June 18

.

Unfortunately, I woke up feeling rather icky. We got up and showered, and walked two doors up the street to the apartment building. I called our daughter to request that she come down from the apartment and bring me a club soda and bitters.

It was a beautiful day. Cool, clear, blue. Lovely.

My better half went off to move the rental car and collect the truck.

We had been parking the rental car in the street. Just north of the apartment is a VERY nice neighborhood, where it's ok to park. Sometimes.

As long as you keep track of which street is ok to park on, when, and move when required, it's a fine place to park.

I had wondered if it would be ok to park a truck the way we'd been parking a car, but apparently it was. Or at least no one complained. We did not get a ticket or wake up to find the truck had been towed......

My daughter and I noticed that the primo parking slot we'd had the night before was open, so we sat on the curb and guarded it.

I really didn't think I was going to be able to go up and down and up and down (and did I mention around and around), so I stayed down with the truck, sipping soda (and developing quite a taste for bitters).

Slowly but surely the Stuff filled the bottom of the truck.

I did venture up, once, to use the bathroom and get some more soda&bitters. And to check in with Southwest, which I had forgotten to do the day before.

The new roommate's mom was friendly and charming and wished she could do something for me. It would have been lovely, had she known magic anti-nausea tricks I didn't know, but, alas.........



At 11:00 the Stuff was all at ground level. The truck was packed. It was Time To Go.

They were concerned about me, driving and flying in my not-so-good condition.

I was concerned about them, and the truck's acceleration issues.



They drove away.

I walked up into the neighborhood to retrieve the rental car. Slowly. Sipping the last of the soda and bitters.



I had Google directions to the airport. One reason I like them is they tell you how far each leg should be.

My first leg began well. The traffic and I moved right along. Then it got sticky, a few blocks before I needed to make my first turn.

As it happened, the road I was to turn on was under construction. Not only did its four lanes (one way) become one (1), but the construction vehicles would back up and block that one (1) lane any time they wanted.

(This would be a good time to mention that my plane wasn't scheduled to leave until 6:10. We hadn't known when the truck would be full, and I hadn't wanted to leave before they did. So ... time was totally not an issue, which had to lower the stress level.)



Where were we?

Oh yes, on Lombard Street.

It took me the better part of an hour to turn onto, and to go one half (1/2) mile on Lombard Street.

(You see why I mentioned the excess of time.)



So there I was, hanging out on Lombard street, moving 10 or 20 feet every so often.

Popping Tums. Chewing Doublemint. Sipping soda&bitters.

I had my penultimate applesauce on Lombard Street..........



I was to turn off Lombard on to Greene.

When that was (at last!) accomplished, traffic was moving normally (hooray!), and it looked like all was golden.

I looked at a street sign (as a sanity check), and it said Russell Street. !!! What? Oh no!

Now what! Where am I, and where is that, precisely, compared to where I should be?

I decided to keep going, and, huzzah!, I was going the right way.

I'm sure Baltimore isn't the only place where streets randomly turn into expressways, but I have been surprised by it more often, in Baltimore, than anywhere else.

Russell obligingly became Maryland 295, which was what I wanted, so all was serene.



I managed to make all the remaining turns and exits successfully, but I am here to tell you that that particular drive is *not* an easy one. Expressway exits on the left, multiple turn lanes (one of which will not be the correct lane once you turn, but which?).....

I made some last-minute lane changes to get there, but didn't have to do any back-tracking.

Very glad it was lunchtime rather than rush hour!



I handed over the rental car (if you ever want a BIG trunk, I can recommend an Impala).

I sat in the rental car building for a while, you guessed it, sipping soda&bitters.

I called my family to let them know that I had made it to the airport in a mere hour and a half (in the past we've gotten there via a half-hour cab ride). They were approaching the Maryland border.



I took the shuttle to the terminal.

My intelligent better half suggested that I might be able to get an earlier flight. I checked, but unfortunately Southwest's next flight was the one I was already booked on.

I went through security, and settled in to wait.

Here is your reward for sticking to it -- the only picture in this post:



Baltimore, on the airport floor. There was Washington, too, nearby, and I'd have taken a pic of it, as well, but people were walking on it. So rude. What about *my* needs????



I found a place to sit.

I read a book. I popped Tums. I chewed gum. I ate some soda crackers.

I had one last applesauce, which I was saving it for 5:00 so I'd be all soothed for my 6:10 flight.



At 3:00 I walked as far as you could walk in that terminal. Not very far, by Detroit Metro standards, but I expect it was good for me to get moving a bit.

Eventually it was 5:00, and I ate my applesauce -- which, it occurs to me to say, I took right through security. It was with my crackers (and Tums) in a plastic grocery bag, and it never occurred to me until after I'd gone through that it was probably "a liquid" that should have been a separate plastic bag for security.

Whatever.

It went through, and it wasn't a Risk, and I got to eat it.

Some time there will be a long rant on Evil Corporate "Food," but not now. I'll just mention that if you are trying to find something easy on the stomach and healthy to eat in an airport (like, say, applesauce), well, good luck with that!

Anyway.

Some time after 5:00 we all surged toward the gate, and at some point we began to line up, as one does to board Southwest.

Unfortunately, we learned we were getting a different crew from the one originally scheduled, and our new crew hadn't arrived. Sigh.

Wondering if my applesauce will wear off and I'll be sad............

The crew was only about 20 minutes late, and we took off 20 minutes late.

I surely appreciate the way people at Southwest seem to feel about their jobs! They all seem to be happy and upbeat, unlike the downtrodden individuals one so often encounters elsewhere at airports. They told us it was Southwest's birthday, and, say I, "Many More!"

The plane was crammed. I took my daughter's advice and sat in an aisle seat rather than my usually-preferred window. Not that there were any windows left, given my extremely late check-in time, but I didn't take a middle, so that I could get up as easily as possible. If necessary.............

I had ginger ale on the plane (I think for the second time in my life). I may develop a taste for that, too, in addition to bitters...............

The flight from Baltimore to Detroit is nice and short -- barely over an hour. A good thing, as I really wasn't enjoying my book all that much, and it was not growing on me..........

I believe it was cloudy all the way, and I'll hold that thought since I wasn't able to see much of anything out the windows from that aisle seat.



After the usual scenic drive around the airport once we landed in Detroit, we got to the terminal at about 8:00 pm.

I called my family to let them know I had landed. They were about 50 miles east of Toledo (you'll recall we went to the zoo there, just a few weeks ago), which meant they were about two hours from home.

I called the dogsitter to apprise her of my location and approximate ETA.

I took the shuttle to the parking lot, collected the little blue car, and headed home. (While we looove the way the Versa handles, it is rather stiff and bumpy on the highway. Compared to an Impala. Say.)



Once in Ann Arbor, I decided to stop for bread and milk, so that we could have breakfast without having to go out for anything.

The dog was fine, the dogsitter had taken care of everything. We chatted a little, and she headed home just as it began to storm.

It POURED down rain, and there was wind and some thunder.

I fixed a loose board on the fence gate and got rather wet.

I had my evening tea.

Just as I was beginning to wonder Where They Were, they arrived. Only about an hour after I did, despite the fact that they drove 10 hours and I flew.


Oy vey.


The important thing was that all went well for both parties, and we all got home, safe and sound. And the Stuff, too.

Whew.

And that was our day, in FAR more words than I am wont to use here.

.

June 17, part 2

.

Still strolling in the neighborhood.

This one is meant to be a bit of mise-en-scene -- this particular road didn't have much traffic.....





A better look at the roof lines on this block.





A look into a back yard.





Mimosa, in someone else's back yard.







I believe we don't have these in Michigan at all, not even in a pale and reserved version.

Love how they look on the tree; love how they look on the pavement......









Note stained glass in upper windows. Almost all of the highest windows on the block were of one of two stained-glass designs.





Tile mosaic, almost visible in the above (you can see a few light specks).





Flowers matching trim.





Matching trim and chairs.





Our destination.



When our daughter was a freshman, her swim team competed in a pancake-eating contest here.

The pancakes were plate-sized. The winner ate nine. (!!!) Did I mention it was just the girls, competing? I'm told the boys could eat 20...........

Michael Phelps (who is from Baltimore) apparently wrote in his autobiography about his typical (ENORMOUS) breakfast order right here at Pete's. Coincidentally, Michael was in Ann Arbor between Olympic Games (as his coach was working for Michigan at that time), and his pics in this article were taken at the Prickly Pear on Main Street in Ann Arbor, where I have eaten many many times (but not at breakfast).







Unfortunately, my insides were not interested in pancakes. I had dry white toast (now you can call me Elwood....), but I couldn't even eat that. I had some iced tea, and some water......

It was a strange kind of nausea. The smell of food did not bother me (it even smelled good), and motion did not bother me, either....... (Luckily, both.)



I was rather taken by the ceiling fan reflected in my spoon, but it's not interesting here, and isn't interesting even in the short video I took. Ah well.





Our next stop was the grocery, where we got some applesauce (my brilliant daughter's idea -- very soothing to my interior), some anti-nausea drugs (bonine, and something else ... I didn't take either, in the end, as I was afraid of being too ... woozy ... to drive). We also got some road food for the rest of my family, who would be driving the Stuff to Michigan. (Tragically, the truck only seated two, so ... someone ... had to fly back.)

I popped Tums. I chewed Doublemint (noting that the newest Doublemint is stronger, mint-wise, than older versions -- a good thing, when I'm chewing to sooth my stomach!).

We went back to the apartment. I had more tonic water and bitters.

More packing happened.

A photograph was taken of a fallen magnolia leaf I picked up the night before. You can't tell how substantial this is, but you can see the gorgeous color, and can almost tell that it was as shiny as though it were wet..........





Around 4:00, we went to collect the truck. A small truck, as trucks go, but ever so much larger than a mini-van.........

It wasn't made by the company which has had so much trouble with stuck accelerators in the last year or so, but perhaps it was a wanna-be ... its engine raced to the extent that it had to be shifted into neutral to be able to be stopped at a stoplight. Twice. In the few miles back to the apartment.

We (by which I mean "my better half") got no joy from the place where we picked it up ("we don't have another"), and was instructed to call the roadside assistance.

While he waited for the mechanic, my daughter and I made another trip out -- to Ace Hardware to get a lock for the truck! Not sure if this is true for all rental trucks, but this one did not come with a lock! My daughter had a standard combination lock, which was not nearly big enough. We now own one of the BIG Master combination locks. If you ever need to rent a truck and want to borrow it, just let us know...... (Don't you think the rental company should say, in giant letters, everywhere, NO LOCK ON TRUCK??? So you'd know to go buy one ahead of time rather than having to make a special trip out???? Sheesh.)

Eventually a mechanic showed up to look at the truck, and (you knew this would happen) when he drove it, it behaved perfectly.

Sigh, and argh.

What to do, what to do.

In the morning, they "*might* be able to locate another truck" we could have..................

We finally decided to commence loading the truck and hope for the best.........



I am the Official Packer. When efficient packing is required, I'm your packer. Not that you can tell, yet, from this pic.........





Me (shadow at bottom), in front of the apartment building, waiting for the next Stuff.





Door propped open.





Fancy light fixture.





Building on the other side of the truck. See the sliver of moon, way up high?





Love the fizzy thing at the top of the tower. So out of character with the rest of the building. Like an elegantly-dressed calm-and-steady older person holding a sparkler.......





After many loads had come down, it was decided that Enough was Enough for one day.

We had intended to eat in another nice place, but as tired and sweaty as we were (and it was 9:00 pm, too), it was decided that a foray in search of take-out would be the better part of valor.

(I was feeling together enough to eat some yogurt and some plain white rice.)

Our daughter's very good friend came over, as did another former swim-team member. It was nice to get to visit with K, and nice to get to know A a bit better.

My better half and I had been staying in the empty bedroom in the apartment, but its next occupant had arrived on the 17th, so we stayed in a quite decent small old hotel two doors down. There was tv, unlike in the apartment, so the basketball fan could check out the NBA championship final game.

I popped Tums, chewed gum, and went to sleep.

.

June 17, part 1

.

The 17th was a nice day. Warm, dry, clear and blue.

We strolled through the neighborhood, admiring the rowhouses and their gardens.





Same dentil and egg&dart; different paint choices.

(Air conditioners are seriously ugly. Don't you think someone could make money if they made them attractive? Two percent of net to me, if you do because you saw the idea here....)





I don't think I'd enjoy doing all this fussy painting, but I surely enjoy looking at it. (even under the bay window, where hardly anyone can see it because of the awning!)





I didn't used to like these newfangled daylily colors, but they are growing on me.....





Love that glowing center.......... Hey! I just noticed this is eight petals instead of the customary six...... Who knew.





Love the blue with the brick, love the very tall door (with window above -- just think how high the ceilings are in there!), love the reflections, love the stars.........





Paint matching the stained glass, flowers matching the paint......





Some have curvy building fronts, some have curvy window tops. (Box fans as ugly as air conditioners! Same 2% net to me if you make money on gorgeous fans as a result of seeing this suggestion.)





The owner of this one was out in front, talking to a contractory sort of person.



See the lion on the front step?



As I walked away, the man told me there was a charge for taking pictures.

I pretended to flip him a quarter (or maybe it was a silver dollar.....).

He pretended to catch it.

We parted, friends.



Big points and little points.





Psychedelic numbers. (Can you hear "Incense, Peppermints" in the background?)





Curves and points.





With tile roofs.





Seriously bright colors.









Hand-made anti-burglar grates over the lowest windows. This one on the house above.





This one on a neighbor.





I think this is a banana tree, out enjoying the summer.





I told the woman in blue that I was enjoying her garden. She was friendly and chatty and we spoke with her for a few minutes. Now she is chatting with the shirtless young man (who is actually paying attention to her, though you can't tell it from the pic).

I loved the long sparkly strings hanging on the tree. You can see one, in the middle, near the top. These had bits of mirror on them, as well as large beads.

I really liked the amount of character displayed by the people taking care of these homes and gardens. My neighborhood is bland and boring in comparison........





More points. More tile. On a beautiful blue day.



.

June 16

.

A visit to a very nice restaurant down by the harbor.







Pea soup with mint oil.



I seem to be having more and more trouble maintaining my body's equilibrium when I travel. Some combination of the unfamiliar (food? water? pollen?) and stress, combined with my usual air-pressure-change headaches (and Excedrin taken for same?) push me into light-headedness and nausea.

I ate a few bites of my soup (which was nice, but not spectacular), and was not feeling that I could continue eating.

The staff was concerned, and when I told them I'd been feeling strange since I got up, I was offered club soda with bitters.

I am a person who dislikes anything fizzy, so I declined.

But the more I thought about it, the more it sounded ... soothing.

So I changed my mind, and tried that combination of two things I never, ever, consume.

And I felt enough better to enjoy my lunch. (reminder to self -- experts are everywhere. TALK about what is wrong; someone may have a solution!)



The other appetizer at our table -- I was told it was very nice.





This was sauteed mushrooms in and on top of a round of puff pastry, with a tiny salad on top. It was delicious.





This is salmon, with grilled baby summer squash and a "squash flower beignet" (a squash flower with batter inside, which had been fried -- interesting, and, I think, the first time I've tasted a squash flower). The salmon was fine, but not extraordinary.





Pork confit, on a slice of green tomato, on rice. The pork was delicious.





Rhubarb "consomme" with um, can't remember what the frozen blob was called.... The consomme part was nice, but a bit too sweet. The frozen blob (which was vanilla on the menu, not the banana it was described as being when it was delivered...) didn't do anything for me. Sugar decoration cute, but not adding much, imh.





Key lime cheesecake, with white-chocolate ice cream, and basil oil.

I am not a fan of adulterations in/on my cheesecake (though I make an exception for pumpkin cheesecake).

This was lovely. The tartness of the lime added to the tartness of cheesecake (instead of trying, oddly, imh, to sugar it over with raspberries or something).

The basil oil was nice with the cheesecake.

Overall -- Yum.





The remaining dessert. The ice cream was COFFEE. Amazing. Speaking of pale and reserved (as I was, yesterday, about northern magnolias) -- this ice cream made every other coffee ice cream I've had taste like decaf. It was wonderful, and I loved it. (See the little pile of dark crumbs under the ice cream? We decided it was likely that was coffee grounds. Mmmmmmm. Just call me Caffeine Ennyday....)

The chocolate, in comparison, was pale and reserved. Alas.

Don't you love the light coming through the lacy thing?





To finish, they gave us these tiny macarons. Which, unfortunately, were more about cute than about flavor.





They certainly succeeded in the cute department. They were about the size of the end of my thumb.





One last image before we venture out -- you saw my chubby glass in the first pic.

I liked what the light did on the table when I lifted it......





It was raining when we arrived, but the rain stopped as we dined.

Just here there are nice restaurants (and new condo apartments) on one side of the street, and boats on the other.





Back up the hill, approaching the apartment building.

We won't have goldenrod in Michigan for weeks and weeks.





We have daylilies now, though, just like Baltimore.





This is the full-of-character apartment building my daughter lived in for the last year.

Hey. Look! That tree on the left is a magnolia.







The windows on the top level belonged to my daughter's apartment.

It was a very nice old building, with high ceilings, picture moldings, windows everywhere, hardwood floors, mahogany doors, and no-longer-usable fireplaces. The building is a bit down on its luck -- the elevator hadn't worked since January ("can't get the part!"), and the shower tiles were in serious need of regrouting. (Air conditioning only when provided in the windows by tenants.....)

But no new buildings have windows in the kitchen, let alone the bathroom!





The rest of the day was spent in packing and moving things toward the front door.

Popping Tums. Chewing Doublemint.

My family went foraging and returned with tonic water (no club soda nearby) and bitters for me, and I managed to ... remain mostly functional......

.