Holiday update

[chipotle]

So the time home has mostly been relaxing. I’ll circle back to the qualifier.

The flight out definitely wasn’t relaxing. 45 minutes late out of San Jose, with one of the engines not able to be started until they were taking off (I missed the pilot’s explanation for why this was). Fortunately, the plane in Denver was 30 minutes late, so I managed to just make it. Except, wait! It had to wait to be de-iced, and took another hour on the runway. Ugh.

Anyway, I’ve caught up with a few old friends. Monday was lunch with coworkers, then spending the afternoon bumming around with Scott (Mirage). Then, dinner with rancourt, kiarrh, dbcooper and argentee at Coconut Bay, a casual Jamaican-themed place in the USF area with pretty good food. (One of only two places I’ve been to that had conch fritters which weren’t just delusional hush puppies.)

Tuesday was another day trip back to Tampa, just on my own, taking a meandering path through Spring Hill, the subdivision I went to high school in. Over the last ten years it’s gone from overgrown development to true suburban enclave, a similar move to what happened in “New Tampa” north of USF, albeit in slower motion. I had one of my required Regional Bad Food meals, too, stopping for lunch at a Krystal.

Wednesday, yesterday, my mother, Mary and I went to Tampa again, this time to see “Good Night, and Good Luck,” the movie about Edward R. Murrow and Joseph McCarthy. Short review: yes, see it. (Longer review later, maybe.) In the evening, we met varjohaltia at Restaurant BT, a new and extremely well-regarded Asian fusion place in Old Hyde Park. (Toivo joked about how I had to come back from San Jose to tell people about great new restaurants in Tampa.)

Today, we have plans to go to Cirque du Soleil in St. Petersburg, and dinner out again, likely at Red Mesa. And, tomorrow I’m looking forward to a dinner at Boma (an African buffet restaurant at Disney) with ladyperegrine and hellesfarne.

So, as for the “mostly” qualifier: I realize every time that I’m out here that “quiet companionship” is not something my mother does. It’s accented by the fact that she doesn’t see me that often now, I know, but it’s difficult to be able to sit and just write or piddle around online or do anything that requires concentration when she’s awake and around, because she will make a concerted effort to keep a running dialogue going with me. And, of course, there’s no way to get across hey, I’m really trying to concentrate here that isn’t going to be taken as hostile or crabby or prickly. In fact, I suspect sitting using my computer at all is taken as something of a challenge. (“I’m not being entertaining enough, or he wouldn’t be on that thing.”) This gets compounded by the fact that I can’t be online without being in the living room—yes, it’s dial-up.

Okay, enough crabbing. I’m going to try to actually do a bit of research online for where we can get dinner after the show.

Comments

[ladyperegrine.livejournal.com]

I can relate to this--I have similar issues with my parents and in-laws. No one seems to quite 'get' that being on the computer is relaxing for me, and that sometimes I NEED that sort of break from, well, everyone else. @.@

I hope you do manage to steal some peaceful time to yourself. :-) And I'm looking forward to dinner tomorrow night as well.

[tikaani.livejournal.com]

Maybe the plane was just doing single-engine taxi. Depending on conditions airlines do this to save fuel and money.

[samiamknot.livejournal.com]

You know my friend, your mother has never been the epitome of "quiet" regardless of how much I admire her. Be grateful that you get a chance to communicate albeit not when you want to but still...