The flight, or flights, to Chicago were … uneventful.
Getting to Gatwick was easy, the station even had coloured lines on the floor so you could follow them to the correct location, which in my case was a machine which would sell me the ticket I needed.
The Gatwick express was comfy, got one of those 4 Seat & Table things to myself, as it wasn’t crowded. A french kid, traveling with his family, asked if I had an adaptor so that he could charge his phone off the train power; I didn’t, but loaned him my battery pack instead.
Stayed the night before flying in a Yotel at Gatwick, so that I didn’t need to worry about getting to the airport for a mid-morning flight.
“Upper” bunk this time, and it was too damn hot; In hindsight, I should have wetted down one of my travel towels & covered myself with it as a swamp cooler, but I didn’t think of it at the time. There was a ventilation system, but it just wasn’t coping with the heat.
I noticed that the night manager had a door to the outside open, presumably for some airflow.
Dublin got a little interesting.
I arrived at US Preclearance, or more accurately pre-preclearance, before the baggage had been transferred, so … I couldn’t continue for a while.
They had seats, so clearly this is a thing that happens.
Eventually I got through, had my bags scanned again, along with my boots this time, and then got through to a little slice of America. It looked just like the Customs & Border Protection setup at LAX; Same uniforms, same design of booth, same layout.
Sadly, way less friendly.
There were questions about why I wanted to stay in the US for so long.
There were long pauses after I finished speaking, I’m guessing to give me the chance to get nervous and start adding to my response & make a mistake.
He did not like it when I answered “What is your occupation?” with “unemployed”.
Then there were sudden changes of topic, I’m guessing to make me break script.
There was the question about my total cash assets.
There was the question about who I know in the US, followed by “what are their names?”
And then it was done, like he’d lost whatever minimal interest he’d had.
Not fun, but I’m aware that I got off lightly. No detailed search, no interview room & hardcore cross-questioning.
I tried watching some movies on the Dublin to Chicago leg, but the only one that I stuck with was one I’d seen on multiple screens in my viewshed, to the extent that I had a solid idea of what the plot was.
Mr. Right, as it happens, is a pretty fun film; Anna Kendrick, Sam Rockwell, Tim Roth.
Steve & Moni picked me up from the airport & took me to my hotel, where cookies happened.
It’s a Doubletree Hotel thing – You get a warm cookie on checking in. Or, in this case, three of them.
The hotel room suite was huge; Bedroom, lounge with couch & desk, decent-sized bathroom, and a little balcony with a view of … a carpark and a dumpster†.
† or so I thought
And then there’s the art.
This was in the hallway.
This was in the bedroom of my suite; Child looking at Bear, Bear looking back.
And this, which I saved for last, was in the ‘lounge’;
This is by far the most interesting hotel art I’ve ever seen.
No idea who the artist of the in-room pieces is, but I’d like to find out. They looked to be photomanipulations, not paintings.
Dinner happened, along with videogames, at a videogame-themed restaurant.
Somewhere along the line I took this photo, from the look of it from the passenger seat of a car.
Not sure when, where, or why, but it’s not too bad a sunset, I feel.
And this brings us back to that dumpster, or what I thought was a dumpster.
It’s actually a squirrel feeder.
There were more squirrels at Steve & Moni’s, just sort of mooching about and posing for photographs.
