Welp

Welp. I thought my trip was going as smoothly as possible. I had a great breakfast with BC, had a nice drive to IND, got through security quickly and easily, got to see Charlie as he was flying back to CLT, boarded our plane, got a seat all to myself, had no problems getting into DCA, turned off airplane mode on my "cellphone" and then BAM: "Flight 5182 has been canceled" pops up on my phone.

I thought, "Surely there has been a mistake." There was no mistake.

I quickly did what any millennial would do and I contact American Airlines customer service. And by "contacted" I mean I DMed them on Twitter. I mean, what was I supposed to do? Call them? Haha that's hilarious.

When I didn't hear back from them on Twitter(yes I know how asinine that sounds) within a reasonable amount of time, I called. And by "reasonable amount of time" I mean about 4 minutes. I mean, come on. Companies need to respond within 4 minutes of DM from a regular customer such as myself right? Right. I didn't think so either.

Anyway, they rebooked me on a flight out Monday morning. That wasn't going to cut it for me. I checked with the gate agent inside and they couldn't legitimately get me in to CAE tonight. They could get me to Charlotte but it was going to be way late. So a hotel at DCA was going to be my best bet up until they found a flight out of Dulles (on United) tonight at 10pm going into CAE. Now, who's flying from DC to Columbia on a Sunday night? Me and about 19 of my fellow United customers fearful that we'll be the next people dragged off a plane, that's who.

So, one $12 dinner voucher and one taxi cab voucher later plus 45 minutes I arrived at Dulles. I've had a service called Priority Pass for quite a while through one of my credit cards(yes Dave Ramsey, I still have a few) but I've never used it before. It basically allows me access ten times per year to airline lounges. Tonight I stopped in the Turkish Airways lounge and boy have I been missing out. This place was very peaceful, had free food and drink, and was a nice spot to kill about 3 hours. The humorous part was that I stopped in the Air France lounge first, and they politely asked me to come back in 10 or 15 minutes. I guess the French still don't like me. See some of my posts from 2009 for more info on that.

Anyway, I'm glad I ended up in Turkey. I enjoyed it. And even though I chose not to use the pray rooms, of which there were three, I'll go back when I'm in DCA.

Terredise

And so another trip to Indiana wraps up.  I'm doing what I've done about 100 times(according to Kristin) and that's sitting in the Indianapolis airport.  I've talked extensively about how much I love this airport(http://roseoverexposed.blogspot.com/2016/02/indy-redux.html) and this city.  This time, I'll talk about Terre Haute or "Terredise"‌ as I was taught yesterday.

Don't get me wrong.  There's not a whole lot going on in Terre Haute, IN.  It's a small town that reminds me of the SoBro(South Broad Ripple) area of Indianapolis.  Lots of residential areas with some small and quirky restaurant/bars strewn about.  Indiana State University seems to be a huge part of Terre Haute.

Let me pause here for a moment and let you know that I just saw Charlie Wentzky in the Indianapolis airport.  So officially I have seen two major celebrities the last two times I've been here:

Amos Lee

Charlie Wentzky

Back to Terre Haute:

It was great meeting Sherard, Greg, Vickie, Ace, Coach Lansing, Marcus, TP, James, Dennis, Angie, Stacey, Nicole, Kristi, Tanya, Troy, Luke, Janet, Evan and probably some more that I'm leaving out.  All of the above work with the ISU Athletic Department at some level(some at the top) and they were ALL extremely welcoming and warm to me.

One of the highlights of the trip was talking with Greg about some seriously challenging topics around leadership, people, philosophies and more.   I really enjoyed talking with him.  He helped me see that I have a lot of growing to do in the area of being welcoming and not hiding behind technology, but rather to get out from behind the desk and build deeper and better relationships with coaches and kids.  I thank him for challenging me in a loving way.

Brett was a gracious host as always and I'm so happy to see how well things are going for him up here.  

A couple of cool things to me in the pictures:

I love how close to downtown DC Reagan National is.  I got some great views of the monuments and of Watergate(I think that's what that is) 

The Indy airport is the most beautiful I've ever seen even though the "I" in Indy is missing currently 

Brett stops regularly at Dunkin for coffee and the folks know what he wants so well that they make it for him as he enters and, no lie, handed it to him when he went to the cash register to order 

I sat in the arena where Larry Bird buried jumpers for three years. 

The Clabber Girl museum offered a look into the past of Indiana and the Hulman family

No trip to Indiana wouldn't be complete without a Mellencamp siting 

Larry Legend

Great to see Larry Bird hanging out in Terre Haute today. I'm guessing he knocked this jumper down

“Cellphones” Are the New Headphones

What is the universal sign for, "Hey, don't talk to me?" Correct. Earbuds in the ear. Pop those suckers in and no one will try to talk with you unless they are incredibly inept at reading social cues.

Yes. That is the first time I have ever used the word "inept."

I'd like to add a new universal sign to the "Leave Me Alone" cue list. And it's not really that new I presume, but it's the lovely cellphone. And I suppose they aren't really cellphones anymore are they? I feel like I've discussed this with someone, or maybe here, but what should we really call these devices we carry around with us everywhere we go?(and I do mean everywhere) I'll come back to that thread shortly.

But nothing says, "Listen, I get it. You're on a plane sitting incredibly and uncomfortably close to me, a stranger. However I really don't want to talk" like burying your head in your "cellphone." Why am I writing this? Because it just happened.

Hey, listen, no judgement here. I respect a person's right to do whatever they want to do(within reason), but I am one that enjoys talking with people. Especially people I don't get to run into on a daily basis. So as much as I enjoy writing this post(truly I do enjoy writing) that no one will read(also true), I would much rather be talking with the lady next to me.

But it's cool.

Now seriously, what do we call "cellphones?" We need a better name. Think of one whilst I'm in the air.

What City...

....has the second most monuments and memorials behind Washington DC? King's Landing is not correct. (Fun fact: I wouldn't have known what King's Landing was until about 3 weeks ago when I started binge watching Game of Thrones)

The answer is Indianapolis. Avid readers of this blog, of which there are 3, know my love affair with Indianapolis. I'm thankful to be going back even though I'll just be passing through on my way to Terre Haute to watch my boy Brett's team play on Saturday.

It'll be good to see another part of Indiana this time around.

Wheels up tomorrow from CAE. It's been a while since I've flown out of the metro. One of my favorite parts of CAE? Yep. The bathrooms. They're gorgeous. And for once, I'm not joking.