Tag Archives: Whiskey

Feb23

A promotion in Oklahoma!

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Weekend of Thursday, 08-Feb-2024 through Sunday, 11-Feb-2024


My friend Dave is getting a promotion!

Well… technically, he’s already gotten the promotion, and this was just the ceremony to officially instate him at his new rank. It’s the Army, I’m not going to worry over-much about the minutia of how it all works… though I’ll admit that I’m pretty jealous of the simplicity and clarity of how their system works. There’s clear requirements, transparent timelines, and a whole system dedicated to keeping it all moving smoothly. Kind of wish the private sector would listen in on that…

Anyways, ranting aside, I flew to Oklahoma!

It was lovely – One advantage of having a work laptop, and being able to work remotely, is that I could save aside a few of my projects onto my harddrive and then boot the beast up on the flight to get some analysis done and summaries written. It didn’t go beautifully smoothly, unfortunately, since “the beast” is an apt term for my laptop’s power consumption, it turns out… I wasn’t aware, but seatback power is limited to 75W… and the 180W power brick keeping that laptop running SUPER overloaded that circuit. No fires caught, of course, it just simply didn’t work.

Thankfully batteries are a thing, so progress was made and a book was read after the laptop died.



Once in Oklahoma, we had a combination of whirlwind adventures and quiet relaxation.

The ceremony itself, along with the time leading up to it, was chaotic and busy by nature. The morning before, and the days following, were beautifully quiet. It was lovely – a good ceremony, great cake, and good speeches. And, of course, excellent celebratory scotch afterward – regardless of glassware choice.




The rest of the time was gloriously relaxing. Catching up with friends, hearing stories and learning new little details about what life’s been like. We took a few nature walks, visited an excellent diner, and had an excellent evening full of pizza, whiskey, and even a few hands of poker! First time as an adult I’ve played Texas Hold’em, and I didn’t do too badly… didn’t do great, of course, but had a good time and didn’t get wiped out too early. Also, I learned not to bet against Dave because he doesn’t bluff. He had the luck of a recent promotion, and didn’t need to bluff.

Jerk.


We poked around the on-base museum (and saw a super cool WWII-era Morse-code transmitter), I took an artsy photo of a bike… I mean, it was a chance to visit with friends and see the life they’ve been building in the middle of the country. It was worth every minute.

Apr27

My Irish Spring – The flights back (Monday)

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Wow… How long has it been since I’ve done an international trip? How much longer since I’ve gone international solo?

Let’s see. The last international trip was to Scotland, right before the Pandemic hit. When I had that really bad flu… right before the Pandemic. With COVID. That presents sort of like a flu. That I’ve somehow avoided getting, as if I’d already gotten it and gained an immunity… Okay we’re not going down that road the last time I went abroad was January 2020. Three years and change.

The last time I went on a solo international trip? Well, that’d be New Zealand, back in 2012. 11 years.

It’s high time I explored.


I got accepted to Trinity College’s MBA program back in November, and accepted the offer that same month… though I delayed admission until 2024, to give me some time to finish up in Oregon and save up a bit more money. While talking to the admissions officer though, I learned about a Business forum put on by Trinity in March – a perfect opportunity for me to stretch my international adventure legs and see if Dublin would make a good home for a year or three!

I planned, I packed, and I set off on my first solo international trip in over 10 years…

(Please note that these are my raw notes from the trip. I’m proofreading them for obvious mistakes… but they’re still short-hand. Because life is busy, and blogs don’t need to be perfectly edited.)


Monday, 13-Mar-2023



My last day in Dublin lasted a bit longer than I’d expected, thanks to an early morning text I got from the airline, informing me that my flight would be delayed leaving Ireland by two hours or so.

Not a bad thing, in my mind – I’d expected this, so had quite a bit of time set aside as a layover in Atlanta, and wasn’t in any danger of missing any connecting flights. Instead, it meant that I could make myself a quick breakfast of my remaining leftovers, instead of tossing them out, and have a lovely relaxed morning just… kind of laying about.

As always, I loved laying about later into the morning.



Soon enough, of course, I did have to leave for real. I gave myself some extra time, and was able to hail a cab basically right outside my apartment. We chatted as he drove, and I learned a few more bits about Dublin, the housing market in the area, and his (very strong) opinions about US politics. I’m never sure if it’s nice that we’re so “well observed” outside the States, or if it’s frustrating that everyone seems to only get the extreme parody version of reality…

Either way, I was through security before I could blink, and onward and upward back to the states before I could grab one last Guinness. I had a layover in Atlanta, which was somehow still surprisingly long even after the previously delayed flight… but soon enough my boots were walking the now-familiar carpet of PDX.

I found my car, I drove home, and I plopped into bed.


It had been a good trip.