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My Pilgrimage To The Holy Land

By Sixxo

Preamble

My flight was due to leave the airport at 6 AM so that required me to be wide awake at 4 AM. Good stuff. Usually I go to sleep around 4 AM, so I contemplated not going to sleep at all, but I was stricken by a bout of being tired and hit the sack around 11 PM. Luckily for me, the Democratic National Convention was about as interesting as watching the floorboards expand and I was asleep in no time at all. Waking up at 4 AM was no problem, what with the 6 alarms I had set up to actually get me up at a desired time. I got dressed, Hawaiian style, and off to the airport I went. Arriving at the aiport promptly at 5 AM and parking in the American Airlines employee parking zone (can't prove me wrong, right?), I got my tickets at the proper gate and waited all 15 minutes until they started boarding for the flight. As always, they will call people up by seat number, starting from the back of the plane and proceeding upward. Now, just because the first class yuppies get to go in first doesn't mean that you can just board the plane whenever you feel like - there's a number system, dammit, and it would help a lot if the people who check your tickets would actually bother to read the seat number. I'm guessing it is based on some sort of honors system that everybody but me ignores. Lousy slackers.

The Flight

The flight seemed fine. Takeoff right on schedule, no explosions, burns, mid-air collisions, or uses for masks with oxygen. Just when I get my usual dose of Coke and start to settle in at the cruising altitude, the flight attendant calls (over the PA system) for any "MD" to come to... I forget where. That's odd, they don't usually call up doctors and have them report in mid-flight. 5 minutes later, after no sign of doctors, the flight attendant announces that a passenger is having trouble with their blood/sugar level and that the pilot is going to "attempt" (yeah, real comforting) an emergency landing at Louisville, Kentucky. Great. Real frickin' great. During the time that the aircraft was bleeding altitude to get to proper landing procedure, I realize that the person setting one row ahead of me and one seat to the right looks familiar. Upon further inspection (I was trying to be as subtle as possible, using the "Oh, I'm just looking at the ceiling on the other side of the cabin" excuse), I realize that they look very familiar - either Snicker from the Rogue Spear Retreat, Carson Daly from god-awful MTV, or a mutagenous cross of both. Regardless of who it was, I had the urge to punch him, or it.

They say that the stopover will be short - no problems, right? Wrong. It is my firm belief that in the job description of anybody who works for an airline lies "At all times, whenever possible, lie to your customers." The short stopover turned into an hour's delay. With no way to contact gracious Rafter, who was tasked with picking me up from the airport, because the phones on the airplane only take credit cards and I refuse to give the guy next to me a $20 just so I could call and notify the proper parties of my delay, I was pretty much screwed. I was counting on arriving as early as possible to the Nest so as to prolong my stay, even if by an hour or two, and this was messing with my plans. It seems that a passenger had "miscellaneous heart problems" (I'm not a doctor, this is the best diagnosis I could discern) and was finally escorted off the plane. My only question was, "Why didn't they just escort her off just as we landed, so we could leave without her?", and, later on, when I found out that the delay would be one hour or more, I asked, "Why didn't they just throw the b**** out of the aircraft with a parachute?" It was clear to me that she was faking it, though. She appeared to be in her late 20s or early 30s and must've gotten word that I was on the plane. She was not too happy to see me sneering at her as she passed through the aisles (oh, hey, if you can walk, you're damn fine - faker!). Maybe she was planning to play hookey from a work meeting by forcing the plane to land in a strange town full of an airport that merges into a mall and delaying dozens upon dozens of travelers, many of them, also, attending meetings, just so she could have some fun? These people disgust me.

As the plane got back into the air, it became apparent that Snicker Daly (as he shall be referred to as from now on) was not going to make his flight to LAX (Los Angeles) due to the delay - he and his entourage of ho's had to make a stopover in Dallas-Fort Worth before boarding another flight to LAX. "Nuts to him," I said, louder than I would have liked to say it. He then proceeded to whip out a spiffy Dell laptop, pirated, no less, that loaded a pirated version of Windows 2000 Professional Edition for what seemed like an eternity. After he typed in his uber-secret login and password, which I neatly wrote down, he moved the mouse around a lot and opened a pirated version of Visio 2000 (I believe that's what it was called). Sickeningly enough, he seemed to willingly construct regurgitated flowcharts and office presentations that used buzzwords such as "X-Drive," "marketing," and "transferrence." I could bear it no longer and promptly asked the flight attendant if she would please punch him in the eye.

After that fiasco ended peacefully (his entourage of ho's seemed nay too happy about my spying on his crap - I am telling you, pure crap), I stared out of the window at the apparent nothingness that populates wonderful Southeastern/South United States. It was more full of nothing than I had expected. I did, however, get to see some neat crop circles, one even shaped in the Star of David, that got me thinking, "These farmer folk think they are pretty damn slick. Sounds like somebody needs some good punching." Snicker Daly had the aisle seat and was pretty much screwed when it came to looking out the window. He deserved it. "Reconvergence!"

And so we landed.

The Arrival

It's around 9:45 AM CDT. As the plane came to a "complete halt," even before the captain turned off the seatbelt signs, pretty much everybody was on their feet and trying to get into the aisle. I admire the flight attendants for not letting people out of the aircraft until after 10 minutes of being docked at the gate. That way all those aisle-jumping, early-unbuckling bastards have to sit through their own impatience. As usual, the line out of the airplane seems like an eternity as everybody is getting their bags out of the overhead compartment 10 seat rows ahead of them. It seems like it is high time that counting be reinforced as mandatory study in today's schools.

Grabbing my large, colorful, fruity bag, I headed out the plane door. Lo and behold, a 90 degree wall of heat b****-slaps me as I exit the plane. Yes, it's Texas, and it's hot. Getting out of the maze of the thingy that connects the airplane with the other thingy, I see Rafter as he waves his hand. That's odd, no insulting signs and no sign of Tongue. Apparently even with the one-hour delay of the flight, Tongue still couldn't get up on time to hold "Sux" with Rafter (who would have held "Sixxo" had the operation been pulled off successfully). Wouldn't that be a great photo opportunity? I am told by Rafter that it gets hotter during the day. Oh joy. I immediately make plans to stay inside for the rest of the trip.

The Ride Back

Rafter drives a neat Jeep (Wrangler, I think), and this time he took the doors off. Mmm, Jeep. Now I am used to driving in New York, where you don't go forward without stopping for more than 3 or 5 minutes at a time. Much to my surprise, Rafter zooms out of the airport parking lot and is going a nice 60 MPH or so within the airport grounds. I make another mental note - wear a seatbelt for the rest of the trip. The ride was pretty fast, about ten minutes or so, through empty an empty highway (or freeway, I can never tell the difference). I can't remember the last time I saw such an open road.

The Nest: Day One: Thursday

We arrived at the parking lot just in time to see Sherman leave his car and enter the office quite a ways behind us. Into the elevator, up to the third floor, and into Rafter's office I went, where I dumped my stuff. DocDoom then wandered in, was introduced to me (promptly telling me that I sucked), and instructed by Rafter in a harsh, commanding voice to introduce me to everyone else who might be in the building at this time. It was still pretty early so not everybody was in. I didn't get the chance to spend that much time with Frying Tiger as he was leaving for one week's vacation around noon the very day that I arrived, but I did get to greet him and wish him well.

After meeting everybody, I got to talk to Rogue regarding various World War Two Online-related issues (minor), his miniature army of vehicles (minor), and Starpeace (major). I am pretty sure that I am fluent in six languages on the inner workings of Starpeace. It's a pretty sweet game, currently in open beta, that's a dream for any fan of SimCity or anyone who loves logistics and micromanagement. Best of all, the entire game is played from an Internet Explorer window. Quite a technological feat.

Afterward, at about 1 PM CDT, it was off to lunch we went. There's a Bennigan's right across the street (literally) from the offices where most of the Rats go to get lunch and, sometimes, dinner. This time I joined by Rafter, Tongue, Rogue, Martini, and two nameless new guys for munchies. Snail, Gryf, and his friend Bloo, who was also visiting the nest, joined us later on. Lunch was pretty much uneventful. Our waiter, "Too Short," was properly hassled by Tongue, a bright waiter offered us desserts that weren't ours, and food was consumed. After lunch there was word of a softball team of some sort and other miscellany discussion amongst the participants. For lunch, it was pretty interesting.

Heading back to the offices, I went up to the fourth floor, where most of the World War Two Online stuff gets done. There I got to chat with Mo and Snail for a bit, as well as Gryf, who showed me the real meat and bones. It was good fun, especially when Gryf started playing Counter-Strike and picking people off with a Steyr AUG. And there I was, thinking I was the only one who cursed at the monitor each time I got killed... Suddenly Rafter came onto the, without a better word for it, PA system, ordering me to head to his office immediately. Hmm, bad mojo, it must be. I was relieved when all he did was ask me if I wanted to catch some dinner and a movie.

Why turn down an offer to catch a movie with a few Rats? Before I knew it, new nameless guy (Carlo Rich), Ramp, Rafter, Mo, Rogue, and I were off to Whataburger to get some fast food and then watch Space Cowboys at "Tinseltown." Word on the street was that Snail walked out of Space Cowboys (it was that bad), but, on the other hand, Gryf enjoyed it (hmm, do I sense some tension here?). Dinner was pretty uneventful except for the fact that, right after ordering and receiving our food, a police officer came in and went behind the counter to inspect the kitchen, as far as we could tell. This caused a lot of us to put our food down and take a step back. Shortly thereafter we realized that the police officer was just there to flip burgers on the side, as well as pimp and harass passerbys.

Tinseltown was huge, and I do mean huge. The theater has about 50 screens and half of them are 75 feet wide. The tickets were pretty cheap (at $7 - I'm used to paying $8.50 or more) but the food was obviously overpriced ($3.50 for nachos!). In the end, the movie was rather entertaining, with a great performance by Donald Sutherland. It was quite interesting to see Mo and Rogue pick apart the movie like grognards going at a newly-released wargame, but we all agreed that it is an entertaining work of fiction that in no way totes itself as being a documentary. Back into Rogue's tweaked Montero we went (Mo offered me the front seat this time as he had it on the way there - chivalry at work, people). Arriving at the Nest's parking lot, Rafter was instructed by Vixen to take me home right after the movie. It was 10 PM CDT, so I properly informed Rafter of the current wussy hour, but he insisted that I get back to the hotel. Pfft... lightweight.

I got home to a neat room, flicked on the TV (The Daily Show was on, mocking the Democratic National Convention), and phoned home. Time to hit the sack...

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