Hats, cats and automobiles (near colliding...)

Another butchered email to skit. I have tried to make it coherent and yet take out the one on one chatter.


Are you interested in Thanksgiving? Is that a yes? Hmm, seems more like grudging acceptance that there is no way you can avoid it. Well, here's news for you: if you don't beg for it, you're not going to get it.

Oh who am I kidding.

So on Thursday, I couldn't sleep. So was up at 5am when I didn't have to leave for another hour and a half. The shuttle came and I hopped on and got to the airport with an hour to spare. Sigh.

So I had a lot of waiting. Plane took off at 9 and landed in Seattle about 100 minutes later and then I had another wait until the next plane left at 12 and landed 30 minutes later at Spokane. The head air hostess person thing on that flight was crazy. She actually giggled over the announcement tannoy thing. Everything is a thing at the moment sorry... Ahem. She seemed so happy to be working. I expect she was a product of the Sirius Cybernautics Corporation or whatever they are called. A Genuine People Personality. So anyway. I met Rian and Aidan at the airport and they (well, Rian really) took me back home with them where I met Someone Else and the feline members of the family. Her house is amazing. So stunning. She's decorated it herself I think... at least she made it seem like she had. Rich wooden gold reddish living room with huge windows, bookcases, pictures, vases... a divan, a couch, comfy chair, window seats, grandmother (I think) clock... cushions everywhere! Each individual and of varying sizes artistically arranged on the furniture and floor. A little Turkish in feel perhaps. Absolutley amazing. And just beyond, a dining room with a golden light, deep dark woods and even more cushions. Her bedroom was (as you are now expecting) full of cushions also. And Aidan's room was in fact two rooms although I was told the second room was actually a closet. Weird.What else... bathroom had a huge bath in it. Oh and of course there was a tv room but this was work in progress. The tv though was huge - something to lust over. So yeah. The kitchen was kitchen-like and didn't have any cushions. It didn't take long to discover that there was a basement full of comics. I wasn't allowed to see it (perhaps the family secrets are stored down there) but Someone Else got a couple of "novels" for me. One was The Flash and the other the Fantastic Four starring Spidey. I read The Flash that evening and the next morning and he made a good recommendation. The bad guy was into renewal energy sources and so had to be stopped. Amused me. Plus there was this whole thing of becoming so powerful you lose your humanity which was kind of good and the writing tended to flow well by repeating phrases but having a different emotional twist on them...

We had TimTams for lunch. And satsumas.

What happened next? Hmm, there was some talk which was nice. Rian gave me the gift of green play-dough with a Spidey figure/stamp (for indenting the spider symbol on the dough) and I entertained myself by building a Green Goblin for Spidey to defeat with his stamping powers while Aidan was being put down for a nap. I can't actually remember how we filled up these hours... But then we went to the Thanksgiving meal at another house. Rian called the hostess Auntie but I don't think I ever worked out whether she was Aidan's or Someone Else's auntie. There were so many people there but I strangely didn't feel overwhelmed. I was passed from person to person being introduced. Rian and co abandoned me quite quickly and yet it was no problem as the family members were all amazing. I was chatting with all these people with rather amazing professions. A lawyer, a dentist, an engineer... okay, now I have forgotten. But I was rather impressed. Quite a few of them went to world reknown places like Caltech. One guy just reeled off all these famous people at Caltech while he was there like... I forget that too. Pauli maybe. Millikan. Feynman. He even met Einstein apparently! I also had a nice talk with his wife who did her degree in mathematics and so we shared our love for the subject for a while. Rian came back eventually just in time because one person just asked how I knew her. It seemed she had kept her board life rather secret. I thought that interesting. I wonder who she told people I was... Anyway, she turned up and I was able to break her little secret to her family (in law). She then drew me away to introduce me to the nice medicine student without a girlfriend who, like Someone, had done a year of uni in Edinburgh. What a great family... anyway.

Phew, what happened next?

So the meal was great and we went back to chezRian and put Aidan to bed and watched some dvd and went to bed at about 11 or so. I was on the sofa and found it surprisingly easy to sleep. Well, not surprising since I was up at 5am but... I don't usually feel at ease in other people's houses but Rian's house reminded me a lot of one of my best friend's houses (well, her parents house...) which made me feel at home.

I read the next morning until people came downstairs and then er kept reading 'cos the story was good. Rian had made reservations to have breakfast at this really posh hotel. The hotel was stunning and put the Hyperion to shame (a comparison I can't help but make...). The ceiling was all gold and decorated and everything was decked out for Christmas. Anyway, we had breakfast and conversation. Rian drank Buck's Fizz which seemed suitably decadent for her but I still was a bit surprised. So, French toast for her and an omelette for me later, we looked at the Christmas trees on the first floor. There were twelve of them (well, 11 as one hadn't been put up yet) for the twelve days of Christmas and different companies had decorated each one and added other gifts to lay under the tree. Each tree and set of gifts was going to be raffled off. And wow some fo the gifts were amazing... tvs, holidays... even a telescope. My favourite tree was lords a leaping which had frog decorations. One frog sang and danced. Which was nice.

Okay so... we then went to a comic store where I found some great comics that I was aching to buy but resisted as I prefer to get the collections (imagine reading a book a chapter at a time- not great but hard to resist buying the chapters when the collected book won't be out for about a year). Rian bought me a spidey soft toy. Which was... naturally wonderful of her. But she had already given me a lot! Anyway. We then went to a fair trade fair (er... yeah fair trade fair... didn't strike me as weird until I had to type it). I didn't see anything I liked but Rian bought herself a great multi-coloured hat which just made me grin to see her wear it which made her accuse me of laughing at her but... really it was just a great hat. She didn't take it off. For all I know, she still has it on. So, behatted we then went back to chezRian (though the slightly intoxicated Rian tried to kill me by running a red light on a busy junction). The afternoon was spent with Rian seemingly sleeping (in her hat) on the sofa and generally more chatter and watching the crazy cats. I should have mentioned the cats. There were three of them. The scary alien looking one that "Dr Lorimer" (seemed so weird to have Rian call her that) sent was absolutely nuts. It kept leaping on and attacking the other two cats and also crawled over me a lot. Dammit but I fell in love with that cat. The other two cats were a little more stand offish even though they looked cuter (one of them had huge eyes just like Puss in Boots in Shrek 2).

I believe at some point in the conversation Rian mentioned having a collection of black leather.

But she was probably joking.

Oh and I saw Jerry! How's that for great? He was younger than I expected and rather boringly good looking, not the kind of oddbody a postman should be. And he wasn't in his shorts.

Oh and the promised snow didn't come! I was very disappointed. It was cold and rainy instead.

I left around four. She took me to the airport (in her hat) and didn't leave. She might still be there. Course she might have left as soon as I got to my gate.

So, two flights and I arrived in San Jose which was not an airport I had been to before but slightly closer than SF so I was able to get home by 11. I believe I welcomed myself home by having a Rocky. I strawed it with ginger tea.

Phew. So that is everything. I worry a bit that I mentioned a little too much. You know how Rian is... at the Thanksgiving meal a family member asked whether she was as elusive online as she was in real life which amused me. It's especially nerve-racking to know she is going to read this and critique it... Hopefully my version of events matches with hers. And I will edit anything she wants me to.