A Whale's....

Vagina....

That's right. I'm in San Diego. I've been here since Saturday, leaving tomorrow. I actually can't believe it's already time to go. The trip went by really fast and was pretty pleasant as far as trips that take you to math conventions go. There have been a few downs, but mostly ups.

Saturday started out with my car service being late to pick me up because the tool box driver they sent went to Target to buy digital camera at 8 in the morning and had to wait around for someone to come to the electronics department to ring him out. Seriously? Why are you telling me that? I was fine with thinking you were stuck in traffic or had to stop for gas. But you HAD to...like seriously HAAAAAAAAAD to buy a digital camera right before you picked me up? Whatever douche...could you please take 90, not the fucking Elgin O'hare just so you can give me the historical background on why it doesn't go from Elgin to O'hare. I realize your a "professional" driver, and I use the term very loosely, but I'm not retarded nor have I just moved to the northwest suburbs. I get it. NO? Fine. We're here? Great. Buh-bye.

Well, it's a good thing my flight has been delayed an hour. Wouldn't want to have missed it due to my new friend Talky McTalks A lot and his acclaimed wealth of information.

Curbside check in...it's cold. Of course there is a family of 15 foreign people in front of me and the inside looks worse. I wait. The old lady directly in front of me is going to Baltimore and obviously hasn't flown in a while. She gives the skycap her credit card and he barks at her "Don't give me your credit card! Where are you going? I.D.?" I feel bad for her. Never the less...I check in. Flight is leaving at 11:15 a.m. now.

Fucking security. Item number 1) Why the hell do HUGE groups of family think it's truly necessary to stand at the outside of the security line and wave and take pictures of their loved one until they are out of sight? Please get the eff out of the way! thanks.

Item number 2 is this:

Dear TSA lady screaming at the top of your lungs at the metal detector about how much liquid I can bring on the plane in what size bag, what articles of clothing i can be wearing, which bags need a bin, and how I have to bring my boarding pass with me through the gate,

PLEASE...shut your God forsaken mouth and deal with the fact that 99.9 percent of travelers are still, despite your incessant monotone yammering, going to fuck it up once they get there because A) the sound of your voice is so painful that they have already tuned you out B) they don't even speak English or C) much like me, they are making fun of you inside their head so much that they don't even know what words are coming out of your mouth. You are the worst. Oh, and can you please take 5 minutes to refill the stupid bins? Because I now need 4 just to get everything I have to strip off, remove from my bag and take off my feet through the x-ray machine.

Your's truly, xoxo, I hate your guts,

me.

5 hours later, I put all my clothes and my shoes on again and I make my way over to the gate. I get my sausage biscuit and my big coke and I go to the good ol' newsstand to get my gossip magazines and something odd happens. I suddenly can't bring myself to read about how Lauren 'L.C.' Conrad went from a size 2 to a size 0 and how she looks "Amazing" now. Or about Jamie Lynn Spears breeding! "What is wrong with me?" I say to myself, I LOVE celeb gossip...but for some reason, I just didn't have it in me this day. My eyes settle on a magazine that I've never read in my life. New York Magazine. it was an issue about 50 reasons to love NY. It looks good enough so I grab that and also an issue of Martha Stewart Living (I wanted to see what it was like seeing as it may be what will be sent to me now that my beloved blueprint has been put to death and as I imagined, it's old). So i spend ten bucks on something I'm about to trash in three hours and head to my gate to sit, enjoy my greasy breakfast sandwich and stare into space for an hour and a half. Then, of course, something weird happened. I met...a self proclaimed...Rude Boy. The worst.

So...I sit down at the gate and I hear from behind me "Oh, someones wearing an Against Me! jacket!" (It was a hoodie, but whatever, that's what this person called it) I ignore it, because I generally dislike people and don't want to acknowledge their presence, much the less strike up witty banter about a band I listen to. Especially at an airport at 9 in the morning. I start to unwrap my tasty sausage b. Ol' dude comes around from behind me and says:

'rude boy': Thank you for wearing that jacket!
me: Youuuuur Welcome?
'rude boy': Did you see them in Tulsa?
me (trying to figure wtf this dude is talking about): Um, no? I'm from Chicago. I've seen them here a few times though.

I then realized that the flight leaving before mine is going to Tulsa at 9:55...and it's pretty close to then, so I don't get too worried because this guy will be gone soon.

'rude boy' gives me a roll of the eyes, like I just dropped some name or something by saying I live in the city of the airport he's in. I think he's going away. He isn't.

'rude boy': yadda yadda, I just saw the Tossers, yadda yadda, (rips open his shirt) look at my Irish themed chest piece!!!! yadda, yadda, I just got out of the Navy...What else is from Chicago?

me (in disbelief that this guy is still going on): uhhhh...The Lawrence Arms? A lot of stuff. I dunno, really.

I turned to try to ignore him and eat my breakfast and the dude sure enough plopped his ADD ass right down next to me and kept going.

The next few minutes were him talking about:

Chuck Palahniuk, how he volunteered to go to Iraq 3 0r 4 times only because he wanted to smoke cigarettes and be an asshole like the guys you saw in "nam," but they never sent him, area 51, the Zombie Survival Guide, Sean of the Dead, and some other weird ass stuff. I just ate my shit and laughed at him in disbelief because he was fucking weird...like on fast forward and shit.

Then he name dropped Death By Stereo. Then I said I don't listen to them. Then he asked me about the Ska scene in Chicago...then I said I don't listen to Ska (and that no one really does anymore)...then he got flabbergasted and told me that he was a Rude Boy...and I said, "yeah...I can tell." Then he pointed out his Fred Perry polo shit and his suspenders and his flanked jeans and his combat boots and then he took his tight ass jean jacket off and showed me his half sleeve that seriously fucking said "Rude Boy." then I almost passed out cuz he smelled like B-B.O. But instead I said..."Yeah..." and started to talk about how I don't really care about Ska. THEN! Right in the middle of what I was saying, they call final boarding for his plane and dude just gets up and says "oh, gotta go" and gets on the plane. WEIRD!!!!

Rest of the day included sitting in the airport...sitting on the runway...sitting on the plane and finally getting to San Diego hours later.

Traveling sucks. Now, I have to pack and go to bed where I'll be having nightmares about having to do it all again tomorrow. Well, that and also this:



k.