Trippin'

Sorry for the delay in posts, but I had a last minute trip back out to Norfolk to find a place to live, which I did. A (more or less) quick recap:

Day 1, Part 1: Fuzzy math

My flight from the Twin Cities to Norfolk left at 1:30 p.m. Monday. I had chosen to drive down to the Cities and fly from there rather than from Duluth because I didn't want to deal with the hassles of connecting flights and the ordeal of running through the airport trying to catch a flight. This reasoning would almost end up being very ironic.
Late Sunday night, I was figuring out when I needed to wake up and leave by. I wanted to be at the airport an hour and a half early ... so noon ... it would take two and a half hours to drive down there, so I should leave by 10:30. Great.
It was about half an hour into the drive the next morning that I realized my mistake.
I should have left at 9:30.
Oops.
I figured my saving grace would be that it had never before taken me more than 10 minutes to get through the line for the tickets and the line for security. That would leave me with about 20 minutes to rush to the gate.
After finally getting to the airport a little before 1 p.m., I desperately sought a parking space near the terminal entrance. In desperation, I asked God for an open space. Lo and behold, three spaces in from the door, I found one.
As I entered the airport, I was dismayed to see that the security line was long. Very long. Go figure.
As I checked in, the self-service kiosk told me that my flight had been delayed. I looked at the list of scheduled departures. It was delayed by exactly one hour. Good thing, too, because I was starving and I ended up flying out of a gate in a far, far away concourse that took me, I kid you not, 20-25 minutes to get to by walking at a brisk pace. There's no way I would have made that flight if it hadn't been delayed.
I'm aware that I lead a pretty blessed life. Sometimes it's just more obvious than others.

Day 1, Part 2: I want my baby-back ribs, dammit!

After landing in Norfolk and getting my rental car, I was driving to the hotel in the downtown area when I began to notice the abundance of restaurants which I have gone without since I moved to Duluth -- Chik-fil-A, Sonic, Arby's, Papa John's. It was a thing of beauty. So after I checked into the hotel, I checked out the phone book for restaurants within walking distance. I saw a Chili's (also something we don't have in Duluth) that had an address on Monticello Avenue. As luck would have it, that was right by the hotel and next to the mall that was across the street. I figured the restaurant had to be somewhere nearby. So I set out on my evening walk. By the time I passed the mall and had gone several blocks I began to think to myself, "Perhaps I should have bothered to remember the street number." But no matter -- it couldn't be that far, and it felt good to stretch my legs after being cooped up in a car or airplane all day, it wasn't too cold out and the fresh air was nice. So I kept walking.
And walking.
And walking.
After about 20 minutes, I began to think I should turn around. I mean, I like Chili's, but it's not that great or anything. But by that point, I was on a quest and determined to see it through.
Eventually, I hit the end of Monticello Avenue.
No Chili's.
So I took what looked like a major road back in the direction of the hotel and figured I'd just stop wherever looked good on the way back.
But apparently I picked a road without any restaurants on it. I got close to the mall and found a McDonald's, but I had not walked for more than an hour and what I later figured out to be about four miles to eat at a McDonald's that I could frickin' go to at home.
I entered the mall instead and looked at the restaurants listed on the directory.
What was the first one listed?
Yep, Chili's.
It was IN the mall the whole time.
As I said, my blessed life is more obvious at some times than others.

Day 2, Part 1: The hunt

I had done a fair amount of looking at apartments over the Internet before I left home, so I spent the morning making phone calls and decided to visit two apartments. As I'm sure most of you know, I despise shopping. Something about the kryptonite in the lights just saps my strength. It ends up shopping for apartments is still a form of shopping, and probably a worse kind. Sort of like red kryptonite -- still bad, just in a different way. My impatience with this sort of activity is probably a double-edged sword -- I get things done quickly, but I don't comparison shop as much as I probably should.
I had an apartment picked and signed up for by 3 p.m. It seems like a nice place in a convenient location. It's a two bedroom, so I've got plenty of room and there's an outdoor pool, which is nice.

Day 2, Part 2: Where's the party at?

So having taken care of that, I had no idea what to do for the rest of the day. I had read in the paper about a Mardi Gras parade that would be going on at 5 p.m., so shortly before then, I decided to go check it out. I haven't lived in a state that celebrated Mardi Gras since I was a kid, so I thought it might be fun.
Well, to quote Daryl Zero: "A few words on looking for things. When you go looking for something specific, your chances of finding it are very bad. Because of all the things in the world, you're only looking for one of them. When you go looking for anything at all, your chances of finding it are very good. Because of all the things in the world, you're sure to find some of them."
Unfortunately, yet again, I was looking for something specific. And while I thought I was on the right street, if there was indeed a parade there, it was very small and very quick, because I never saw it.
So instead, I decided to drive around the better part of Norfolk, stop at the beach to stare out across Chesapeake Bay and generally wander around aimlessly to get to know the area a little better.
Then I called it an early night.
Maybe I'll find the party next year.