Key West: Prepping to leave home...

   "Should I do it?" I asked.  I was nervous for some reason.

"I don't know!" she smiled back.  She was laughing just at the thought of it.

"I'll go, I'll go, I'll go..." I muttered the quote from Cameron in Ferris Bueller's Day Off as I got the nerve and made a phone call.  "Okay," I said.  "All set."

I devilishly snickered a little every time I thought about it -- ever since I started to think about it.  I'm pretty predictable about things like that.  It was silly and wouldn't help anything, but hell... I couldn't resist TRYING it.

Since the last week in January, Rae and I had been planning ahead for our trip.  I knew I had to think about it more than she did.  My winterized, alabaster skin in the Florida heat would surely scorch.  I was sure to come away with anywhere from a bright pink to a deep red somewhere.  It was a matter of time.

Rae has it lucky in a way.  She has that golden complexion from genetics, and her years of life-guarding the north metro beaches as a teen only helped her tan that much quicker.  Lucky ducky.

I however get the skin of my ancestors from northern Norway, above the polar circle.  The ones who don't see sunlight for months at a time.  And, even in the summer, it's too cold for prolonged exposure.  

Oh yeah, and my time spent in several overnight jobs in my youth didn't help at all.  I worked 3rd shift at a gas station and a grocery store.

Then there was the summer I devoted myself to learning how to play a drum set.  I was in the garage during the day trying desperately to figure it out, worked at night, and my skin actually had kind of a bluey-green tint to it.  Looking at pictures of me during that time, you might want to adjust the color to warm me up, only to discover that the sky behind me had turned purple.  So, I guess my 1992 skin tone would look great as long as you expected to have one of those psychedelic Flash Gordon backdrops.

Things did get rosier for me though.  All those years spent in promotions for the radio stations brought me out into the sun.  And I've been spending recent summers on some serious landscaping projects.  But still... I'm pretty pale compared to most.

I'm a "winter." 

So, for me, I had no option.  I gotta get in shape.  Not my muscles, though I have been working out more in 2009.  I'm talking about my skin.

It had been a long while since I visited the tanning booth, but I knew I still had sessions left on my account from about 2 years ago.  Tanning booth is a loose term for me -- more of a colloquialism really.  

It's the place where I get to feel like a fucking baked potato in the microwave.  

It's the place where there are really only three possibilities.  Either I don't burn and see very little change, I burn a little in various places and notice very little change everywhere else, or I burn quite a bit and can't get comfortable for three days.

It is for this reason I always wear underwear in the tube.  Always.  Boxer briefs are preferable, to make sure it's all covered.

I'm actually quite proud to say that my ass does not see the sun much if at all.  I like sitting on it, and would hate to NOT sit on it.  I don't even want to imagine how uncomfortable burning it would be.

So, we went to the strip mall and stopped in to the salon.  I guess salon is the best word to describe it.  

Every time I go in, the smell hits you as soon as you walk in.  Hot sweat and day old grapefruit.  It's like I'm stepping into a different world, and my skin starts prickling as soon as I enter.

Since last time I went in, they had more bed options for me.  One that was very hard to burn in, one that was very hard to burn your face, a stand up one, and the regular beds.  They also had the spray on kind, which I dismissed right away.

So I bought in.  I thought I should try the "sample pack."  One of each of the four... minus the spray on one.  That was too cheesy for me.

All of these beds, by the way, have great names that all mean the same thing.  They were: Ultimate, Superior, Premier, and Super... I think that's what they were.  They could have been Optimum, Superlative, Ideal and Top-Drawer for all I knew.... like I knew what the difference was between them.  It SHOULD be: Non Burn-y, Non Face Burn-y, Stand Up and Regular... but I guess the marketing folks decided to stick with their thesaurus left open at the word BEST.

So, I tried the Non-Burn-y one first.  The lights looked like black lights, and you had to physically flip over about half way through.  The heat got pretty bad toward the end, but I held together.

I burned.  But only slightly.  I knew I could be the exception to the rule!

A couple of days later, I did the Stand Up one.  Don't do the stand up one!!!

Here's why:  I stepped in and grabbed each of the two stripper poles (hands at or above head level) on the sides after closing the casket.  The bright lights came on and I felt the heat immediately.  And, I swear to all that is holy that I could smell butter, sour cream and chives.  Why not just wrap me in fucking tinfoil and throw me in the oven for an hour at 350?

I was only in there for seven minutes, and I was just about to bail when the lights shut off.  My skin was smoking, I'm sure.  I just couldn't see it with those goggles on my face.

I stepped out, smelling like my high school gym locker and a produce dumpster, got dressed and felt my skin stretch.

After getting home, my abs (they may lack definition, but they're still there) and sides --especially under my arms -- were solid red.

That night, I sweated it out.  It was cold outside, but my skin was steaming.  I put on a waffle shirt the next morning.  I stammered out, "Mamamamamamamama," like some babbling baby as I threw it off and opted for a very soft cotton shirt.  It really hurt.

I didn't go back to the salon for a week as my burn continued to calm down.  I was now unevenly discolored. My upper chest was still pretty white, and the lower part was still pretty in pink.

"I burned... badly," I told the really friendly woman behind the counter.  She was the one who clearly knew everything about her place, and every other girl was just trying to get free tans to make sure they stayed as "the hottie" in the popular crowd.  

Don't get me wrong... most of them actually are pretty to very hot.  They already know that.  And I think we can all guess that if the girls working at tanning booths had just a few more daddy issues, they'd be working in other "salons."  But that's just a guess.

So, I did the Non Face Burn-y one next.  Thankfully, there wasn't enough time to get torched.  I didn't care how pale I still was, I only cared that I didn't burn again.  Woo hoo!

It was the week of the trip, and my skin wasn't ready.  That burn really ruined my initial plan, but fuck it.  I knew I would be wearing 30 SPF during most of this trip anyway.

Then I got the idea.  It was on the last trip as I waited for Rae to come out of her little room.  I saw the poster on the wall.  I went up to the knowledgeable and friendly (and very hot) girl behind the counter.  Red faced for at least two reasons, I asked questions.  I considered.

"I'll go, I'll go, I'll go..." I muttered the quote from Ferris Bueller's Day Off as I got the nerve and made a phone call.

I got to the place, breathed in the gym socks and citrus scent, and said, "I'm here."

The hot and knowledgeable one explained the procedure.  They left, and I put on the hair net. I used the lotion the way they said to do it.  I stepped in and put my feet on the marks on the floor and waited.  An electronic voice told me to turn... turn... turn.

I was spray painted.

"The guys are gonna freak when they see me," I said when we got home, smiling.  "This will be the tannest I have EVER been."

I was right.  I was actually tan.

Apparently the chemicals they sprayed me with worked with the proteins already in the skin.  So it wasn't a color that they put on me, it was a chemical agent that would allow a unique color based on what I already had.

But I had to leave the spray on for 24 hours.  That sucked ass.

It was the same sort of smell as normal, but it intensified as time went on.  By the end, it smelled like shark guts seared over a white hot grill, served with lemons cooked by an acetylene torch.  I couldn't stand my own stench, and Rae had a hard time sleeping because of it.  But damn was I tan.

When Rae got home after her massage at around 7pm, I was a bronze god.  Even my normally lily white ass.

I had my reasons to do this.  They were:

1. I hate being the whitest guy in paradise.  When a hot sun beams down on my pasty skin it can burn people's retinas.

2. I knew my skin couldn't take anything below 15 SPF.  That's just the way I roll.

3. It's kind of funny, right?

I also knew that the other couples weren't preparing for this trip the way we were, so it would be extra funny because I'd be the tannest one of all six of us, if only for a day.

But I wasn't going to say anything, and looking back on it I should have.  I should have stood proudly and said, "I am the goddamn Bronze-en-a-tor from the Land of Milk Toast and Ice Chips.  I am the chosen one to represent my people on this tiny spit of land you call the Conch Republic."

That would have been better, given my particular sense of timing.

So... nobody gave me shit about it.  They may have been amused by it when they found out, but it was nowhere near gut-wrenchingly funny.  It fell a little flat, to say the least.

But yes, the bronze god did get sunburned.  Freckles covered and overtook my fading tan, and about halfway through our week nobody thought about it anymore.  Talk about a buzz kill.   Good thing we had enough booze to kill 14 giant elephants.

Key West: FUBAR...

We drank.

We drank some more.

And we kept drinking.

Upon arrival to our awesome house, Terre (after picking us up at the airport at 2:30 in the morning) opened the fridge and showed us the supplies he and Deb had picked up.

I think I said something like, "Holy shit dude!"  The fridge was stockpiled with a case or two of soda, orange and cranberry juice, a couple cases of beer (Bahamian, jamaican, and local brews), lots of limes and other fruits.  It was packed.

Then, I looked at the counter.  Booze galore!  There were at least five or six bottles ranging from standard issue to a Mango Tequila liqueur, which as we found out Gwen LOVED.  And, we also found out that she's a very cute, very giggly drunk.  But that's another story!

And, looking down from the counter, there was a wine rack.  Crap.  Over a case and a half of wine. 

So, after our mouths finally shut after being agape for a few minutes, we headed off to our beds.  And, thanks to Tom's selection during our random drawing for bedrooms, Rae and I got the master suite!  Whoo hoo!

The next morning, I had a beer at about 9:30 or 10.  Then, I had another.  Soon, there were four dead soldiers on the counter and it wasn't even noon.  "This is gonna be easy," I said to myself.  "As long as I can keep going at this pace."

That was the problem.  Monday we went on a full day sailing adventure, and we kept going out to eat.  We did the Duval crawl for my birthday, and it didn't seem like supplies were dwindling much at all.

Terre at least had the bright idea of taking some of the cheaper wines and making sangria.  Hell, we had all the ingredients, and who can drink a full bottle of wine a night on top of all the other booze we were shoving down our throats?  

Making it a little fruitier did help make it possible to drink wine throughout the day and night, thus evening out our wine buzz with our booze buzz with our beer buzz.  

I felt like a drunken bee.

We started out staying up reasonably late with our concoctions, but then again we were filled with energy, hadn't been burned enough in the Key West sun, and felt like we had a lot left to explore on the tiny isle.  As the week wore on, our sleeping patterns changed quite a bit.  Hell, I would get toxed and start passing out before 8:30... I wasn't on my game.

I remember a trip to Mexico that I took with some people from the radio station back in 2001.  We would get up at noon, walk down to the pool and order a couple of buckets of beer while waiting for everyone else to get up.  Then we would pound beer all day long, and all night too.  We would stay up until 4 or 5am, drinking at Sr. Frog's until it closed.  Yeah, it was kind of a blur... but I did it, and did it well!

The only real problem I've ever had was when I didn't know what I was drinking.  Take a Bahamas trip I took with another "friend," Adam.  Actually, he's a good guy who was a little misguided one afternoon when he made mixed drinks with a heavy dose of Bahamian 151... 

We all passed out by about 8 that night EXCEPT for that little prick.  AND, everyone except him also woke up around 4am and headed down to the beach for a chilly but beautiful sunrise.  So, maybe it all works out in the end.

And, really I have nothing against Adam... I just enjoy calling him a prick from time to time to remind him of that trip.

Back to Key West...

I found myself getting drunker quicker than usual.  I also found myself getting tired quicker.  And EVERYONE in the house found out that I was snoring WAY LOUDER than normal.  I guess it was like a friggin' chainsaw.  It sounded like a kodiak bear was mauling the state fair's blue ribbon pig.  It was like a T-Rex was tearing the two-story house off it's foundation (not with its tiny arms though).  And, depending on who you asked, it apparently sounded like everyone was directly in the middle of a supernova just before it turns into a black hole.

It was loud.

I couldn't understand it when I was there, but I did when I got back.  I was getting a really bad cold and just didn't know it yet.  This cold laid me out helpless for 2 days without letting me up.  I had razor blades in my throat.  I had over a bottle of Dayquil and half a bottle of Nyquil.  Yes, it was cherry flavored NyQuil.  I can't stand that green shit.

At least that's what I'm using for an excuse... take it or leave it.

Back to Key West...

The "let's drink earlier" theory proved to be somewhat successful.  Some in the group had to wait until noon.  A few months ago I had stopped wearing a watch.  So I was able to keep my end of the task at hand, which was to try to get rid of as much alcohol as possible before we left.  It seemed like a good plan.

The whole thing came to a head on our final night, when we went on a sunset sail.  We found a boat that cost less, as it was a BYOB cruise, not the normal (somewhat pathetic) franchised, glossy, meat-market booze cruises that seemed geared toward the Mardi Gras, show-me-your-tits type of crowd.  You know, the popular kids from high school realizing that somewhere along the line they messed up their lives and are now looking to find salvation in meaningless sex.  Or even the "hey, I'm on spring break and I've always wanted an STD" cruise.  

Nothing against that if it's your particular brand of vodka.  Just calling it like I see it.

Anyhoo, we bought in to the BYOB sail, and managed to stuff five of the remaining wine bottles into our packs and headed off into the big blue.  Before we left the dock, we popped the first cork.

I poured my second glass as we headed out of the harbor, just as the crew started hoisting the sails.  I somehow managed to dump my full glass of red wine all over the white deck of the ship about a minute later.

"Fuck me running," I thought aloud.  Sailor Jerry and his crew of former ski lift operators (it's true!) were still busy with masts and sails and such, but told me to go to the head for paper towels.  Red in the face, I headed down twice to clean it all up.  I finally took a deep breath, put myself ass end down, and filled up again.

At the end of our second bottle, I was already feeling the effects.  Maybe it was the Dramamine I always take before I go on open water (a trick I learned all too well after going on a ship in Norway).  Maybe it was the oncoming cold or the rolling of the waves.  Maybe it was all the beer, booze and wine I had already drank in that day.  Hell, maybe it was a cumulative effect from the week.  (Actually, if you clicked the link for Dramamine and read the warnings... then I think you already know what it was.)

I felt myself stammering, not able to get my head straight.  I'm sure other passengers thought I was kind of a jerk, or at least a drunk.  I'll confess to both now and say I'm really much funnier when I've only had a drink or two.  After four, really, I think I start to lose all conscious thought and my jokes go to autopilot -- which isn't good as my mind is pretty quick with cut-downs even on a full tank of wine.  After six, I lose clear and understandable speech patterns.  After ten... well, you get the picture.

We managed to suck down all five bottles though, and I managed to get red wine on my new sweatshirt and Rachel's sweater, and her wine red backpack.  Thankfully you can't tell at all on the latter.

I swayed and floated and tripped back to the house where I packed my crap up for the trip back home.  No more wine for me!  We went to bed fairly early that night, in part due to our early rise (4:30am) for our early flight... though I think the booze didn't help matters any.

We ended up polishing off most if not all of the beer and mixers, all but one bottle of gin (still unopened), and left 4 or 5 bottles of wine.  I didn't get a final tally though.  My head and my overworked innards just weren't interested anymore.

I have yet to even think about drinking again since our return.

As my ancestors always said, "Skol!"

Key West: The conch quest...

I consider Terre to be a really good friend.  You know, someone (other than the wife) who you'd try to save in an earthquake or a blizzard... maybe even a nuclear holocaust.  Though I'm guessing he'd be rounding up all of his friends and family himself if he could.

Rae and I have vacationed with he and Deb several times, including time in Mexico, Florida (St. Pete's and Orlando), and a couple of weeks trippin' around the land of Oz.  He's an energetic guy with a big heart(they are an energetic couple!), a real go-getter, which is great for us as we're much more laid back and casual.  We probably wouldn't do even half as much on trips if it weren't for them.

But he does come up with missions... very specific goals with (at times) elaborate rules.  Like, he won't say he technically visited a place unless he spends a week solid there.  

I'll say I've visited a place if I drive through it.  "Seen it!" I'll exclaim as I check it off the list.

Hell, I've visited Nebraska several times, rarely staying for more than 24 hours as I drive along I-70.  I get it.  It's flat, and there are a lot of farms.  It seems nice in parts, crappy in others.  Moving on!

His mission in Key West... to eat 20 orders of conch fritters in eight days.  The rules:  Order at least one batch of fritters (essentially hush puppies with bits of conch inside) and take one picture with the full order still on the plate alongside a logo, wait staff with logo shirt, or other memorable visual cue.  Then he would try one, and try to place it amongst the best or the worst of the category.

As with most of his missions, at first it was cute.  Terre puts all of his energy behind these things, and sells it... making it fun, especially at first.  The only problem is with the longer missions, the more difficult it becomes to keep selling it.  Even to himself.

Along the way, we became a lot more informed about conch.  Each couple brought a laptop except Rae and I.  I had my iPod, which given the power of wi-fi is a great travel tool.  And when we had down time, you could find any number of people sitting in front of a screen, usually with a drink

Terre wanted more information on conchs and the conch industry, and proceeded to read off several things from the glow:

1. It's illegal to take this endangered animal from U.S. waters.

2. All conch brought to Key West is frozen.

3. The Key West is called the Conch Republic.

He would read aloud from his screen about this and that, usually skipping the boring parts and hitting the meat of it.  Sometimes he would ask if we wanted to hear, but even if we said no he would usually start reading anyway.

Again... because of him, I came away with a new appreciation of something that I probably wouldn't have if it had just been Rae and me on vacation.

In a way, this plot unfolded similarly to Brewster's Millions.  At first, it was easy to get an order, a picture, and a judgement.  We had all the competition stacked neatly from best to worst.  Toward the end, though, people were falling off the conch fritter bandwagon.

It really started Tuesday night, 4 days in on the trip and my birthday.  The group of us: Tom, Gwen, Deb, Terre, Rae and I went out along Duval Street, stopping by bar after bar to get a drink or a shot before moving on.  We walked a few blocks up from Front Street on one side of Duval, only to return to it on the other.  Toward the end of the night, we needed food to calm down our drunkenness.  

Terre ordered the fritters, and Tom turned to him with a slurred smile saying, "You must have a strong constitution or something because I just can't eat that shit anymore."  The table erupted in laughter, a part in our liquid reaction, a part in disbelief, a part from Tom's delivery (very droll indeed), and a part in the truth of the statement.

We were on #13 or 14 at that point, and Tom had tried most of those.  I think he and Terre had spent a good chunk of time earlier that day on the "Conch Quest" while Rae and I were off at urgent care.

After that, the quest took a back seat to the rest of the trip, though Terre did manage to get 16 orders in before Tom, Gwen, Rae and I headed back to Minneapolis.  I haven't gotten a full report from him since returning to the Great White North, so maybe he made it... we'll see.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Key West: A near deaf experience...

So, we were getting settled in our place in Key West.  We were staying in a beautiful house in the Truman Annex near the post office (a gated community right next to everything in Old Town).  Terre had his rental car until the afternoon, so we headed off to the store to grab a bunch of groceries to go along with the massive stash of beer, wine, mixers and booze Deb and he had picked up the day before.

Tom, Terre and I wandered around the store picking up a few things, criss-crossing each others' paths as we tried to figure out where everything was kept.  We returned to the house and put everything away, and Terre, Deb and Rae went to return the car and hoof it back the 3 miles from the airport.

When they got back, we had a little while to get ready for a sunset Valentine's dinner at the Westin Hotel, which is right in the middle of the best sunset viewing in Key West.  My ears were a little itchy, so when I saw Tom with his cotton swabs, I borrowed a couple and went for the first ear.

This gets a little descriptive, so if you're at all uneasy about this sort of thing, you may want to skip ahead a bit.

Now, I'm used to Q-Tips... and these were not those.  You wouldn't believe what a small difference can mean.  I only really meant to hit the sides of the ear canal, dipping the tip just inside the final fold of my ear.  But I didn't adjust for the difference, and the swab ended up slipping way deeper than I intended.

"Fuck," I said quietly as I ran up to our bedroom and into the master bath.  I couldn't hear a goddamn thing out of my right ear.  I tried the swab again to see if I could release the pressure I felt from the wax that clogged the pathway to the tympanic membrane.  No such luck.  Instead, all I saw was a dirty swab, darker than I had seen before.  Ick.

"Shit shit shit shit shit."  I muttered to myself in the echoey cave of the bathroom, only hearing the upper ranges through my left ear.  I resigned myself to knowing that I was pretty screwed for the night.  I didn't realize it would be much longer until it could be fixed.

I did the other ear too, finding that there was just as much build up as in the other, though I didn't clog that one.  I thought about it, and it had only been a few days since I last cleaned them.  What was going on?

We headed off to the pier, watched a portion of the crazy cat guy's show before being seated for our dinner.  It was good, but all during the meal I was distracted.  I told Rae what I had done, and that hopefully it would get better before tomorrow.

The others found out about it that night and were sympathetic to my plight, mixed with some jokes of course.  I would expect nothing less!

The next day we toured around the town and found a drug store, where I got (among other things) an ear wax removal kit.  

When we returned to the house, I shot upstairs and read the instructions.  Essentially, I had to tilt my head and keep the crap in there for "several minutes" and then rinse with warm water.

I tried it.  No luck.  I wondered if it was actually worse.

Then, I made the worst decision I could possibly make.  And the worst part about it was that I knew it could be a very bad thing.  I tried the other ear.

The liquid removed the build up from the canal all right.  But because my head was tilted (I had been laying on my side on the bed), the pathway on my left side was now blocked.  "Holy mother fucking cock sandwich."  I could only hear the muffled tones inside my own head.

It was Sunday.  All the doctors offices were closed.  Monday was President's Day.  All the clinics were closed.  Through these next two days, I was busy reading lips and trying to make light of the situation.  I could usually hear everyone facing me around the table at meals and in quiet rooms, but I struggled if someone turned their back on me.

I woke up in the middle of the night and looked at my phone.  It was 3am Monday morning, and I had a terrible dream only to wake up to terrible silence.  I knew that if I didn't get my hearing back, my whole life up to this point had been a waste.  How can a guy who builds his career off of audio have ANY kind of hearing problem?  I stayed awake for hours and mulled over the possibilities.  They were dire, to say the least.

But I tried to be as normal as possible.  Yes, being near deaf was a talking point, but I didn't want to dwell on it too much... though I'm sure I did.  There are only so many ways to ask someone to repeat themselves.  Eh?  Pardon?  What's that?  Come again?  What the fuck did you say?

Every day I hoped that somehow it would automatically get better.  Monday we went on a boat ride for snorkeling, kayaking and sun.  When I was in the water my ears seemed better, but it didn't last.  As soon as I was on the deck, muffled sounds returned.

I had to get my ears fixed.  Now.  But that wasn't going to happen.  The clinics wouldn't be open until Tuesday, my birthday.  So I waited.

After brunch with the gang, Rae and I walked to urgent care a couple of miles away.  We walked through the neighborhoods tourists rarely see.  Small one stories houses on tiny lots dotted the broken pavement.  Dogs barked as we passed them, and the occasional car or plumbing van passed by.

The whole time, I thought about my plight.  But this time around I thought of the people I had been sharing it with, and how cool they had been.  They really are a great group of caring folks, especially the wife.  Rae has her own problems with hearing, so having her as my "hearing ear bitch" (as I jokingly called it) was probably a struggle for her at times too.  

Hot, sunburned from the day before, a bit sweaty and breathing harder than normal from the quickened pace of the last 5 blocks, we arrived at the clinic.  We waited in a tiny square room, with hard walls and a tile floor, a television playing reruns.  I couldn't hear the people shuffling in their seats, the words falling from the tv's speaker, or the echoes slapping around the room as anyone did anything.  I missed hearing room sounds.

Finally it was my turn.  The first nurse asked what happened and plugged in my vitals into the computer.  I told her everything, and she half-heartedly told me that cleaning my ears with a Q-Tip wasn't a good idea.  I agreed, though I told her it probably wouldn't stop me from doing it again.  She laughed a little and nodded.

The P.A. that came in next, checked it out and said, "Yep.  That's wax."  Thank you Sherlock.  At least she was easy on the eyes.  It always makes bad news easier when the person has their look together.

Then a nurse came in with a plastic tipped syringe filled with warm water and hydrogen peroxide.  I held up a plastic tray to my head while she did the honors.  The force of each squirt felt like a fucking fire hose.  It didn't hurt, but I wondered if the solution was being trapped inside my head.  

Finally, there was a crackle and my right ear cleared.  It was exactly like turning the treble knob all the way to 11.  It was beautiful.  However, the nausea and dizziness that hit me as my ear re-pressurized was a bit much.  I looked in the tray to see what it caught.  Gross.

A few squirts in the left ear proved to be a success too.  I was more than relieved.  I was ecstatic.  I waited again in the little room while they put my paperwork together and for a cab back to the house.  

I heard the little speaker in the tv.  I heard the skin of my hand passing along the fabric of the waiting room chairs.  I heard the hard echoes of the room as people talked and worked.  I heard the palms slapping in the breeze outside.  I heard the radio in the taxi.  I heard the lock of the door to the house click open.  I heard my friends return from their adventures.  I heard the wine bottle open, and I drank it all in.

TO BE CONTINUED....

Key West: I shoulda known...

Friday the 13th was probably NOT the best day to start a vacation.  At least not in this case.

Rae (the wife) and I headed to the Twin Cities Int'l Airport (MSP airport code), found a parking spot, and then found our friends Gwen and Tom after getting through security at around 11am.  Although we had to walk longer than anticipated (at least on my end), all was good.  And we were excited to get to Key West, where we'd hook up with our other friends Deb and Terre, who headed from Minneapolis to Miami the day before, so that they could take a leisurely drive down along the bridges through all the keys.

From Minneapolis, we headed on Delta to Atlanta (ATL airport code).  Now of course Rae and I were used to Northwest, but traveling on Delta was a new experience for both of us.  On this Delta flight, all the seats were that dusty navy leather.  Leather isn't really preferred for us hot bodies, as after about an hour we feel our skin heat up (if not earlier).  I don't know about you, but when I have a long day of traveling ahead of me, I like not to start off so.... moist.  Not that I was sweating, but damn man... the possibilities were there.

Also, Rae noticed that the seats were actually smaller than on all/most of the Northwest flights we'd been on.  The only real redeeming thing about this flight was that the airplane had the tv screens throughout (watch your head!) so you could watch old reruns of one good show (Futurama) and a couple of OK ones.  Rae and I opted for watching Baby Mama on the good ol' iPod Touch... which is really great to have on a trip.

We arrived in Atlanta, and after a two hour layover we boarded the 70 passenger plane that was to take us to Key West.  Key West (EYW airport code), has a really short runway, so they tend to keep the passenger load down to around 50 for these flights.  Ours was 55.

Once seated, they began calling names out, almost stalling for time.  They asked these people to recheck at the gate -- and all but one were disappeared from the flight, never to be seen again.  The one guy that came back was fighting them, as he had been booted from 2 other flights to the Keys that day, and had been at the Atlanta airport since 8am.  We left the gate sometime after 7:30pm.

The flight took off and we flew across Georgia, over Tampa, St. Petersburg, Key Largo, and I could see lone U.S. 1 that lead on into the night.  And I watched the clouds and fog build, not really thinking of anything.

Then I felt my arms and legs first turn weightless and then to lead as the plane dropped and banked hard to the left, leaving U.S. 1 behind us.  Two minutes later the captain came on the speaker and told us we were going to Miami.  As his voice crackled into the cabin, he told us three other planes attempted to land, but couldn't see the runway due to heavy fog.  The visibility was 10 feet!  the Key West airport had actually closed early.

Of course there was uncertainty.  I turned to Rae and said, "If they offer us hotel, I'm renting a car."  She agreed.  Our priority was getting to our destination.

And of course the Miami airport (MIA airport code) wasn't ready for our reroute.  The gate they sent us to was in a wing that had been virtually shut down, and the airline hadn't yet told us their plans.  Of course, I don't think they knew yet.

We waited in the plane at the gate waiting for a gate attendant to usher us out.  My guess was that once we left the plane we would be gone for good, though others said we might take off again in a half hour or so.

We waited more, the passengers all talking amongst themselves, checking their mobile phones for updates from the outside world.  I was texting Deb and Terre to give them updates, as they had offered to pick us up at the airport when we got in.  After 45 minutes on the tarmac, we were released from the plane into the terminal.  Other than the 24 hour news stand and the weary passengers from our flight, the place was a morgue.

We were relegated to wait even longer while they figured it all out.  The hotels in Miami were all booked, they said.  So were the ones in Ft. Lauderdale.  I didn't even know that was an option.

Again, I was of the mind to just rent a car and get down there.  Why deliberate and fuck around taking about what we should do?  Let's just DO IT.  I had energy, and knew I could make the 2-3 hour drive myself.  But we needed our bags before anything could happen.  

Delta did right by their passengers.  They chartered a bus to take us down.  So we finally were released to baggage claim to wait for instructions.  I texted Deb and Terre again with an update at about 11pm.  Another 30 minutes and we were in the bus.  For whatever reason, the four of us were back by the bathroom.  I remember that in grade school the back of the bus was the sought after position.  However, the yellow buses we rode didn't contain any black water.

Thankfully, there weren't too many people using the facilities... so we didn't catch a ton of whiffs of the sweetly sickening scent from the other side of the door.

We drove through the night.  The orange light from the sulphur streetlights swinging by the windows did battle with the deep green cabin lights, camouflaging our tired bodies with pallid painted streaks.

We stopped occasionally once in the keys, letting off passengers alone in the darkness, sending them off into the deep, heavy air.  We continued on... to Marathon, Big Pine Key, and finally swung right into the Key West airport.  We drove around the parking lot and looped all the way around (I'm guessing the driver missed his stopping point the first time around).

The lot was empty other than the cars huddled together in the cozy parking lot, so I texted Terre to pick us up.  He texted right back, saying he was 10 minutes away.

Of course, by the time we swung back around the lot, the drop-off area was swarming with taxi cabs.  We were hounded by a dozen drivers looking for fares.  I figured Terre was already on the road, so why call him now.

So, all the other passengers got in their cabs and left, leaving the four of us chatting with the Sheriff as he waited to make sure everyone left safely.  As we talked about the unusual weather, Terre pulled up quickly next to the Sheriff's truck at around 2:30am.  We piled in to his rental, our excitement of arrival tamped down with the weight of exhaustion.

TO BE CONTINUED....