there was a shocking 26º. Fortunately this time was much more pleasant with temps in the low 70s for our morning stroll. We drove a little bit around the town and saw where Forrest Gump sat at the bus stop recounting his stories of 'Nam and runnin' and Jenn-ay. Oddly enough, we saw someone dressed up as him during breakfast at the Holiday Inn Express. I was grabbing my cinnamon rolls while I overheard a very over-the-top southern accent and just assumed this was standard for the area. I didn't realize there was a character breakfast going on behind me. From Savannah, we headed west toward Alabama. Highlights from the drive included Nicole's first trip to Chick-fil-a and . . . that's about it. It's difficult to convey just the sheer lack of anything between cities in the south. There are very few places to exit and grab food and not much to look at off the side of the road.


Eventually we arrived in Montgomery, Alabama. Why Montgomery you ask? Well, it just so happens that there is a minor league baseball team called the Montgomery Biscuits. Its mascot is a biscuit with eyes, baseball cleats, and a tongue made out of butter. While we didn't actually see a game, we made sure to pick up some much-needed biscuit merchandise. At one point we had considered spending the night in Montgomery, but the town was virtually dead. Restaurants were closed, businesses boarded up, streets void of cars. We saw a memorial for Rosa Parks, but the museum was also closed.

We continued our drive south from Montgomery through the town of Greenville, Alabama, where we were hoping to find a place to eat. The best Yelp reviews were for a bbq place next to a gas station. In person, it was a tiny shack in disrepair with a heavyset man passed out in front of it. A few of the other eating places listed were boarded up or closed. Where do people in Greenville eat? It is a question that has no answer. We continued south for another two hours until we got to the very bottom of Alabama and the city of Mobile. While outwardly, it looks like much more of a city, it too is a bit like a ghost town. While we were able to find a restaurant that was open with relative ease, the streets were pretty dead. I understand it's a Tuesday and it's not exactly mardi gras, but it would be unusual to see a car driving down the street or people out and about. I'm just not used to this sort emptiness. Even Washington, DC was more lively at night. Nevertheless, Mobile is a quaint looking town. In some ways it reminds me of New Orleans, but maybe a bit cleaner. I am glad we chose to continue driving rather than stay in Greenville for the night. It's a different world in the south.

Winding Down in Houston

I have entered my final week at the Houston base and things are finally coming to a close. The area has been pounded by storms and heavy rains that resulted in flooding. There was one day of good sunny weather when I took this picture of a 777 with a Star Wars BB-8 livery. We were preparing to depart toward Acapulco, yet another Mexican destination. Without a doubt, I have spent more time flying back and forth to Mexico than I have within the United States since being based in Houston. I can't even count how many times I have flown down to Monterrey. Lately I've been assigned primarily local flights where I am back in Houston by day's end.

This has advantages and disadvantages. I find myself being put to work at my sister's house. Fortunately Buc-ee is available to assist, though he struggled with power tools. At one point, he was spinning counter-clockwise at great speed around the drill. It's a good thing he wears safety goggles. With my sister smuggling some kind of large creature in her belly, my LA transfer cannot come soon enough. Most people describe a pregnant belly as appearing to be hiding a basketball. This is no basketball. It's like a yoga ball in there if I ever saw one. It has become a full house with my parents also taking care of business around the house.

In an effort to solve two problems at once, I plan to transport my parents vehicle from Florida to Texas while experiencing everything the "dirty" south has to offer. Road trip! It should be an adventure. After this journey through the deep south, I technically have two more days of reserve in Houston, but I can't imagine them calling me because they are so limited as to what they can give me. It couldn't be anything more than a quick out-and-back trip (presumably to Mexico). In any event, I look forward to having some free time next month to finally use my travel benefits to go somewhere fun instead of using them to commute to work. Farewell jumpseat. Farewell running through the airport to make a tight connection after landing. From now on, I shall just walk out the door, into my car, and back home. Huzzah! For now, let's all reflect at where I've been flying since late fall.

Tacos.

I was assigned a simple out-and-back trip down to Leon/Guanajuato in Mexico. This time, I would be arriving in the evening, and departing early morning, so not much time to venture out and explore. However, while introducing myself to the crew, they inquired, "Do you like tacos?" Who doesn't like tacos? Everyone likes tacos. You know who didn't like tacos? . . . Hitler. One of the flight attendants stated that if I didn't like tacos, she would have been forced to call the airline and have the flight restaffed with someone who likes tacos. This can all be very serious business. If you recall from my previous Guanajuato post, the hotel is not within walking distance from the town center, so I thought they had plans to all hop in a taxi and get tacos downtown. I was wrong. We merely took a stroll down the street for a couple blocks and plopped ourselves down at a place called Brasitacos. And if you try and find it online, you will not. You may think you found it, but that is a different Brasitacos in a different town.

It is a very unassuming place. Bottles of coke line the fridge at the far end. A TV rests on top of the fridge playing a local soccer game accented with the excitement one would expect from a Mexican soccer game. Goooooooooooooooooooooal! The kitchen staff, in full view of its patrons, is vigorously making tacos and putting together plates of carne asada, and stuffed potatoes. I ordered a total of four tacos - two chorizo and two pastor. Pastor, in this case, meaning thinly sliced pork off of the spit you see in the picture. It was not a very kosher meal, but it was all delicious. The cost for four tacos and a Fanta? $3. I guarantee you that will beat any Taco Tuesday in the U.S. I didn't think to actually take a picture of my tacos because I was too busy eating them. Yay tacos! And I know my Mom is currently sitting in Houston in a panic thinking to herself, "Why did he go there?! He's going to get sick! They probably don't wash their hands!" Statistically, it's safer than Chipotle. Furthermore, I have heard from multiple crews to stay away from the Applebee's because people have gotten ill.

One cannot judge a place by its exterior. Unless that place is Chipotle . . . then you should definitely judge and also question your other life decisions. These low brow tacos were the best meal I've had in Mexico to date. And part of it was the atmosphere itself. There were certainly no tourists, or anyone speaking english for that matter. The flight crew was mildly shocked when I rattled off my order in spanish. While they speculated that I either had a spanish-speaking girlfriend or studied in school, they seemed a bit confused that I had somehow taught myself using an iPad app. Again...things are not always as they seem.

Ca$h Money Outing in Palo$ Verde$

My reserve schedule this month is not that great. The longest period of time I have off is this weekend with four consecutive days off. And keep in mind, I am still commuting from LA to Houston which cuts into one of the days. I landed Friday evening in not-so-sunny California where it had uncharacteristically been raining. It was grey all day Saturday and one of the local weather forecasters, named Dallas Raines (naturally), was predicting rain and overcast skies throughout the weekend. We were a bit surprised on Sunday to see sunny skies throughout the area. We decided to head out and explore a little bit. We drove south to Palos Verdes, a peninsula situated between Redondo Beach and Long Beach that is home to numerous hiking trails, the Trump golf course, and the houses of lots of people with a lot of money. We didn't have any particular destination in mind, so we just headed down some random roads and pulled over when we thought something looked interesting. It was the perfect time to test out my new camera.

I put in my bid for the May schedule this morning and it looks like I will have a pretty good chance of getting some good blocks of days off and be able to do some traveling next month. Nicole was excited about this because she will also have some time off. We prepared ourselves accordingly by playing with our cameras. Like an overprotective mother, I had to keep telling Nicole to be careful of the sheer cliffs a few feet away from her. In spite of this, there were some surfers who somehow found their way down the cliffs to the water.

After driving down the road a bit more, we pulled over at San Vicente. I had seen this lighthouse probably a hundred times from the air when I was doing flight training from the nearby Torrance airport. Despite that, I had never actually seen it from the ground. We were not the only photographers at this site. There were about a dozen photographers with massive telephoto zoom lenses pointed at the side of the cliffs. I don't know if they were bird watchers or what their story was, but I do know that they had spent a lot of money on their equipment.

We completed our outing by grabbing some lunch at a small café. There was a blonde-haired youth dressed like a skater wandering the parking lot aimlessly and giving us the stink-eye. One cannot trust the affluent offspring of Palos Verdes yuppies. They have been raised on celery water from Whole Foods and vegan cookies. No wonder he looked so angry. He must have just discovered that his whole life has been a lie and that there is, in fact, nothing organic or GMO-free about vegan cookies. A sad day, indeed.

Wanna Guanajuato?

It was another morning of setting the alarm at 4 am. Also keep in mind that this is also on the east coast, so back in LA, it's 1 am. Somehow, with all these weird time changes and early call times, my body adapts and functions. I have yet to succumb to requiring coffee. They all say it's only a matter of time. I honestly think my body doesn't respond to caffeine anyway. After a three hour flight from Cleveland back to Houston, we went to our new gate and headed off to Guanajuato, Mexico: a new destination. While in Cleveland, I did a little bit of research about the town and thought it was worth investigating. After landing at the small airport, we rode in the shuttle for about 20 minutes to our hotel. This was still a ways from the town center, so I ended up taking a taxi to the zona centro. Somewhere 1500 miles away, I think I heard my mother screech at the thought of me hiring a taxi in Mexico. It was safe. Calm yourself. One interesting aspect of the drive to the zona centro is the tunnels that go beneath the city. They were not technically designed for cars, but for diverting river water back in the day, but it's a maze of underground intersections and junctions now. It's actually pretty interesting in its own right.

After getting dropped off, I explored the town's many squares and plazas. This is a picture of the Parroquia de Basilica Colegiata de Nuestra Señora de Guanajuato. That was a mouthful. I didn't go inside because I felt awkward about it, but it looked very photogenic from the outside in its bright colors. I continued my stroll through the Jardin de la Union, which was surrounded by numerous cafes and a few shops. I stopped here briefly and sat on a bench where I successfully hacked someone's wifi for about 30 mins before I got kicked off.

This is the Jardin as viewed from above at the Monumento al Pipila, which I walked up hundreds of steps to reach. Apparently there was at some time a funicular that would take you to the top of the hill, but it has been broken for months. Tripadvisor suggested getting a taxi to the top, but I discovered that you can walk up the hill by going through numerous alleys with lots and lots of steps. And let's not forget that the city is already around 6,000 feet above sea level, so my heart was pounding pretty hard.

Eventually I reached the top, but it was not without some effort. My 12-year-old self would have had the foresight to count the steps when I started. Then I could rattle off some number that would impress the masses, but all I could *pant* think about was *wheeze*  . . . *coughing fit*. . . actually I can't remember. The view from the top was the best part of my mini day trip into town. It really gave perspective on the layout of the town and you really see how it was built into the hills. And the crazy thing is that I walked up to this overlook twice. It was overcast and hazy when I initially arrived, but after grabbing a late lunch in one of the plazas, the sun came out and broke through and I felt obligated to retake the pictures I already had because the lighting brought out the colors of the buildings a lot better. After spending the week complaining about missing the opportunities to run with any regularity, I have perhaps made up for it by climbing those steps at altitude . . . twice.

Was it worth it? Yes. So as I mentioned, I had a late lunch. I found the cafe by accident. I was on my way to a market, but looked to my right and saw an alley going somewhere that looked interesting, so I forked off. It was a little less touristy than other parts of the town. I just picked a cafe at random without yelping or otherwise. I ordered the carne a la tampiqueña because at least I knew what that was. This version was not only better, but cheaper than the hotel restaurant version I had in Monterrey just days ago.


It was a hearty late lunch and my perpetually hungry stomach decided it didn't really need a dinner. I've been getting good use of my elementary spanish on this trip. I can tell you firsthand that the Duolingo language app does actually help. When I went to Peru and Chile almost eight years ago, I knew "Por Favor,""Gracias," and "Buenos Dias" and that was about the extent of it. Today I was giving directions to a cab driver, discussing money amounts, ordering food, and understanding the responses too. The only snag I ran into was when the waitress asked how I wanted my steak and I really wasn't sure how to convey "medium-well." I did, however, understand when she brought it out that if my steak wasn't how I wanted it, she could take it back and make another one. I was pretty proud of myself for understanding any of that. After a busy day, I noticed a cab was dropping some folks off so I asked if he was "libro" and I successfully got back to the Holiday Inn Express. Hear that Mom? You can relax now.

How Did I End Up In Cleveland?!

I had an early morning show time, but my consolation was that it was an easy leg back to Houston where I would sit for a few hours on "ready reserve" and hopefully go back to my sister's house and relax. Of course, that was not to be. I was trying to be proactive and pull up a flight release on my phone before we got in the hotel shuttle, and quickly discovered that I'd been preassigned another 6 legs over the next 3 days. So with a suitcase filled with short sleeved shirts and board shorts, I discovered I would be flying a leg up to Cleveland. º_º

On account of assuming that I would be relaxing the rest of the day, a 2.5 hour flight to Cleveland wasn't terribly appealing to me. One can never assume anything when working for the airlines, though. Lesson learned. As I sat in the cockpit setting up the flight computer for Cleveland, the trip grew on me. At least I would be busy for the next couple days and punch my ticket home without having to worry whether or not I was going to be called at 4am. The weather in Cleveland was ominous and shortly after landing it began to rain. Once again our hotel was close to nothing. Fortunately, I have a cousin and his family who live in the area.

They said they didn't get many visitors to Cleveland and I think they enjoyed the excuse to go out to a place called Danny Boy's Pizza where I was subtly encouraged to order the "Clevelander," a hybrid Chicago deep-dish pepperoni and sauce extravaganza. It was nice to get out of the hotel for a minute and talk to non flight crew folks.

I had sporadically checked throughout the afternoon to see if people were getting awarded any base transfers. I felt like a hero this last week for the airline. For one call last week, I got to the airport in 35 mins instead of two hours and enabled a flight to depart on time against all odds. Two days later, I agreed to take a standup to Brownsville, Texas when nobody was available. And not that I had a choice this morning, but I didn't call to protest that I didn't have any winter garments for the flights they had assigned me. So in the back of my head, I kept thinking, I have earned the right to get based back home, and at 8:30pm I received an email indicating that my hard work appears to have paid off. Starting May 1, I will finally work where I live. It's time to come home.

Spring Break: Monterrey

Ok, so it's not exactly spring break, but I did spend most of my day at the hotel just sitting at the pool. And isn't that really what most Americans do when they go to Mexico? You never hear of anyone renting a car or exploring. It's Señor Frogs or bust. The problem with my situation is that the hotel is close to the airport, but not really close to anything else. The main city of Monterrey is about 15 miles to the southwest and not really accessible from where I am, so I just accepted that I would be staying up here for the day. I downloaded lots of magazines to my airline-issued Microsoft Surface and sat out by the pool while struggling to see the screen through the glare.

The crew and I met for lunch at the neighboring hotel's attached restaurant. Again, the pickings were slim in this area, but this place came well reviewed by the man on the hotel shuttle, so the decision was made. I ordered carne a la tampiqueña, which is a local dish with foods representing different things from the area, but I ordered it because it sounded good. I enjoy how one can order a steak this massive and get the bill which is about $8. Nom nom nom. After lunch, I did some lounging by the pool. I read various articles from travel magazines about different countries and cities to add to my travel list.

That is . . . if I could see the screen. You see, the Microsoft Surface is one of the most poorly designed tablets in the history of tablet makery. When Apple came out with the iPad, it came with a few quirks, which were fixed and the iPad became faster and more efficient and an overall solid product. Microsoft looked at Apple and thought to themselves, "We need to make something like the iPad, but let's make it terrible!" Rather than use the iPad as a starting point and improve upon it, they tried to make this weird hybrid desktop/tablet thing that just . . . doesn't work. It freezes, the buttons sometimes lack functionality for turning on/turning off, it lacks touch screen sensitivity, and finally . . . the screen is reflective. The picture at right is not a selfie. It is a picture of the screen of my surface while I was reading a magazine. Do you see the magazine? No. You see everything behind me. I curse at it daily, as does every other Captain I've flown with. Do I prefer it over paper charts? Yes, but that doesn't mean I can't whine about it over and over again.

 There, I saved you $12, or whatever the Microsoft Surface costs. Until next time dear reader, I bid you Adios from Monterrey's industrial district.