Weekend!

Jaybird

Jaybird is Birdmojo on Xbox Live and Jaybirdmojo on Playstation's network. He's been playing consoles since the Atari 2600 and it was Zork that taught him how to touch-type. If you've got a song for Wednesday, a commercial for Saturday, a recommendation for Tuesday, an essay for Monday, or, heck, just a handful a questions, fire off an email to AskJaybird-at-gmail.com

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41 Responses

  1. j r says:

    I fly throw the Doha airport a bunch for work. Qatar Airways is by far the nicest of the airlines that go to some of the places I need to go and because of Qatari subsidies, I don’t have too much trouble getting the fares approved.

    Last time I flew through, I decided to get out and have a look around. I spent the day and that night, which seemed about the right amount of time to spend checking out Doha if you’ve got no other reason to be there. The Museum of Islamic Art was definitely the highlight. The souk was nice. That Qatari lime mint drink really hits the spot when its 42 degrees Celsius. And had some of the best hummus and tabbouleh I’ve had at the Syrian restaurant in the Souk.

    Oh yeah, there’s this viral Che-style image of the Emir that was up all over the place. Wondering if it was there the last time you were there. Heard it was a new thing, since the beef with the other GCC members.Report

    • Jaybird in reply to j r says:

      Oooh, I haven’t seen the Che-ish Emir portrait yet (may he live one thousand years). Just the one portrait of him standing and that portrait was always next to the portrait of his son in a similar pose.

      I’ll look for it this time!Report

    • Miss Mary in reply to j r says:

      I like the Denver airport. PDX is my favorite and LAX is the WORST, but Denver is in my top five for sure.Report

      • Maribou in reply to Miss Mary says:

        @miss-mary It’s pretty great once you’re inside it, pretty awful to get inside of, IME. That’s why I like flying places COS—>DEN (layover to account for bumps)—>

        Agreed about LAX. THE WORST. Toronto is a close 2nd.

        SFO international terminal is pretty great, dunno about the rest of the joint.Report

        • Slade the Leveller in reply to Maribou says:

          My wife and I flew to Toronto and landed at YTZ, the little airport in the lake. I love small airports, mostly due to security being way less of a hassle. I’ll choose Midway here in Chicago any time there is a choice.Report

          • @slade-the-leveller Oh, that would be glorious; I was of course talking about YYZ.

            Trying to get from COS (or DEN) to YYG, at a price that won’t bankrupt me, has led me to compare the merits of way too many airports that are way too big, over the years…

            I like Winnipeg’s airport a lot. Small and friendly.Report

  2. Jason says:

    Seeing IT tonight. The trailers look good, so I’m hoping it’s a decent horror flick. I know it can’t possibly get all the scary stuff from the book (even if this one’s only doing the kid part), and that’s okay.

    Other than that, grading and preparing my next paper unit for my courses. Maybe a little of Destiny 2.Report

    • pillsy in reply to Jason says:

      In a way that’s a shame, because I thought the creepiest part in the book was the build-up at the beginning as all the adults were drawn back to Derry. Then again, the parts with the kids in the old TV movie still hold up and the parts with the adults, er, don’t.Report

      • Jason in reply to pillsy says:

        I agree with you about the book (and I liked the history bits, too). But I think it’s a (possibly) good choice in adaptation.Report

        • Jason in reply to Jason says:

          Because they would have to introduce the seven adult characters and make a connection with the seven kids and then start the kid’s stories. That’s a lot of work for a movie. I think the ideal adaptation, one that could fit in the best bits from the book would be an HBO series. Or maybe a Peter Jackson extended edition trilogy.Report

  3. Maribou says:

    Plan to spend the weekend doing the chores that exhaust me since I don’t really have a be-utterly-exhausted option when Jay’s away – he takes really good care of me if I overdo when he’s around. Litterbox switchout, mostly, maybe something else if I have juice to spare. (Stupit chronic illnesses! I used to be a person of boundless physical energy…)

    A lot of sleeping and watching dumb TV is probably also in store. And probs some reading.Report

  4. Mike Dwyer says:

    @jaybird

    How long is the flight to Denver? Does the plane even reach altitude? If my math is right, aren’t you less than 100 miles away?Report

    • Fish in reply to Mike Dwyer says:

      Google says 96.6 miles from airport to airport. You actually end up waiting in the terminals at both ends longer than the flight itself. But the drive sucks, so…Report

      • Jaybird in reply to Fish says:

        Yeah, the drive is what makes it awful.

        There’s a part of me that would want to just fly from Denver and get picked up from Denver, but when I get home there is *NO* way that I could possibly drive and I wouldn’t want to put anybody else through that after sunset.Report

      • Maribou in reply to Fish says:

        Things that are worse if a Colorado Springsian flies out of DIA than the relatively tiny C Springs airport, in order of magnitude.

        1) Cost of gas + parking (+ tolls if you want to stay under 100 miles and not drive through all the Denver traffic, adding at least 30 minutes to your trip) is more expensive than the flight from C Springs to Denver. If you choose to have someone drive you and drop you off, gas doubles and they’ve just spent an extra 1.5-4 hours on the road roundtrip than if they drove you to C. Springs airport (depending on traffic and if you took the toll road). Possibility of really bad construction traffic completely horking the timing.
        2) More likelihood of drastic, majorly slowing-you-down security issues in DIA than in C Springs
        3) Way more crowded, worse wi-fi, and longer waits for breakfast/lunch/whatever.

        Downsides to flying out of C Springs
        1) sometimes they cancel the c-springs / denver flight
        2) higher likelihood of 50+ soldiers all getting deployed somewhere getting into the checkin line right in front of you at the same time all the machines go down (this has happened to me twice)

        Overall flying out of Co Springs is a better bet.Report

    • Jason in reply to Mike Dwyer says:

      It’s about thirty minutes or so. (i’ve flown from Springs to Denver a fair number of times). The plane reaches an altitude, but not “altitude.” It feels like the flight is a perfect arc: take off, reach an altitude and start the landing process.Report

      • Maribou in reply to Jason says:

        @jason Heh, it’s a perfect arc when it goes smoothly. A rollercoaster (or as an old guy once said who was sitting next to me, “a real tree-skimmer”) when there’s a bunch of turbulence.

        I’ve had takeoff to wheels-on-the-ground take fewer than 15 minutes in ideal conditions.Report

        • Jason in reply to Maribou says:

          I try to fly from Springs when I can because it’s about 35 minutes from Pueblo and I don’t even hit any Springs traffic to get to the airport. (your assessment above is spot-on; just add another hour for Pueblo traveling.

          Unfortunately, most of traveling lately (conferences for work and two trips to Paris) has been from DIA. I’m not rich, but I spend the money for the toll road.Report

  5. Mike Dwyer says:

    This weekend I battle our lawn. One last round of spray on the crabgrass before fall. Then we’ll over-seed in a couple of weeks and hope for the best. The peer pressure of life in the suburbs is real folks.

    And completing the last of my management course. 20 hours of prep work and the actual class runs all of next week. I’ll learn new skills like Time Management! Successful delegating! Developing employees!

    Should be fun…Report

    • Maribou in reply to Mike Dwyer says:

      @mike-dwyer Brrrrand new skills, right? I’ve had a few of those myself. Usually pick up some nuggets here and there but occasionally the thought crosses my mind that I’d make more money teaching these classes than I do sitting in them.Report

      • Mike Dwyer in reply to Maribou says:

        I’m sure I will learn some new things and I generally like that kind of training, but this one is kind of silly. I’ve been in management for years, but I fell through the cracks on this class. It’s similar to when I forgot to take Archaeology 101 in college and then had to take it after working in the field for three years.

        The pre-course did have some stuff I hadn’t seen about prioritizing tasks and action lists, which is like catnip for me, so I will enjoy those items for sure.Report

    • Miss Mary in reply to Mike Dwyer says:

      I’d never make it in the burbs. I don’t even notice the grass until it’s away too long. My thoughts are with you, Mike.Report

  6. Oscar Gordon says:

    I was supposed to be getting ready for a trip to Orlando and a week of strategic business planning, but apparently they are having some kind of thunderstorm this weekend, and as normal, the whole state is flipping out and closing down 😉Report

  7. aaron david says:

    Even when self employed summer vaca has to come to an end. Start working on my next map, which at this stage is really mainly thinking about and researching to see if anything new has opened. Not much of a weekend really, but to make up for it, I am replacing half the stair treads in my house, which is fun do to the precise fitting. By the way, 12″ bullnose stair tread runs an astronomical amount per foot, and I need many, many feet.

    If you are interested, I plan to pull out one of the damaged treads, use it to make a template out of scraps (put my skill saw against one edge and clamp it down, then put a piece of scrap down the length with a 2×4 up against the end to give consistent cuts for each piece.) cut the pieces I need, fit them, pull them back out for staining (putting the old ones in temp. so no one falls) and while drying fill the screw holes some former owners put in. Should be fun!Report

  8. Will Truman says:

    Unexpectedly, we were approved for an animal adoption this afternoon. Though the timing is bad, we’re going out to meet him tomorrow.Report

    • Mike Dwyer in reply to Will Truman says:

      @will-truman

      Mazel tov!Report

    • Jaybird in reply to Will Truman says:

      Oh that’s great! Good luck!Report

    • Unfortunately, things didn’t work out. They put us down under another dog’s name and while I drove an hour to go meet the little guy, the little guy was interviewing with a potential guardian just down the road.

      The whole thing was really a mess. It’s no fun to explain to a five year old that she’s not going to get to meet a new dog that we might be taking home with us. I stressed the “might” but it didn’t penetrate, occasionally. Then the dog they did match us with was an Australian shepherd, which is a no-go… but that didn’t matter because he was adopted by someone else before we got to meet him anyway. Combine that with the truck being an hour late, and we spent about two-and-a-half hours not meeting any dogs.

      But she did get to see a bunch, which helped her get over her disappointment.Report

  9. Miss Mary says:

    Nowadays I feel like all I do is pump breastmilk. Literally day and night. I do get to leave the house to volunteer for the Parent Teacher Organization today, and tomorrow I’m hitting the farmer’s market. I was going to paint at my pregnant friend’s house this weekend but she canceled due to bed rest. One day I’ll have a life again, but for now it’s mostly rest.Report

  10. fillyjonk says:

    Editing a paper (not mine; one someone else wrote) for a journal. Volunteer scut work that there’s not really enough thanks to make up for the time and effort it’s taking. (the author occasionally makes big spelling errors, and is someone who seems to randomly make up sub-species and varieties of things – I am mostly doing the name-checking of species, which is something I’m good at because it’s incredibly-anal-detail-requiring work, but it’s exhausting and not fun.).

    And this afternoon is a much-delayed memorial service for a friend. (A particular family member was being…difficult, to be polite about it….in re: planning/scheduling the service).

    So, it’s not a happy or fun weekend here, and next week will be hell, because I have several evening meetings.Report

  11. Saul Degraw says:

    I was in Phoenix for work for the first time this week. Some thoughts:

    1. The airport is nice but their TSA seems much more through than SFO. I wonder if this is because it is smaller and the workers are bored.

    2. Phoenix would not exist in its current size without air conditioning. Same with QatarReport

  12. Maribou says:

    @jaybird and I decided to go off the rails of our quiet and dutiful weekend at home with a date night tonight, because our local AAA team was in a playoff series game. They lost in the 10th after a series of weird confusions in the 9th that could’ve used a @richard-hershberger in the box to explain to us what the heck just happened. (As in both teams were confused, not just the fans… the ump was clear on things but not the rest of us.)

    It was a heckuva game, and if Jay wasn’t heading out next week, we’d totally be there for the series final tomorrow. I’ll be figuring out how to listen to it on the radio.Report