Grazing Rites

Slept in by over an hour, not a good way to start the day. So instead of the usual hour I give myself I got ready in 7 minutes which is good for saving time but bad for me because it makes me feel icky. I go to open the door to leave and it starts to rain. So I left the house 16 minutes late.

I’m not really sure why I overslept. I do remember having bad dreams, like one in which someone I know did something bad to my son and I was the only person who wanted to hold them accountable.

But despite this crappy start to the day I wasn’t in a bad mood. Maybe it was the happy smiling baby I got to see before I left. Maybe it was the less than 30 degree temperature. Maybe it’s the light at the end of the tunnel.

I do love September. It’s not because of my birthday because September was often somewhat depressing when I was in school. My appreciation of September began in 2002, it was my first September after getting my degree. Fair was over so I had a decent amount of cash. Putting in long hours not only makes you lots of money, it also keeps you from spending so when it’s all over you’re left with lots of free time and lots of money.

The perfect combination for a vacation.

You’re also in a perfect mindset to appreciate both the time and money as you recently had no free time nor the time to spend money.

And the perfect time to vacation is at hand. If you go south the weather’s great, prices are low, lines and crowds are non-existent, but everything is still open.

Hopefully I can trust y’all with this knowledge. I don’t want you spoiling it.

Oh, but the vast majority of people who don’t take advantage of this can’t due to school or other commitments. Students, teachers, and parents of school age children can’t travel at this time.

September 2002 was also when I went on one of the greatest road trips of all time. Jon and I went to Anaheim with stops in Portland, San Francisco, and Redding.

Yes, Redding, they had a cool nightclub called Impulse.

We met Jay Leno and saw the Goo Goo Dolls, James Woods, and John McCain. We went to the Golden Gate bridge, The Tonight Show, 6 Flags, Universal Studios, NBC, and Disneyland. Not to mention a couple Hard Rock Cafés.

Was it the greatest vacation ever? I don’t know. Our road trip to Edmonton was pretty great, Europe was amazing, and Las Vegas a hell of a lot of fun. It’s in the top 4 though.

I’d give almost anything to do it again.

Do you hear me, Jon?

But there have been other special September vacations as well like when I went to Toronto in 2003 after completing my first management contract. This was the first time I ever went somewhere by myself. Yes I stayed with Pam when I was there but I did everything else myself, bought my ticket, went to the airport, all the planning. It was an important step in my development.

While there we went to Paramount Canada’s Wonderland and Niagara Falls and I went on the Maid Of The Mist for the first time.

September’s my special time to sneak in fun while everyone else is knee deep in commitments. It’s appropriate given the reverse being true for most of the summer.

But I always think back to that Anaheim trip. It felt like we had discovered a magical time that no one else knew about. A 13th month where the rules of school, work, day to day life, crowds, and economics didn’t apply.

So despite sleeping in by over an hour I was only 15 minutes late and I don’t even think anyone noticed.

Warren came by today to see his girlfriend perform with the Elvii. It was cool, I got him in, showed him my cubicle, and he bought me dinner. I showed him some pics of my son and he shared some tracks from the album he’s been working on. He came up with an idea for my birthday, a post-Orlando dinner at a place famous for ribs, Memphis something. Ironic considering I have a stopover in Memphis on the trip. It didn’t occur to me until later though.

All-in-all a good day despite an inauspicious beginning.

This entry was posted on September 8, 2007 at 10:57 am and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.