Airport Misadventures

My eldest daughter returned yesterday from a three-week exchange trip to Austria. The return flight information was in my Blackberry based on the original information from the American teacher. There was either operator error in inputting the flight number and arrival time or the flight number and arrival time changed from what was in the original parent packet. Either way, waiting at the international arrival gate at the airport for over an hour for other parents to show up was not on my afternoon agenda.

People-watching is a great way to kill the time. There were the Delta attendants sporting the new, and highly controversial, red designer duds. There were the Air Lingus attendants that reflected their country’s demographics of 50% blondes and 50% brunettes. There was the bilingual couple behind me whose conversation easily flowed between French and English. There were even our across-the-street neighbors returning from a family vacation is Scotland. (Sadly, there wasn’t enough space in my vehicle to give them a ride home.) Finally, the American kids and their teacher rounded the turn to be enveloped by hugs and kisses from parents, siblings and friends.

The most important lesson that you will learn from today’s blog is to never, NEVER put your parking ticket next to your cellphone. Similar to what happens when you put your hotel key card near your cellphone, my parking ticket was demagnetized. After several attempts at the in-terminal payment kiosk, it finally dawned on me what had happened.

But when you can’t prepay your parking ticket, you have to wait in line with everyone who’s paying cash. Two lanes out of a dozen or more were Cash Only. Not that bad, only three cars ahead of me. However, when the cashier manually rung me up, the price was bumped up to the next portion of an hour. I looked at the clock in my car. One minute over the hour. One minute! And he made me pay the extra hour!

Lesson learned. Never put anything magnetized near your cellphone.

Mr. Zuckerberg, Tear Down that Website

This is not a recruitment ad but a sobering view of hatred. The picture was taken from James von Brunn's website. He's the man who walked into the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC, yesterday and fatally shot a security guard for the sole reason that the security guard was black and working at the Holocaust Museum. The shooter claimed to be a World War II veteran. Perhaps he was.

Many of you have read before about my favorite World War II veteran. A man who landed in Normandy on D-plus-14. Who told stories of the sky glowing orange on three sides from the fighting - the fourth side being the blackness of the Channel. A man who helped liberate a camp in Austria and was in charge of delousing the Russian POWs. Whose stories were first-hand accounts of the tragedy known as the Holocaust. Whose stories were scrubbed clean to become my bedtime stories as a child - of being separated from his unit in France, guarding the tanks during a hot summer night, attending Christmas service with a French family who invited him to eat with them.

How hatred develops is easy to understand. Perceived slights and indignities, one's feeling of entitlement not being supported by all around, grudges left to fester. But it's also learned. And quite frequently at an early age. One way of reaching younger and more impressionable people is through Facebook.

Facebook won't take down the Holocaust denier pages claiming that they are expressions of free speech, however ignorant. There's a fine line between free speech and Big Brother. We can't become like Iran which shutters access to websites, like Facebook, that the government considers to be a threat. Yet, there are stories from here in America of local government tyrants doing the same thing because certain online threads are undermining their credibility. But where can we draw the line?

What about people who declare that Dr. Tiller should die for his actions and someone following through on that? What about musicians who shout to the world about forcibly putting women in their place? What about people who claim the Holocaust never happened?

Any threat, verbal or written, against the President is perceived as real and investigated. All citizens should be given that same chance of survival. Whether an individual, like Dr. Tiller, or a group, such as Jews, and African-Americans, and Muslims, and Christians. For we've all been victims, at one time or another, of persecution and hatred and bigotry and ignorance.

We're Leaving in Ten Minutes!

After meeting my Austrian exchange student at the subway stop, he informs me he and his best friend want to go to a store before going to the Farewell Dinner.

"Sure."

"We'll walk home."

"Where's the store?"

"[Rhymes with stove] Street."

"Do you mean [rhymes with love] Street?"

If English is your second language, sometimes you have trouble with street names when there's no context. So I offer to drive them to the store then to my house to hang out before the dinner. As my car pulls around the curve I ask them if they're sure there's a store back here.

"Ja, there it is," the friend points to an army supply store.

For the size of the store, they sure are in there a long time. But they bring out their purchases and we head home. At some point, my house became inhabited by four American teenage girls. When I drive up with three Austrian teenage boys, I wonder if I should read them the Riot Act. But they settle into the family room in front of the TV.

I putter around the kitchen gathering the snack foods for the dinner. The music is loud coming from the library. The TV blares on the other side of the kitchen from the family room. Concern slips out of my mind until I realize that the TV and the stereo are both on but not a single person is to be found downstairs.

Upstairs I go with the pretense of getting ready for the dinner. One bedroom with an open door has three American girls and one Austrian boy. I inquire where my other daughter is. "In her room," is the answer. Two deep voices are heard from behind the second closed door. About that time she peeps out of her room to see what's going on. Aha! She not in there with them.

Having two teenager daughters is a full-time job. Having four teenage girls and three teenage boys under the same roof is daunting. Countdown to Dinner time has begun!

Facet Hound

A kiss on the hand

May be quite continental,

But…

Our latest excursion with our Austrian exchange student was the Natural History Museum. His choice. Once inside, the teenagers split from us old folks and the little one to parts unknown. The youngest child wanted to see the new Written in Bone exhibit. But we had to make a detour for Mama to see her favorite exhibit – the Hope Diamond. It’s more than just the diamonds that thrill me. There are rubies, and emeralds, and sapphires, and garnets, and opals, and, and, and.

Tiffany's!

Cartier!

Black Starr!

Frost Gorham!

Talk to me Harry Winston.

When I was dating my soon-to-be fiancé, a childhood friend admonished me “No yellow diamonds”. Blue, red, yellow, clear – the color isn’t that important. My one desire during high school wasn’t a backseat boogie with the star football player; it was that delicate necklace on display at the corner jewelry store. Every Friday evening as the high school crowd would gather for Friday-night “cruising”, my first stop was the corner window to covet what I couldn’t afford and, as a teenager, didn’t need.

But stiff back

Or stiff knees,

You stand straight at Tiffany's.

Nowadays, the resources are budgeted towards college tuition for the kids and retirement for my husband and me. Indulgences are limited to four-star restaurants, spa half-days, and Godfather trilogy Blu-Rays – things that don’t have to be financed. But every now and then, standing close and gazing at the sparkling ice is just what the doctor ordered.

But square-cut or pear-shaped,

These rocks don't loose their shape.

Diamonds are a girl's best friend.

Frau Robinson

[Editor's note: Don't forget to vote in the poll to the right of this blog.]

When you were in high school, didn't you look at other kids and think, Oh, s/he's cute? Even though you may be married, don't you see a stranger at the mall and think the same thing? As we age, do we stop appreciating good looks? Are we supposed to not acknowledge the fact that we think someone is cute/good looking/hot/beautiful/gorgeous? Perhaps if we're married and the person we think is cute is the same age as our eldest daughter?

She takes German in school and is participating in an exchange program with a group of kids from Austria. Even though the ratio of girls to boys in the German classes at her high school is fairly equal, for some reason there are more American girls than boys participating in the exchange this year. The Austrian class is split closer to 50/50. Which means that some of the girls need to host a boy. Even though we have only daughters, we moved the youngest in with another and offered to host a boy.

The Austrian students arrived yesterday and when we got a look at the young man who'll be staying with us both the teenagers' as well as mom's eyes widened. A quick glance at my two girls and I could see in their face what they were thinking.

When I privately told my husband about their reaction, I also mentioned that I thought he was cute. At which point my husband immediately starts in with "coo-coo-ca-choo".