The following is part one of a two-part series, the second part of which ran a few weeks back. Oops!
Chicago always makes for a perfect time… to get the hell away from it. And so, here's the first installment of a Pretzel Logic Look at my recent trip to the Gulf Coast.
Play Ball
I was flying from Chicago to Gulfport, Mississippi, via Dallas, Texas. Though I couldn't fly direct, at least I got to fly through a cowboy state ( and I am not referring to the damn football team either ) .
Fly The Friendly Skies
As the flight to Dallas from Chicago started, I got out my reading glasses to read the paper, and one of the lenses to my glasses fell on the floor right between my feet. The guy sitting next to me saw what happened and asked if I could reach it. I replied I could if I were a contortionist ( since those damn seats are so close together ) , to which he said 'I guess you're not a contortionist then.' He then reached down and over between my legs, getting an up close and personal view of my seatbelt region, and retrieved the wayward eyeglass. I think he started to get suspicious after about the 18th time my lens popped out, amongst other things.
If This Plane's A Rockin' Don't Come Knockin'
I was getting some sleep on the Chicago to Dallas flight when the bouncing of some turbulence woke me up. My eyeglass-rescuing buddy looked over, smiled and said 'Looks like no sleeping on this flight,' and I started to wonder if it was turbulence or something else.
A Snowball's Chance In Texas
I should have had about an hour or so to scope the hell out of cowboyed-up Texans at the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport. I mean to have some George Michael time with the eyeglass guy in a secluded part of the airport… no, sorry... I really mean an hour for a quick lunch and a chance to stretch my legs at the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport. But I got fucked over in my layover and had just a few minutes to get my connecting flight to Gulfport because the flight out of Chicago was delayed about an hour on account of a snow and ice storm... in Dallas!
I Can See Clearly Now
On the flight from Dallas to Gulfport nobody was sitting next to me, and my reading glasses did not come apart even once.
...If Christmas Cookies Were A Hallucinogenic, This Is What You Would See
On my first full day in the Land of Dixie I went with my friends to see the Christmas lights at Bellingrath Gardens and Home. We walked through it first in the late afternoon while it was still light so we could see the full gardens, but then after dinner we walked it again to get the full effect of the Christmas lights when it was dark out. Consisting of over three million lights set up in about 550 displays, I have to admit to grinning like an idiot the whole time, totally entranced by the magical feeling of the display, and I did comment to my friends that...
They Had A Life-Size Picture Of Him On The Wine Bottle Label
On our way back from Bellingrath my friends and I stopped at a Cost Plus World Market store as we wanted to buy a bottle of a wine they sell that features reproductions of old rodeo posters on the label. While we were there I did sort of scope out the cutest blond guy in his late 30s who was wearing a tan pair of boots with what had to be 2 ' heels, and even with them on he was still all of 5' 3'.
Clean Shaven, With Beard
It turned out I saw World Market Cowboy Guy at the checkout counter with a woman and two kids, but when he was on his own earlier in the store a lot of the checking out he was doing seemed to be centered around quite a few of the places where I was shopping.
If you're a chatty, eyeglass-lens-rescuing business traveler, or a diminutive Dixie daddy ( or anyone else for that matter, don't be shy ) you can e-mail me at PretzelLogicDave@aol.com .
