Menu Close

1997 North Carolina

Museum and Snow

Today brought a visit to the Greensboro Historical Museum in the light snow. Just call this the “Greensboro History Tour” I guess, as that has seemed to be the running theme. Spent the rest of the afternoon shooting pictures around town for a new section of the web site (coming soon).

  

Tonight, I met my friend Taylor at New York Pizza. We first met on the Baltimore leg of the US Tour last fall, and an evening with Taylor is an always entertaining thing, from stories of Tennessee Williams to recollections of my hometown to comparisons of strange southern eccentricities.

Back to history, though. I seem to feel this need to collect my memories of the old hometown while I can still write them down and while they remain relatively fresh in my memory. I’m not really sure why, but I have a feeling it will seem even more important to me in my later years. I’ve always had a fascination with the history of almost anyplace I’ve lived. And Greensboro, boring as it may be, has an interesting history to be sure.

Boxing Day

Had lunch with the Bosnian refugee family my mom has “adopted”. They’re really nice people, although there was a pretty significant language barrier. Why is it that children who were raised by non-American parents seem so much better behaved than those born and raised (and coddled and spoiled rotten) here? I guess I may have answered my own question…

 

Tonight, we headed next door to my aunt’s house. No badly behaved brats to complain about here either. I was relieved.

Christmas

 

Christmas Day. Gifts this morning and long drives this afternoon. My dad’s side of the family came over tonight, then I headed out to the Palms to hang out with Jeff and several ex-mistakes from my past, all of whom I managed to avoid.

Highlight of the evening: watching “King of the Hill” with a distant relative who could easily have qualified as a cast member.

 

After the festivities, we made the traditional drive downtown and around the city to see the lights. For all its bleakness during the day, I have to say downtown Greensboro came across pretty well when “wrapped” for Christmas.

 

Home for the Holidays

So here I am, about to spend my second Christmas in a row at home in Greensboro.

Sitting in the waiting area with 90 minutes left before my flight. What a crazy 24 hours it’s been. I realized last night that I wouldn’t be receiving my ticket in time to make it home for Christmas. So one was sent to me on a plane from Charlotte at 11:00 this morning. I grabbed a $30 cab to the airport after doing ALL my Christmas shopping last night. I’m exhausted. And mildly hungover.

At least there’s cute boys to look at here. Most of them cuter even than the guy I chowed down on last night at My Place. He was cocky and shot all over my head and face. The onlookers were pleased.

It’d be nice to have a laptop on this trip, but I’m Ok using pen and paper for a week or so, although it’s a little strange getting used to writing prose in longhand again. I seem to be unsure which of my 7-8 different handwritings to use.

It must really suck traveling with children. I often wonder if I was as bad as rugrats today are. Actually, I think children were better behaved when I came along; parenting was more about teaching discipline and responsibility than “self-esteem” and “creativity”.

Scored First Class on the flight. It’s worth it!