Mele Kalikimaka (Merry Christmas)!

Darlene & C R Albritton

Finally out of Grand Rapids, Louisiana looked absolutely wonderful while we fretted over schedules of where, who, when and how we would all get through family days together. It was great that my Mom could come down with Darren, Donna and the kids and get together with Jared, Jaime and Henry along with Blaise and Laurie. While some had in-law family functions needing attention, others went in many directions over the weekend. Mom and I got a chance to get out and drive down to Gramercy & Lutcher on the River Road and saw the old plantations and countryside. My real intent was to show her the bonfires on the levee. Each Christmas, people on the rivers build huge bonfires to light the way for Papa Noel to find his way to the good girls and boys on Christmas Eve.Decades ago, these bonfires also helped families find their way up and down bayous and rivers as they found their way to and from midnight mass.

Most of the levee bonfires are seen near Gramercy and Lutcher, LA. While most are conical bonfires cut from local willows down behind the levee, some are more elaborate in various shapes. I've seen them shaped like the state capitol, airplanes, trucks, houses and this year, a motor home.

Adding to the confusion, I got a call from the office asking me to be in Honolulu for a while soon after Christmas. Without hesitation, Darlene asserted her desire to go too, so we booked both our flights and flew out on Christmas day, thinking it might be less hassle and crowds then. This was true to a point.

I took Darlene to the New Orleans airport early then turned back to Baton Rouge where I caught out 3 hours later. The different schedules and airlines were to put us into Honolulu within 30 minutes of each other but snow and delays in Denver let Darlene sit in a plane on the tarmac for 4 hours and making her 6 hours late.

Oh well, we're here. During the weekdays, Darlene spends time walking around downtown Honolulu and Waikiki, getting shin splints from wearing sandals.

Saturday, we took somewhat of a tour around the northshore through the towns of Mokuleia, Haleiwa the beaches of Banzai Pipeline.
Although the big waves were not here yet, there were several in the 15 foot range. Locals tell us we should be able to see the "big ones within the month if I'm still here.

Beautiful seascapes included things like Chinaman's Hat near mountains where scenes from Jurassic Park were filmed.


This is Sunday, so we'll be out and hopefully tonight I can edit a few surfer pictures.
Sometime in the next two weeks, we plan to visit the USS Arizona/Pearl Harbor Memorial.


Here's the link for all the photos on the Hawaii blog. (Click for the photo link)

We made an attempt a snorkeling at Hanauma Bay but arrived an hour prior to low tide and by the time we got through the lines the water was so low, it made for miserable swimming over the dead coral in the extinct (we hope it's extinct) volcano cone.
We decided to cash it in and gladly pay the buck apiece for a ride up on the trolley.

Grand Rapids.......Outta there!!!!!!!!

A body can only take so much cold......well, that's my take on it and probably there's a million MichiGANDERS who might take issue with me on that but I for one, can't see why someone in their right mind would live in a place where snow is on the ground for 5 months of the year ....on purpose.

Anyway, I busted out of there this past Friday morning and flew to O'Hare in Chicago where we let American Airlines delay us for an hour for our flight to Baton Rouge.

Saturday promised us rain but it pretty much stayed dry so I took advantage of the warm morning and mounted the marvelous contraption for a few miles before the clouds formed and the thunderstorms swept in.

As I was leaving, the home office called and scheduled me for a few days in Abbeville, LA. Monday morning found me on I-10 headed west to Abbeville in a rented Impala to where I had not visited in 10 years, way back in my optical sales life. Not much had changed.

After settling into my hotel in Lafayette, I met up with Toni, the rep I'm working with temporarily, and had dinner at Mulate's in Breaux Bridge. Great food and tons of atmosphere.
Too bad we were both ready to leave just as the band was pulling out the fiddle and the accordion.

Tuesday afternoon, I headed back home again, admiring the Atchafalaya swamp on I-10. Darlene had forgotten that Rebecca and Jacqueline was to be in a Gonzales community play
(That's Rebecca in the blue)
so we changed clothes and made our way into town.

Probably wasn't an Academy Award production but it's family. That's what it's all about, isn't it?

Relief From the Cold

Friday, December 7: Wearing a wool cap and a leather jacket over a wool sweater, I hopped on a plane out of Grand Rapids for home and just didn't feel bad about it at all. On arriving in Baton Rouge, I had already shed the jacket, rolled up the sleeves of my sweater and stuffed the wool cap into one of my bags.

Darlene had been sick with the crud and missed 3 work days so she wasn't into eating out or visiting friends and relatives so we went directly home. Both of us were a little hungry so I fired up Boudreau and ran up to DeAngelo’s Pizzeria for her and picked up a calzone and a shrimp poboy at Gulfnet for me.

Saturday morning, Darlene was still feeling badly and the last thing she wanted was me hanging around while she continued to sleep. Even though I felt a little guilty for enjoying myself while she stayed home, I overcame my reluctance and rode the motorcycle into Baton Rouge to see my grandson, Henry (yes, Jared and Jaime too). Pretty spooky in that much fog.

By 11 AM, the fog had begun to burn off and the road was dry so I called Louis, a friend of 25+ years and agreed on meeting in St Francisville. Arriving there, I found the streets crowded with people enjoying "Christmas In The Country", and annual event that draws people from Mississippi to Baton Rouge. After making a few passes through the middle of town and dodging jaywalking pedestrians I managed to find Louis taking aim at a jambalaya stand. I parked the Harley, talked a bit with Jan and some of their relatives and wandered back into the center of town to check out a black gospel band. The smell of barbecue and the smoke of open grills permeated the warmness of the day. I think I had missed the parade.

Before long, Louis and I cranked our bikes up and headed east on Hwy 10 through Jackson, turned north on 19 and drove through towns I'd never been in like Wilson and Norwood before getting to Centerville, MS.,where we then turned back west toward Woodville and eventually back south to St Francisville. I have to admit, that was some pretty country up in the northern part of the Felicianas and southern Mississippi. As we cruised in 80 degree weather, I couldn't help but think of the cold and snowy conditions in Grand Rapids.

Arriving home, Darlene was feeling a bit better but wasn't into going out so we concocted a batch of red beans & rice and apple pie before both nodding off while watching a boring movie on TV.

Sunday was equally beautiful but Darlene was still in no mood for getting out so I went up for a short visit with Jared, Jaime and Henry and met Blaise & Laurie before having to come back, repack and catch a plane for Grand Rapids. I'll note that there was a fifty degree difference between home and the 28 degrees I arrived at in Michigan.

Again, it was a wonderful weekend.

Winter......redux

Last winter (2006) started with me seeing a light dusting of snow in Hot Springs Village, Arkansas then on to White Bear Lake(MN), St Paul (MN), Navarre (OH), Ada(MI) and eventually finishing out in Pagosa Springs, Colorado.

What do these all have in common, you might ask. Answer: I froze my rear end off at all these places and saw more snow that year than I have in my life.

I have the sneaking suspicion this might be a repeat of sorts. This weekend, it started snowing and according to the forecasts, the Grand Rapids area will get snow every day this week. My feet may never thaw.

On the optimistic side, I'll be out of Michigan within the next two weeks but the pessimist side of me says this is just the preamble for a really long, cold and white winter. I really miss ole Boudreau and those warm winter days on River Road in Ascension Parish.

Merry Tossmas

Pursuit of Excellence..or the lack of

Has the pursuit of excellence died or did it take the last bus out of town? I'm guessing a bus trip because if it wanted to get out of town quickly, a trip on Delta, United or Pinnacle (a Northwest regional out of Memphis) would have it at the terminal still guessing when it would board.

After a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday, I reluctantly caught a Northwest Airlines flight out of Baton Rouge and arrived 15 minutes late in Memphis. Exiting the plane, I checked the monitors and scrambled from the B terminal as quickly as I could, thinking I only had 10 minutes before boarding time at C1. Even though the monitors said the flight to Grand Rapids was at 6:40 PM, there was nothing on the monitor behind the desk that even mentioned Grand Rapids, so I waited in line until the old guy (my age) finally acknowledged me. "Grand Rapids?", I asked. "Yep, it's here", he remarked, not elaborating whether it was late or on time. The other guy behind the desk acted clueless about the GRR flight and Pops said to him, "I have two flights outta here". I took that as a positive so I backed off. Within a few minutes there were still no indicators on the board and wondered if I
was really at the correct gate so I walked down another 30 feet to gate C2 and asked the clerk if it was true that 5924 to GRR truly was flying out of C1. "Yes, that's correct", she said politely, so I sat down and waited. After the time had come and gone that I should be on the plane, I asked Pops again when boarding time would be. Pops turned his head, muttered something unintelligible and wandered off. Had I not thought I'd get arrested for causing a disturbance, I would have thrown a hissy-fit right there amongst them. Not believeing I couldn't get an answer, I picked up my carry-ons and walked up the terminal to the bank of monitors and saw that my flight had now been changed to 8:19 PM. When I returned to Gate C1, there was a female agent there and finally got an explanation out of her. Finally, an announcement over the system told us that there was a delay and they were waiting on a plane from Nashville to use on the Grand Rapids flight.

False hopes in hand, Pops' shift replacement had as bad of an attitude as he did and sat in one of the lounge seats overlooking the tarmac. He would get up and do something when the female agent seemed overwhelmed with passenger needs and complaints. At 9 PM, a group of passengers gathered at the gate desk to ask exactly when we would get an update. She made a call and explained that the departure time had come and gone with no call to board had been given. Finally, at 9:20 we boarded the plane and had sat there for another 30 minutes when the flight attendant announced we didn't have enough fuel and were in the process of refueling. Oh, and the lavatory isn't working so don't even think about needing it. Other passengers called on cell phones to friends and relatives who would be picking them up, while I tried to get through to the local desk at my car rental company. I tried unsuccessfully to talk with Benny in India but the accent barrier proved too challenging so I thanked him and called back to see if I could find an Indian that could stand toe to toe with me in vocabulary skills. On the third try, a lady Indian patched me through to someone in Grand Rapids who promised he would wait until my arrival before shutting his termial down.

At 10 PM we are pushed out to the runway and have and an ETA in Grand Rapids of 12:35 AM. I would be needing that lavatory by then.

One would think as much as I've flown, I would have taken all this in stride but somehow this time it was more than I was willing to accept in good nature. I don't know whose fault it is, whether it's Pinnacle flying for Northwest or Delta which shared the flight with them and Continental but almost every horror tale of delayed flights, missing luggage or completely missed connections had Delta or Pinnacle's name connected to it.

I believe Pops and his buddy must have scored a "D" on the Customer Relations exam.

Thanksgiving

It was a great Thanksgiving weekend, although my Mama couldn't come down. We hung out with, at various times, all our kids, grandkids and nieces and nephews. There was a lot of delicious food cooked up and brought to Rob and Janet's (brother-in-law/sister-in-law) who were our hosts for the day.

Heck, I even managed to get on Boudreau at some point every day even though some rides were cut short by rain.
After everyone had packed up and moved on, Darlene remarked that she was going to miss all the voices, babies crying and mass confusion as we tried to get around to hug necks and see everyone.

Sexagenarian

Main Entry:

sex·a·ge·nar·i·an

Pronunciation:
\ˌsek-sə-jə-ˈner-ē-ən\

: a person whose age is
in the sixties

Darlene had the time of her life today, turning sixty. We had a little gumbo over at Laurie and Blaise' Saturday afternoon attended by Darren, Donna, Jared, Jaime and an assortment of close friends, grandkids, nieces, nephews, neighbors, cousins and a couple of dogs.

Darlene Albritton

She was the queen, the lady of honor and the bell of the ball.