2005-05-25 - 2:27 p.m.

Let�s take the weekend in Chronological order. I�ll try to convey the hijinks as best as possible.

Background:
I feel the need to defend my choice of airline and airport. From our house to Raleigh is a 10 hour drive. I hate any drive over 3 hours. There was no chance we�d drive this past weekend and be married when we got back. So, I knew that Southwest flew from Philadelphia for almost nothing. It�s a 2 hour drive to PHL from our house and only 1 hour to Newark. Southwest wanted $60 round trip per person. I splurged and went for the $80 option to get a better flight time. Continental wanted $400+. Worth the extra hour in the car? I think yes. Plus, since we had to change flights after the accident, Continental would have buttraped us for at least $400 more. No thanks.

Southwest is proving that you can make money as an airline. They�ve stripped the whole thing down to �You want to get to that place. We can take you�. No frills, no nothing, just on time service at next to nothing. I love it.

Saturday:
We drive out and cross into Pennsyltucky. On the way, we stopped to get breakfast at a local Wegman�s. For the uneducated, Wegman�s is a supermarket. However, to JewelrySlut, it�s heaven on Earth. She�s been in love with it since she was abandoned in Western New York for college. She likes to hang out there and just walk around, seeing the sights.

(More background: Sometimes, I�m blind. I can�t see a thing from time to time, especially when I drive. I wear glasses, but they don�t always work. What I like to do n those circumstances is read signs as I see them. It�s fun)

We pull in and I see a sign:

I see:

Me: Hey�I thought that sign said Gund Bear. I didn�t know one could sell stuffed animals by the pound.
JewelrySlut: What? How else would you kill it?
Me: WHAT!
JewelrySlut: Gund bear�you know G-U-N-N-E-D. How else can you kill it? What did you think it meant?
Me: Stuffed animals. You know, G-U-N-D.

We then spent the weekend talking about how one should kill a bear in order for it to be best sold in a supermarket.

We arrive at PHL:

We hike back to D, go down a few levels, go across a moving sidewalk thing, down a flight of stairs (lugging the bags, because, I�m in Angry Man Who Needs To Carry All The Bags mode. We get to ticketing and there�s no Southwest�

They�re in E.

FUCK!

We walk to E and get ticketed into group B.

Who�s flown Southwest? If you haven�t, here�s what happens:
You get assigned into a boarding group. There�s no assigned seats, you line up and board. The thing is that people start lining up over an hour in advance. They just stand there like cattle. And since one person starts it, everyone else joins in. We sat at another gate to avoid the crush and waited until B was almost done and then hopped into the end of the line and boarded�and got Exit row seats. SWEET!

The flight is barely an hour. I read SI and we arrived.

Got the car no problems and set off towards Cary, NC. Cary�s allegedly known as the City Area of Relocated Yankees. Holy shit, them southern folk be awful clever. We saw a townhouse/apartment place and knew we had a fallback plan. We then drove off to JewelrySlut�s brother�s house. We stopped at the Evil Empire along the way to get birthday gifts for his son. His birthday was a week before and we missed the party. We bought loud toys and a Styrofoam cooler. To fill the cooler, we stopped for vodka and Apple Pucker. It was going to be a tini weekend back at the hotel.

We hung for a while and set off to the hotel in Wake Forest, NC.

Know what about New Jersey? We don�t make left hand turns. This state believes that 3 rights = a left and we do it. They turn left in NC�across highway traffic. I handled myself OK, but if we hadn�t been driving a Kia Rio, I�d have been happier. We had a choice while driving it: Gas or A/C. It had a lawnmower engine in it. We settle in, have a few drinks and pass out.

Sunday
The Hampton Inn offers breakfast. They have the coolest little things. They have food in a sack that you microwave. We each had little egg things. They were shockingly good. We took off to meet our realtor and see some houses.

I have to give her a plug here:
Eleanor is awesome. To make it even better, she�s originally from London and still sounds like it. She also has a foul mouth. We hit it off right away.

We drove to a townhouse complex and found where we plan to live. It�s a 3BR unit and it has a fully finished basement. The downstairs and basement carpet is brand new. The upstairs rugs need a little cleaning. It�s in pretty good shape for a foreclosure. The wallpaper�s a little old and the kitchen needs a face lift. But, for the price we�re paying, it�s a steal and a half. We can get it for cash and rent it once we�ve decided where we want to live. Apparently, that�s popular down there. We looked at 2 other units in that complex, but they were either creepy or too small. Nope�we�d found our house.

We didn�t have much more to do, so we went back to our car and drove out to Durham. I wanted to go piss on Duke. I hate Duke. I despise Duke. I loathe Duke.

I got to give the finger to Cameron Indoor. That was fun.

We drove through town and saw this old 1920�s house for sale. We went to the open house and nearly passed out. It was gorgeous. We can�t afford it, but it�s insane. It was listed for $440 and would go for at least 2 million in NJ.

We took a nice ride back across the top of the area and stopped in and out of developments, looking at what�s available. We saw some really nice places right near the hotel.

Now, our plan was to go see Star Wars. Instead, we had a few drinks, got some dinner at a local Mexican place, had more to drink, drove to Target to get bathing suits and then went back to the hotel pool and had a few more drinks.

It was an awesome day. We sat there just giggling at our decision. We�re so happy with ourselves!

Monday

We were meeting Eleanor after lunchtime, so we drove around Wake Forest some more and went to some new construction sites. Holy Shit, is it cheap down there (in comparison). I can�t explain it properly. Imagine being able to triple the size of your current house and pay a little more than half of what your current house is worth. And be in an area with a great job market. That�s Raleigh.

We met up and went back to Cary to see another place, just to make sure. I am sooo happy we did. Eleanor told us that there were instructions for the house. Apparently, Harvey (the dog) didn�t much care for visitors. We were supposed to yell at him if he came after us. Hoowee! Let�s go. We walked in the house and the owner was there. So, we had to behave. To start, it smelled like the cheese powder that you use to mix up some Mac�n�cheese. Not at all pleasant. We get to the kitchen and on the fridge is some Confederate stuff and a picture of a bunch of good�ol�Boys on a pickup. The 3 of us all start giggling. We go up the stairs and they have a Confederate sword and musket hanging on the wall. There�s also a picture of some genteel-like Confederates. Oh�the kitchen also had a Gone With The Wind calendar in it. Upstairs was sweet. One room had a general Lee model. The bathroom had an empty Bud Light in the garbage. The closets were filled with cammo clothes. We were in one heck of a redneck house. It was awesome.

We left and all started laughing half to death. It was very funny and I was pleased to see that the South will one day rise. And, if old Cletus is leading the charge, we�re all in trouble. Seems that he has his shit together.

We went to the office and got the paperwork going. We have to wait until Thursday to find out, but we�re hoping for good news.

We visited a few other developments and continued with the giggling. I kept remarking that we�re going to need more furniture�a lot of furniture. We�ll have rooms to hold our soda, our spare air, our dust, etc�

We finally made it to Star Wars and mercifully passed out early. My allergies were going full force and I was tired.

Tuesday
We had a pleasant ride to the airport and got to watch the idiots line up almost 2 hours in advance for a different flight. What the hell? You�re all getting seats, folks. There�s no reason to stand there for 2 hours to make sure you get a good one. The flight is barely an hour long.

I had 104 emails waiting for me this morning. Someone told me that wasn�t that bad. That statement alone indicates how insane email use is here at this company. 104 emails in 2 days is not considered bad. What would be? 200? The nice part is when you get the same email from the same person. Apparently, they can�t read your Out of Office thing. Ugh�

They�re still dragging ass on whether or not they�re keeping me for a while. At this point, I barely care. The main benefit is the health insurance. If we can avoid going out of pocket for it, that saves a bunch of bucks. Otherwise, it�s no big shakes. In the end, it will hurt them more than it will me.

I guess this weekend we�ll start packing. I have to try to get my hands on some boxes now. I�ll be calling Home Depot and Lowes to see what they have available. Now the real fun starts�