More on the Topic

People we did not see in the airport

Mr. Right has been hard at work on his internet class (that’s so ethical of him) and tied up the computer Friday and Saturday. Well, actually, Friday night I watched the final four episodes (ever? Perish the thought!) of Arrested Development, as Fox has canceled it. Yet they can keep absolute garbage (like what passes for journalism on their nightly news) on indefinitely. Why having my intelligence insulted still bothers me, I don’t know. Does that mean my intelligence is actually falling?

Anyhoo, I spent Saturday watching movies, so here’s a quick synopsis of my reading/listening/watching of late:

Elsewhere, by Gabrielle Zevin, read by Cassandra Morris – a magnificent audio book about a fifteen-year-old girl who dies and feels cheated her life on earth was so short. Sounds like the afterlife is pretty cushy, so I don’t think even at that tender age I’d have been too terribly crushed. Excellent writing, excellent narration, highly recommended although I’m not yet done with it.

Flush, by Carl Hiaasen. Good book for young people about the Florida Keys and pollution. See why I took it on vacation? Not quite done, but again, recommended for budding conversationalists.

8 Mile – I enjoyed this movie although I know nothing about Detroit (played by Toronto) or rap music (Eminem, playing essentially himself). Rating: Recommended.

The Big One (Michael Moore) – a cute look at making a book tour while having another agenda. Loved the Rockford segment! Wish I would have gone to his book signing! Shows Moore at Media Play being told Barnes and Noble (a block away) did not have his book, sales were only 3% of attendees and Rick Nielsen of Cheap Trick was not home. Of course, Moore disproves all of the above! Best tidbit: TWA uses prisoners as telephone ticket agents. Rating: OK, not great.

Napoleon Dynamite – Silly fun, but what’s the big fuss? No plot. Adequate look at teen angst, cute retro-angle, but so what? Lack of true dilemma or solution killed this one for me. Falls short of greatness, but a must-see for its cultural reference. At least now I understand the Pedro for President t-shirts. Rating: Recommended with reservations.

Alexander – Oliver Stone. Not impressed. Was it truly the topic? It’s a huge, complex, little-documented story to tell, and Stone comes across as more History Channel than Conspiracy Theorist, to his great detriment. Something tells me he needs to watch Brokeback Mountain to see how it’s done. Starts out as Alexander’s story told by an old man who was one of his generals reflecting on the past. It then becomes a flash-back within a flash-back when the story skips back a decade to flesh out little tidbits that occurred earlier in his life to influence the ‘present’ point of the story. Not good. A better script would be my first starting point. Perhaps his life is too big to tell. Stone should have concentrated on just the death of his father, Phillip. Lots of unsolved intrigue and conspiracy there. On the plus side, Bucephalis is played by a beautiful Freesian, but I didn’t agree with his death in battle or like the omission of Alexander’s creation of a city named after his favorite steed. Alexander’s human side was killed by lousy acting. Who cast Colin? Barf. Jolie made a good crazy mom, but she’s what, four years older than Colin? They did nothing to ‘age’ her, such as grey hair, etc. and instead played up the Oedipus angle to the hilt. Cop-out. Rating: Not Recommended.

Sunday Mr. Right asked for the movie Insider as it was recommended for his ethics class. I could certainly see why, and strongly recommend this movie. Heck, it has Al Pachino, so right there it gets my endorsement! Fantastic movie. Really makes you want to be a whistle blower so you can be harassed the rest of your life and live in poverty (which may have happened anyway, it just compounded it further). Rating: Strongly Recommended.

Let me tell you in excruciating detail about my exciting trip to the Keys….

Flew out of O’Hare and the experience was unexpectedly pleasant. The American Airlines check-in was painless: a computer terminal guides you through the process and a clerk weighs your bags. Louise’s bag was overweight so we crammed some of her stuff into mine to avoid a $25 surcharge. I thought I over packed. Ha! (More on what all was brought later…)

This is the lamest new revenue source for the airlines, the imaginary Too Heavy Tax. First off, can you trust their scale? Secondly, as you will hear later, the whole luggage handling crew is a scam. Post-911 air travel was new to me, as I never go anywhere, and hadn’t done the whole Lockdown thing before. I remember the good old days when you could see someone off at the gate and be there when they arrived. Now you can’t use those cute little luggage locks because everything is opened and peered at. Great, I will now spend the whole fight terrified my bag will pop open and spew underwear all over the tarmac. The plane was about an hour late, but as this was not a connecting flight or some sort of business meeting, I wasn’t stressed about it. The staff was kind enough to seat us together and we ate some of my provisions on the way down.

As soon as we stepped off into the Miami terminal, things took a turn for the scary. The smell of mold assaults you immediately and our trip to the restroom was horrific. They haven’t remodeled or cleaned this airport since Amelia Earhart’s visit. Heck, I think I saw her wreckage in that creepy restroom. We waited forever for our luggage while I took the opportunity to play “Spot the Drug Mule”. I was scared of the airport staff, and don’t even get me started on the patrons.

The weather was ok, not really warm, low sixties. They had a cold front move in right when I decide to visit, of course.

After waiting forever for a shuttle, we got to the car rental place and were soon armed with an inaccurate map and on our way south towards the Keys. And yes, the streets are filled with tons of traffic, mostly young men with cars that thump, bounce and have spinning wheels. I knew this. I did not need to see this.

Once underway, we passed the largest car dealerships imaginable*. Are they the only ones of Miami-Dade County? It looked as if everyone in the state bought there cars there, that’s the only way you could justify such monoliths. Is there some program whereby Cuban refugees are issued a new car upon arrival that I don’t know about? These dealerships were huge: four- or five-story high parking garages filled with vehicles. They had names like Planet Dodge. I think a few had their own zip codes. Several were right in a row, looking like Woodfield Mall. Spooky. Prediction: with the failure of Ford and the dominance of Wal-Mart, I think Wal-Mart will start selling discounted Fords, and when they can’t produce them cheap enough, they will switch to GM, etc. etc; down the line until Wal-Mart is the number one car seller in America – of Daewoo’s.

So we proceeded down a highway punctuated by Drive Safe signs that served as little highway memorials (crosses, flowers) and warnings about Crocodile Crossings. (There are saltwater crocs in the area, although the American Alligator is much more common and not endangered. Guess that’s why you don’t have to slow down for them.)

We saw some signs for a sandal outlet, which led me to question, what constitutes a ‘second’ in sandals? A flip-flop missing the little thing that wedges between the toes?

Arriving in Key Largo quite late, we were told by the staff of the Hungry Pelican Hotel that they were overbooked and we had to be moved to a smaller room – one big bed, not two. At this point we were so tired, we really didn’t care. After seeing the room, I cared. Guide books lie!!

Now this was tiny. I could hold up my arms and touch fingertips to each wall. The mirror in the bathroom was so high, I could only see my eyes. Couple that with the fact it had not been painted or cleaned since Bogart was in the area, and I was getting downright unpleasant. After bumping into each other a few times and wrestling with the suitcases, we managed to shut the door. No worry about anyone breaking in, the luggage blocked the doorway. There was no phone in the room, so ‘road blog’ was out. Heck, there wasn’t a light bulb over 40 watts in the room, or a flat place to set anything down. Grumbling, I fell asleep quickly.

Tomorrow: What Continent Serves This for Breakfast?


*Check this out! The fire happened the day we landed and was all over the news! Looks like the dealership ‘took care of it’. Can you say Conspiracy Theory?