11PM Saturday, 4/5

I have a bunch of pictures from the past couple of weeks that didn't make it up here, and stuff I want to talk about, so here's a little mish-mash of entry.

On the way back from Arizona, Niamh and I spent something like 20 hours in airports and airplanes. Niamh had these little mind game GRE-type things, which she loves. Sort of explains why she does so well with standardized testing.

Niamh, mind games and a pizza

That pizza was delicious, by the way. We got food vouchers from the airline because we downgraded, so I ended up getting two pizzas during our stay at that airport. I think the place is called "California Pizza Kitchen" or something like that. They have a wood fired stove, and make these little pizzas constantly so they are damn fresh and damn delicious. Good stuff. I got a kick out of the two girls behind the counter too. The one who was cooking the pizzas was kind of private but she was rockin' the woodstove. She ended up holding down the fort when the other one left, too. And the other one--well, I forgot why I thought she was so nice, but she did something to make me think that.

Cool, spinny boredness-at-the-airport picture

I also got the chance to see Spirited Away at the theater last friday, FINALLY. I've been dying to see that movie for months now. Every time I suggested it to Niamh, she had something to do, and I dumbly never went off on my own to see it. But it was rereleased last week becuase it won the academy award for best animated picture, so I got a second chance!

Wowie

I loved it. John loved it too, but disagreed with me about reasons (figures). I really thought it had this amazing optimism and wide-eyed wonder about the world that you just don't see in Disney or Pixar or Dreamworks pictures. Or Blue Sky or Fox or any of the other studios in the states. I really got the sense that there was this magic in the world--the kind of magic that children see everywhere. John thought that was bullshit, that the spirit world and the human world were totally distinct in Spirited Away.

Either way, we both though it was great. Andrew Stanton has got his work cut out for him with Finding Nemo in June. Miyazaki just raised the bar.

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4PM Sunday, 3/23

That hardly went smoothly.

Mary Kate was pretty sick yesterday morning in the Hotel and throughout the day. We made it onto the plane, but the flight attendant basically said that they would really prefer if she didn't fly. The flight was overbooked anyway and flying sick is no fun. So America West put Ben and Mary Kate up in the Radisson at the airport and Niamh and I stayed on the plane.

Unfortunately, that plane never left the ground. They found some problems that needed to be addressed before the plane could fly, so we got off, had some dinner, and waited for another plane.

The plane they found was much smaller than the original, so they started offering vouchers and whatnot for passengers willing to take a red-eye through Philadelphia instead of our nice direct flight. Eventually they offered $300 vouchers for a flight that arrived at 8:45am instead of our original flight, which by that point wasn't going to get to Hartford until past 2:00am anyway. So Niamh and I took the vouchers.

So here we are, 2:30 local time. I'm at the dorm, Niamh is at Susan's recital, both of us dog tired. Ben and Mary Kate are probably at the airport right now. Hopefully they will be getting on a plane this afternoon and will be back here in Storrs before midnight. We'll see.