Flying 1st Class....

After dinner and playing around the internet, I finally went to the boarding gate to wait for the flight to start boarding.

The bad news: The flight was delayed by more than an hour, meaning that my Mexico City adventure is probably not going to happen.

The good news: Because tickets were oversold, I was upgraded to first class!

This is the first time that I have flown first class. Only 15 minutes into the experience and I never wan to fly coach. I was allowed to board ahead of all everyone else. I got to see everyone board after me. People kept staring at me as they walked past me to find their seat in the back of the plane. I am not sure if they were jealous, thought that I was a rich prick, thought that I was too young to be flying first class, or knew that that I was upgraded for free and are upset that this not happen to them.

The main reason that I was upgraded is that I am flying with my frequent flyer number, and I am flying alone.

There are some really cute looking girls walking past me, almost makes me want to downgrade just to talk to them. The first class is almost empty and I don't have anyone to talk to. This makes me sad. I enjoy talking to people during long flights. I will write more as about my flight experience as the flight get on its way.

-----Two hours into the flight ------

I had a second dinner. I could not abstain, it looked good. I was impressed with the fact that they gave us real cloth napkins and and metal utensils. I even took a picture of my meal before I ate it (below). The fact that I am impressed with these things clearly shows just how accustomed I've become to the bare minimum in coach.

The free booze is also nice.

I also had a chance to meet an very interesting family. The father was born in Zimbabwe, and lived in Cuba for a few years where he met his wife (who is Cuban). They both now live in Australia. They are on their way Cuba to visit family. He is a civil engineer, and spend some time telling me about concrete. I would have actually been more interested in the topic if it weren't for the fact that it's 3am for me.

I should try to get some sleep before I land.

The LAX Waiting Game...

I left my apartment a little after 6pm. By 8pm, I was at LAX with my boarding pass, past security, and sitting at a restaurant having dinner.

My plane does not board until 11pm, so yeah ... I have three hours of waiting time.

As I am writing this, I am about half way into the waiting time. I sat next to this woman who happened to be a lawyer. She was really interesting and we had a great conversation about law, significant others, the military, career choices, and traveling. Sadly, she had a flight to catch and had to go. She was kinda of cute too.

One thing that I am glad about about myself is that I am able to strike a conversation with just about anyone. This is a good skill to have, and has proven to be useful.

Right now the biggest thing that is occupying my mind, is the question of whether or not to leave the airport in Mexico city with only a five hour layover. I have subway maps. Pages from a guide book, telling me how to get from the airport to Zocalo. It's cutting it really close. Half of the people that I talk to think it's a good idea and the other half think it'd bad. I am not sure at this point. I guess this is going to be moot if the plane comes in late. We'll see. Updates to come.

Unfinished Business Before I leave the Country ...

I wanted to complain about certain companies before I leave the country. This is a good way for me to leave all of the bad karma behind.

First: Cheaptickets.com

The messed up my reservations, TWICE. However, they did try to make up for it by offering me a $25 dollar voucher each time. I tried to use these vouchers for my NYC trip in August. The first one was applied without any problems. The second one ... oh man.

The main thing I hate about calling them is that their calling center is outsourced to India. I have no problems with this, except for the fact that their accents are so hard to understand over the phone. Six calls, and four emails later I got a supervisor who was willing to "make an exception" for me and manually apply the second voucher. Apparently, I cannot use two vouchers on the same reservations. This was something that nobody told me, and this term was not in the email with the voucher information. She made me feel like I did something wrong, and was helping me out of the kindness of her heart. One advice when dealing with them, there are better supervisors if you call during the day and not 2am.

I am NEVER using them again.

Second: Anthem/Blue Cross

My health insurance bill is due on the first of every month. They force me to pay a $4 bill printing fee, when I don't want a printed bill. No option to pay online. I can pay using their automated phone system. Except is doesn't work. I keep getting an infinite loop when the systems asks me for my ID#. Since I am leaving the country, it will be very hard for me to call back when they are open and I can speak to a human. I hope, I have time to call from Nicaragua. Otherwise, my insurance will lapse, and God forbid I need it when I am injured abroad. Bastards.

Third: Procter and Gamble, makers of Febrezee Noticables

This is an air freshener that you plug in. If you let the oil run out and leave it plugged in, it can damage your floors. Picture here.

Last: Nicaraguan business in general.

For some reason latin american countries do not believe that business should be open on Sunday. I've been trying to get reservations to a nice restaurant on a Sunday night, only to be told my many of them are closed that day. Gerrrr. I eventually managed to reserve an early dinner at one place for an EARLY 4:30pm dinner.


Ok ... all done. I feel better. Now I can enjoy my trip. Not a bad post in the time it took this bus to get to LAX.

On my Way to LAX....

Right now I am sitting on a bus, on my way to LAX.

One thing I am going to miss while I am in Nicaragua is having internet access for my laptop everywhere by using my phone as modem.

I will try write about my trip to Nicaragua everyday, and upload the entries whenever I get a chance to connect to the Internet.

Hope....

Hope...
is unborn memories
Untreatable disease
a mortal enemy
It's got me on my knees
Bound and gagged and
begging for mercy

Sparta: Untreatable Disease
Update with correct band name.

Local Politics ...

On my way back home a couple of days ago I saw a rally sponsored by a local AM talk radio station, AM 640. The rally was a protest of California Senate Bill 1499, a ban of mylar balloons.

The language of the bill would actually ban any floating ballon made out of an electro-conductive material. Most of the balloons you see in grocery stores are made out mylar, which conducts electricity. The main reason for the bill is to prevent power outages caused by these reaching power lines and causing a short circuit.

The host of the show spent most of the time reading statistics showing how mylar balloons really don't cause power outages. The rally was also sponsored by local ballon manufacturers who were giving away balloons. Plenty of pictures of sad kids were shown at the rally (see below).



In the end, I thought that they were right (if the statistics are true). Since these balloons really don't cause that many power outages, there is no point in banning them. I love these balloons. But honestly, I was more interested in the van that they were using to broadcast the signal. Notice the shortwave antenna as opposed to the parabolic (satellite) antenna in news vans.





The rest of my pictures are at the end of this set.

It's Over...

Hillary will suspend her campaign. It feels good backing a winner, and hopefully now the Democrats will be able to take back the White House with Obama.

I still worry over the fact that I don't hate McCain. This is an indication that while he may lose a part of the extreme right Republican base, he may gain votes who are more neutral, those infamous undecideds. Enough to win.

At this point I cherish the thought of a Obama-Clinton ticket. I think this would unite the Democrats and create a force to be reckoned with come November.

Let's hope for the best.