Ready. Set. Ready!

In the course of my travels (and preparing for travels), it has occurred to me that there are no fewer than 3 responses to the question, "Are you ready?" The three categories I have observed so far are:

"Ready!" - this group is actually ready to walk out the door. They're packed. They have snacks. Their electronics are all fully charged. They've just gone to the bathroom and they have a full bottle of ice water. Oftentimes they are equipped with a no-nonsense attitude and Listerine-colored checklists.

"Ready?" - this group is not ready. Not only is this group not ready, they didn't even realize they were going somewhere, at least, not so soon! If you hadn't set their alarm for them, texted when you woke up, called them when you were on your way, and threatened to immolate their living room upon arrival, you never would have made it the the airport with a full three minutes to spare.

"Not yet/Almost/two minutes" - That is, they'll be ready as soon as they; pack, put their contacts in, take a shower, get dressed, have breakfast, update their iTunes, find their socks, clean their sunglasses, have lunch, change their voicemail, write to their Aunt Linda, and bake some fresh muffins for the trip. It is unlikely that this group will ever actually BE ready, so it is on the other members of the group to push them out the door. Inevitably they will have forgotten "the most important thing ever" and blame those who "rushed" them out the door.

Anyways, I'm totally ready for my trip to Chicago tomorrow. I haven't packed yet, but how long does that take? two minutes?

UPDATE: As I was being rushed out the door it dawned on me as I got to the airport that I left the Greyhound tickets on the coffee table. Frig.

Gee Reg

Recently, a friend of my returned from a trip to Romanisylvania, or Rome, or something. You know, someplace FOREIGN. Weird language, used euros, good food, bad drivers, the whole bit. Foreign. The type of place any of us would love to go when our work/school is paying for it. Ask him how it went though and you'll get, "What a shithole!". And now if you know me and my friends, you know who I'm talking about. This is the only person on the planet that could visit Rome, see the Colosseum, stop by the Vatican, have everything paid for, and still be pissed off about the whole ordeal.

Granted he was there to speak at a technology symposium about some papers that he and a team of nerdy engineers had published, so it wasn't a trip of pleasure. The way he tells it though the Colosseum is in better shape than ninety percent of Rome's buildings and walking through the Vatican is like "...going from Third World Mexico into the U.S. except the streets are paved with gold and the buildings lined with pearls". He gave the food two thumbs up, but did note that it was crazy expensive (something like 24 euros for breakfast). I knew I should have invested in Euros when it was something like 80 cents to one Euro =(

I guess that just means I'll need to save up for a few extra months before I make the jump across the pond!