Archive for the 'Travels' Category

In the beginning

…there was a 16 hour stay at the Pittsburgh airport.

We kicked off what we thought would be our final hours on US soil with Mass at St. Joe’s followed by a bonfire at the Sanders’ house. There was beer & a trampoline, but Matt tells that story best.

By about 4 a.m. on Sunday July 13, 2008, we were assembled at the airport, waiting to check our luggage & find our way to the gate. Our flight was scheduled to depart at 6 a.m. When we arrived at the gate, I was excited & surprised to see Bishop Zubik there. He and many of the seminarians were going to be on our plane too!

6 a.m. came and went. We were told that it was taking longer than expected to load our food onto the plane. Then we were told they wanted to add some more fuel. We finally boarded, probably around 8 a.m. only to wait for about an hour while they redistributed some fuel from one tank to another… and then it happened. We were asked to leave the plane. Fuel was leaking and a part was going to have to be ordered.

The flight crew went home… we knew we were in for a long wait.

Bishop Zubik had Mass with all 425 of us at about 11 a.m. & afterwards told us that it looked like we probably wouldn’t be leaving until 8 p.m. (our “last hours” became our “last day”) A talent show scheduled for 3 p.m. was announced, too. In the mean time, the Bishop & several priests heard confessions, many people napped under the chairs at the concourse, others played cards, Saw, frisbee, hacky sack… we sang & prayed, too. It was something of a “retreat before the pilgrimage” except without amazing food. The airline provided us with $20 each in meal vouchers, but it just wasn’t quite the same as the catering we’ve had at various retreats.

The talent show was a lot of fun. The majority of the participants were (no surprises!) from the St. Joe’s/St. Mary’s contingent. Skits included “Down with the Sickness,” “The Candy Store,” and “The Lawnmower.” Levi, Sarah & Rebecca played & sang “Cast Your Burdens” and an original song called “Lord You’re Movin'” and Dan did what Dan does best… he solved the Rubix cube in less than a minute. People from other groups sang songs and juggled. My favorites were probably the group from Natrona Heights who wrote a song about our delay and the Bishop & the seminarians singing in Latin.

Our delay was big news! It was covered by KDKA (if you search their video archive you can find a few interviews, too! Hat-tip to Mrs. R. for the info), WPXI, and WTAE as well as the Post-Gazette and the Tribune Review. You’ll notice in the stories that some of the details change depending on the reporter, but the basics are the same: A lot of ‘Burghers had to wait a LONG time before we started our journey to be with hundreds of thousands of Catholics from around the world and celebrate Mass with the Pope.

Also worth a mention: Mrs. E. found this blog that was updated periodically through the trip by someone who traveled with us but remained anonymous as “great-gramps.” GG caught a few good pictures of some of our crew hanging out at the airport and later at the Mass with all the pilgrims from the US.

author’s note: hopefully Matt will jump in with some of his thoughts & insights on the trip… look for those to start probably Thursday at the earliest. I’ll be blogging about the trip in small pieces, hopefully to make it more manageable to read and also to write about. Pictures are up on facebook but I need to go through them all again before I upload them here… after that I’ll start adding pictures to all the blog entries for the trip

Back from Down Under

We got home last night at about midnight… lots to tell! There will be more blogging in the coming week. Pictures will also appear soon. Some are being uploaded to Amy’s facebook so check there first, but they’ll be in the regular albums on this site later after we’ve had time to sort through & organize them. Amy picks up the cats in the morning & we’re just praying they’re not too mad about being left behind, especially considering we traveled to see Ratzi’s namesake ;)

New Pictures!

Check the gallery… lots of new pictures to see including our new house, 4th of July, our trip to the beach, Bethany & Shane’s wedding and, of course, new pictures of the cat. Would life really be complete without more pictues of Ratzi??

West Virginia Wrapup

My business trip to ALCAN in West Virginia was exhausting. In the three weeks I was there, I worked up enough overtime to be the equivalent of three weeks of work… in three weeks time. That’s a lot of time.

Highlights included breakfast at Bob Evans. Almost every day (except for the three days I ate hotel breakfast, which sucked, and the one day I was called in at 3am), I ate French Toast with Strawberries on top and a side of crispy bacon. The cooks there really know how to make crispy bacon. I believe they teach their own discipline, crispabacon-fu. One waitress always immediately brought be a large glass of OJ and a small glass of water, that’s how regular I became. On the last day she waited on me she even made my breakfast entirely, since the cook had to step out for a bit. That earned her the largest breakfast tip I’ve ever given, at over 35%.

We also invented songs. Our favorites were, “How the Quench Stole 4th of July” (You’re a mean one… mister quench…) and “The Plate Expansion Opera,” with one song based on the Oompa Loompa song from the original Willy Wonka movie.

Two days ago, we found a new Mexican restaurant that had opened just outside Ravenswood. The food is awesome. I recommend the Echilada Poblano (whose adjective seems to not agree with the noun, until you realise it isn’t really an adjective, but a type of sauce, and hence another noun). However, they have the worst service ever. They act like they don’t know how to run a restaurant, and are in bad need of a greeter/seater/cashier, since the waitors and waitresses don’t have the time to multitask without forgetting about their customers. I’m sure in a month or so, they’ll have it all figured out since they won’t be rookies anymore, and it’ll be great. I just won’t be there anymore to eat the food, since I won’t be down there. But still, great food. Horrible service.

The project went well. STill some bugs left, but they are relatively minor, and it’s a lot of watching and making sure it stays working. My other two cohorts have next week covered, so now it’s time for the beach!

I was very happy this morning when I came in and saw things were working without me.

Bliss!

All is Right with the World!

We were at a wedding on Saturday (you’ll start to notice a pattern). It was a lovely, wonderful wedding and I’ll have pictures up probably next week. I had a bit of trauma at the ceremony, though. Long story short, I thought my camera was quite broken. I got the camera as a birthday gift when I turned 18, so my Canon Sure Shot & I have been through an awful lot together. The thing has been abused & beaten – it got dropped on the floor at the Empire State building and kept right on clicking. So this silly thing I did that caused it to stop functioning was sad & embarrassing. (I ended up buying a disposable camera so I could take more pics at the reception.)

Tonight, I was shopping for a new camera, figuring that it would be cheaper and easier than trying to find somewhere to have mine repaired. Matt said “Hey, let me see the camera for a minute.” Two minutes later, my baby was working again. All he did was take the battery out long enough for the display to reset itself and it bounced right back.

I <3 Canon! (I <3 Matt, too)

Bring on the rest of the weddings!! =)

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