A Wonderful Week
On the Friday after Christmas, I drove down to Louis Armstrong Airport in New Orleans. I had a book with me, a compilation of Frasier scripts Heather and Will gave me for Christmas, and although it's one of my favorite TV shows -- one of the few that reads well in script form as it does watching the performance -- I found it a little difficult to concentrate. I was waiting for someone. Waiting for my Erin. We hadn't seen each other since June, and she hadn't come to Louisiana since my sister's wedding back in September of '06, so I was anxious all over. I couldn't wait to see her again. Her plane was delayed, but only a little, and when she came down the concourse to my waiting arms, it was like no time had passed at all.
Our visits are so ecclectic. Sometimes we've got days where we're trying to decide what to do. Sometimes it feels as if almost every second is accounted for before we even meet up with one another. This trip fell into that second category. With the New Year holiday and assorted other get-togethers and plans, it seemed that we'd be lucky to sneak in even a few quick moments just for us.
We were very lucky.
That Friday, after she came into town, we wound up going to my grandmother's house. My grandmother has been after me to bring Erin to her house since her first visit, but it just hadn't happened before. On this particular weekend, some of our cousins from Texas were in town for a visit, and the family wanted to get together with them. Oddly enough, of all my relatives, some of these had met Erin before -- back when we had to evacuate to Texas after Hurricane Katrina. It was a nice visit, and as always, Erin blushed over how much my family loves her. There was one minor mishap right off the bat, though: somewhere after checking in at the Pittsburgh airport, Erin had lost her driver's license.
Although the license was -- as it turns out -- waiting for her when she got home, she needed one to actually get on the plane in New Orleans. She wound up having to call her mother to get the DMV to send her a replacement in priority mail, a process that required us getting some forms off the internet, getting them notorized and faxing them up there before the license could be released. My dad was a big help with that, helping us find the notary and use the fax machine in his office. I know Erin was really grateful.
After the Great Driver's License Adventure, Saturday was ours for the most part -- we went out and did a little shopping before meeting up with my friends for dinner. Most of the ol' group was there -- Jason and Andrea, Mike and Kim, and Kenny all made it. (Chase was working and Jenny couldn't join us.) This was the first time that Andrea or Kenny had met Erin, and as Kenny pointed out, it was nice to know she wasn't fictional. The plan was to meet for dinner and then catch a movie, Sweeny Todd being at the top of the list. We went to Pepper's in Houma (which, incidentally, is freaking awesome) and had a night of pizza, drinks, and a slab of lasagna roughly large enough to make the boats on "It's a Small World" bottom out and strand a dozen tourists from Hoboken in a room full of creepy midget animatronics singing at them in German. By the time we were ready to leave the movie had already started, and the next showing was ridiculously late. We still planned to try and make it, but while hanging out at Target to kill time, we realized we were all too tired (this is a euphamism for "old") to try to hit a 10:50 p.m. movie. The trip to Target wasn't a complete waste, though -- Erin found an Ani DiFranco CD she'd been looking for, I got my hand on the Futurama: Bender's Big Score movie (which we watched together), and our journey in the toy department introduced us to a talking Puss in Boots doll that was supposed to whistle and flirt with you when you walked by, but for some reason only seemed to do it for Kenny. Draw your own conclusions.
One other nice thing while we were there -- Erin got me a little stuffed Thing doll, knowing he's my favorite Marvel comic character.
He now occupies a place of honor in my car:
We spent Sunday at home watching our respective teams, the Saints and Steelers, take turns losing games. The good news is, Erin got to bond with the cats, Casper and Rascal:
That night Erin was introduced to another Petit Christmas tradition -- getting together with the Champagnes, who have been friends of the family since before I was born. Chip and Kayla came down from Baton Rouge and we joined them, Heather and Will in a game of Will's A Christmas Story monopoly for a while before we left. It was actually painful to leave -- by the time we had to put the game away Chip had only bought one property and there were only a handful left. He usually wins these games so handily that I have to admit, we were having fun watching him struggle a little.
Donna and Gill Champagne have been close friends with my parents for a really long time, and every year for Christmas our two families get together at their house. I do believe this year set a record in how many people we had, though. Aside from Chip and Heather each having their spouses and me having Erin with me, both of Donna and Gill's kids -- Amber (who is my age) and Jordan (a college freshman) were there, and so was Amber's five-year-old son Chase. It was a great evening, with lots of food, conversation, and catching up. Although the highlight, as Chip would quickly remind you, was a session of playing Lego Star Wars 2: The Original Trilogy on the X-Box against the five-year-old. Although they were technically on the same team, I think most of us would agree Chase won.
Monday was New Year's Eve. Erin and I went out again, doing a little more shopping and the like before meeting up with Chip, Kayla, Heather and Will to buy some excitement for the evening's festivities:
For the party, we went to Tammy and Carl's party, co-hosted by my Aunt Mona and Uncle Joe, as we have for several years now. It was a great party, with tons of food, Jambalaya Po-Boys, copious amounts of adult beverages and, for some reason, a Guitar Hero jam session.
And finally, after all this time we've been together, I got to kiss my sweetie at midnight.
After the ball dropped, we began the annual tradition of blowing up enough firecrackers to destroy a small subcontinent. It started wonderfully -- until...
Thaaaaat's right. It's technically illegal to shoot off fireworks in our town, but as we've been doing it for 30 years (and, in fact, the police officers on our street frequently light them WITH us) we'd never had a problem before. Someone "anonymously" complained about it this year, though. Ahem.
But phooey on them. New Year's Day is for sleeping late, which we did, and going to dinner at my grandmother's house, which we also did. This time my Uncle Wally managed to join us, which was especially nice since he was ill and missed Christmas this year. We had a great visit, and Erin again was reminded that my family thinks she's the bee's knees. When she reads this, I know she's going to make fun of me for using the phrase "bee's knees."
The next day Erin and I went down to New Orleans so she could again visit her personal mecca -- the Lush store. She was slightly disappointed in their selection this time, until she heard the magic words "buy one, get one free." After she finished, she calculated just how much free stuff she got and it was, as expected, an awful lot. We walked around a bit more, seeing some sights and enjoying New Orleans on the single coldest day I've ever spent in the French Quarter.
That's Saint Louis Cathedral behind us. We know you can't see it. We don't care.
Thursday was fun. A while back, my 2 in 1 Showcase partner, Chase, discovered that I haven't actually seen that many episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. As he and his wife Jenny, as well as Erin, are all HUGE fans of the show, they resolved that when she visited they were going to make me watch a mini-marathon of episodes and then we'd all record an episode of the podcast. It turned out to be a lot of fun -- I loved it, and it was great to get the girls on the show with us for a change. That episode will be online next weekend. Ooh, Erin also got to play with the cats again. She wants to demonstrate, for example, just what a little chubby Casper actually IS:
Friday kinda sucked. I had to go to work for a professional development day which consisted of a very charismatic speaker who, in retrospect, didn't actually say much, and the realization that the school has fewer English 2 teacher's edition textbooks than it has English 2 teachers, which is really bad mathematics. When I got home, I found out that my folks offered to take us out to dinner for Erin's last night in town. We met up with Heather and Will and went to Copeland's Cheesecake Bistro, which is pretty hard to top.
Saturday was such a mixed bag. Erin got the latest flight she could, 6:30 in the afternoon, because she didn't want to ahve to rush through the morning and say goodbye like we do so often. Trouble is, with a 6:30 flight you really need to be at the airport by 4:30, so while it was wonderful to be together, we didn't quite know what to do. I took her to lunch and to Cafe DuMonde for a snack, and we toured some parks in the area, and finally we wound up at the airport quite early. We stayed there together until finally, inevitably, she had to go home.
We didn't have any big events this week. No weddings this time (although Erin is going to try to come back in March for Jason and Andrea's wedding), no big conventions or trips. In fact, except for the shopping, I did pretty much exactly what I would have done last week even if she wasn't there. But having her there, having her with me, made things so much better. We both agreed, as she left, this was the best trip we've had together yet.
Yeah, I know a lot of you guys are asking a certain question. Y'know, you sound like my mother. I'll tell you what Erin and I decided this week.
It's not a question of "if." It's a question of "when."
Good enough?
I love you, Erin. March will be here soon. Just not soon enough.
Our visits are so ecclectic. Sometimes we've got days where we're trying to decide what to do. Sometimes it feels as if almost every second is accounted for before we even meet up with one another. This trip fell into that second category. With the New Year holiday and assorted other get-togethers and plans, it seemed that we'd be lucky to sneak in even a few quick moments just for us.
We were very lucky.
That Friday, after she came into town, we wound up going to my grandmother's house. My grandmother has been after me to bring Erin to her house since her first visit, but it just hadn't happened before. On this particular weekend, some of our cousins from Texas were in town for a visit, and the family wanted to get together with them. Oddly enough, of all my relatives, some of these had met Erin before -- back when we had to evacuate to Texas after Hurricane Katrina. It was a nice visit, and as always, Erin blushed over how much my family loves her. There was one minor mishap right off the bat, though: somewhere after checking in at the Pittsburgh airport, Erin had lost her driver's license.
Although the license was -- as it turns out -- waiting for her when she got home, she needed one to actually get on the plane in New Orleans. She wound up having to call her mother to get the DMV to send her a replacement in priority mail, a process that required us getting some forms off the internet, getting them notorized and faxing them up there before the license could be released. My dad was a big help with that, helping us find the notary and use the fax machine in his office. I know Erin was really grateful.
After the Great Driver's License Adventure, Saturday was ours for the most part -- we went out and did a little shopping before meeting up with my friends for dinner. Most of the ol' group was there -- Jason and Andrea, Mike and Kim, and Kenny all made it. (Chase was working and Jenny couldn't join us.) This was the first time that Andrea or Kenny had met Erin, and as Kenny pointed out, it was nice to know she wasn't fictional. The plan was to meet for dinner and then catch a movie, Sweeny Todd being at the top of the list. We went to Pepper's in Houma (which, incidentally, is freaking awesome) and had a night of pizza, drinks, and a slab of lasagna roughly large enough to make the boats on "It's a Small World" bottom out and strand a dozen tourists from Hoboken in a room full of creepy midget animatronics singing at them in German. By the time we were ready to leave the movie had already started, and the next showing was ridiculously late. We still planned to try and make it, but while hanging out at Target to kill time, we realized we were all too tired (this is a euphamism for "old") to try to hit a 10:50 p.m. movie. The trip to Target wasn't a complete waste, though -- Erin found an Ani DiFranco CD she'd been looking for, I got my hand on the Futurama: Bender's Big Score movie (which we watched together), and our journey in the toy department introduced us to a talking Puss in Boots doll that was supposed to whistle and flirt with you when you walked by, but for some reason only seemed to do it for Kenny. Draw your own conclusions.
One other nice thing while we were there -- Erin got me a little stuffed Thing doll, knowing he's my favorite Marvel comic character.
He now occupies a place of honor in my car:
We spent Sunday at home watching our respective teams, the Saints and Steelers, take turns losing games. The good news is, Erin got to bond with the cats, Casper and Rascal:
That night Erin was introduced to another Petit Christmas tradition -- getting together with the Champagnes, who have been friends of the family since before I was born. Chip and Kayla came down from Baton Rouge and we joined them, Heather and Will in a game of Will's A Christmas Story monopoly for a while before we left. It was actually painful to leave -- by the time we had to put the game away Chip had only bought one property and there were only a handful left. He usually wins these games so handily that I have to admit, we were having fun watching him struggle a little.
Donna and Gill Champagne have been close friends with my parents for a really long time, and every year for Christmas our two families get together at their house. I do believe this year set a record in how many people we had, though. Aside from Chip and Heather each having their spouses and me having Erin with me, both of Donna and Gill's kids -- Amber (who is my age) and Jordan (a college freshman) were there, and so was Amber's five-year-old son Chase. It was a great evening, with lots of food, conversation, and catching up. Although the highlight, as Chip would quickly remind you, was a session of playing Lego Star Wars 2: The Original Trilogy on the X-Box against the five-year-old. Although they were technically on the same team, I think most of us would agree Chase won.
Monday was New Year's Eve. Erin and I went out again, doing a little more shopping and the like before meeting up with Chip, Kayla, Heather and Will to buy some excitement for the evening's festivities:
For the party, we went to Tammy and Carl's party, co-hosted by my Aunt Mona and Uncle Joe, as we have for several years now. It was a great party, with tons of food, Jambalaya Po-Boys, copious amounts of adult beverages and, for some reason, a Guitar Hero jam session.
And finally, after all this time we've been together, I got to kiss my sweetie at midnight.
After the ball dropped, we began the annual tradition of blowing up enough firecrackers to destroy a small subcontinent. It started wonderfully -- until...
Thaaaaat's right. It's technically illegal to shoot off fireworks in our town, but as we've been doing it for 30 years (and, in fact, the police officers on our street frequently light them WITH us) we'd never had a problem before. Someone "anonymously" complained about it this year, though. Ahem.
But phooey on them. New Year's Day is for sleeping late, which we did, and going to dinner at my grandmother's house, which we also did. This time my Uncle Wally managed to join us, which was especially nice since he was ill and missed Christmas this year. We had a great visit, and Erin again was reminded that my family thinks she's the bee's knees. When she reads this, I know she's going to make fun of me for using the phrase "bee's knees."
The next day Erin and I went down to New Orleans so she could again visit her personal mecca -- the Lush store. She was slightly disappointed in their selection this time, until she heard the magic words "buy one, get one free." After she finished, she calculated just how much free stuff she got and it was, as expected, an awful lot. We walked around a bit more, seeing some sights and enjoying New Orleans on the single coldest day I've ever spent in the French Quarter.
That's Saint Louis Cathedral behind us. We know you can't see it. We don't care.
Thursday was fun. A while back, my 2 in 1 Showcase partner, Chase, discovered that I haven't actually seen that many episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. As he and his wife Jenny, as well as Erin, are all HUGE fans of the show, they resolved that when she visited they were going to make me watch a mini-marathon of episodes and then we'd all record an episode of the podcast. It turned out to be a lot of fun -- I loved it, and it was great to get the girls on the show with us for a change. That episode will be online next weekend. Ooh, Erin also got to play with the cats again. She wants to demonstrate, for example, just what a little chubby Casper actually IS:
Friday kinda sucked. I had to go to work for a professional development day which consisted of a very charismatic speaker who, in retrospect, didn't actually say much, and the realization that the school has fewer English 2 teacher's edition textbooks than it has English 2 teachers, which is really bad mathematics. When I got home, I found out that my folks offered to take us out to dinner for Erin's last night in town. We met up with Heather and Will and went to Copeland's Cheesecake Bistro, which is pretty hard to top.
Saturday was such a mixed bag. Erin got the latest flight she could, 6:30 in the afternoon, because she didn't want to ahve to rush through the morning and say goodbye like we do so often. Trouble is, with a 6:30 flight you really need to be at the airport by 4:30, so while it was wonderful to be together, we didn't quite know what to do. I took her to lunch and to Cafe DuMonde for a snack, and we toured some parks in the area, and finally we wound up at the airport quite early. We stayed there together until finally, inevitably, she had to go home.
We didn't have any big events this week. No weddings this time (although Erin is going to try to come back in March for Jason and Andrea's wedding), no big conventions or trips. In fact, except for the shopping, I did pretty much exactly what I would have done last week even if she wasn't there. But having her there, having her with me, made things so much better. We both agreed, as she left, this was the best trip we've had together yet.
Yeah, I know a lot of you guys are asking a certain question. Y'know, you sound like my mother. I'll tell you what Erin and I decided this week.
It's not a question of "if." It's a question of "when."
Good enough?
I love you, Erin. March will be here soon. Just not soon enough.