the portland trip*

Getting there:

I arose at 4 a.m., threw on some clothes, and walked down to the BART station in the predawn darkness. At 5 a.m. I boarded BART, which deposited me at SFO at 5:30. Then the fun began. I had only carry-ons and I had checked in online the night before, so I was expecting the airport experience to be a breeze. And it more or less was, it was just an annoying breeze. First, the AirTrain which takes you to your terminal was experiencing a "delay" and would be arriving "momentarily". After five minutes and at least three "momentarily" announcements, I got annoyed and walked to terminal 1, which was just the next terminal over. Then I get to security, which was busy, but not insane. I'm feeling very smug at this point, because I'm all prepared: shoes off, laptop out, toiletries all 3 oz or less in a resealable quart-sized bag. Except it turns out I have no idea how much a quart is. The night before, I'd been packing, and I'd held up what was probably a gallon-size ziplock bag and asked DWE, "This looks like about a quart, right?" DWE glanced up from his laptop and said something to the effect of "Sure. They aren't too strict about the size of the bag." Well, maybe they aren't too strict at Oakland, San Jose, LAX, PDX, and whichever other airports he's flown out of recently, but boy howdy are they strict at SFO. So my bag, and all the toiletries in it, were rejected by security, and I was left standing crankily next to the X-ray machines debating what to do and trying (unsuccessfully) not to scowl at the security workers. I was about to throw my toiletries away (what else could I do?), when an angelic woman asked if I needed a quart-sized bag and said she might have an extra one in her luggage, which was going through the machine at the time. So she went through security, but the buckle things on her overalls beeped, so she had to get wanded, which took a while. So all my stuff has gone through security and is totally unguarded, and I'm standing stubbornly with $10 worth of toiletries waiting for some stranger to give me a plastic bag. Which she did, bless her heart. I accidentally ripped the bag, but fortunately no one seemed to notice. So by the time the security debacle is over, it's already time for my flight to board. Except it turns out that my nonstop flight to Portland is now a flight that first stops in Sacramento. Yes, Sacramento. In case you were wondering, the flight from SFO to Sacramento is LITERALLY 15 minutes long (not including taxi-ing...dude, how do you spell that word?). So that was annoying, but no big deal, and I was able to sleep on the subsequent flight to Portland.

Mr. and Mrs. B and their beautiful baby:

I spent my first day relaxing and basking in the presence of A and her incredibly sweet and smart 7-month old m (she gets a little m because she's a little baby!) who is now sitting up and has more hair. We went to Target, which was awesome because I love Target and there isn't one in the SF city limits. I bought a red sweater and A bought a green shirt, as well as an adorable outfit with little suede pants for m. When IB got home, we went out for yummy yummy Thai food on Hawthorne, where our service was slightly comprimised by the fact that our server was totally taken with how cute little m is, to the point of sort of ignoring the rest of us. It was pretty funny. Other highlights of the day included the three of us singing to m in the car to try to calm her down, me trying to keep m from swallowing A's wristwatch, and the fact that m entertained me by waiting until her diaper was off and peeing all over herself twice, once while each parent was changing her. A kept joking that things at their house aren't very exciting, but there's something really wonderful about being in a big (well, compared to my apartment), quiet, comfy house with a mom and a baby. Plus A and IB are awesome, and I was really happy to see both of them.

Okay, that's all for now. Stay tuned for more...


*This is also the title of a West Wing episode. Just wanted you all to know.