The Burning of Atlanta, I

Next Destination

November 18, 2012

Just a quick note from Newark Liberty to anyone who's curious.

I'm heading to Atlanta to visit my sister-in-law Maryellen and her husband Kenny, and also several bars.

This was the fun thing this morning:

I am writing from the Ruby Tuesday concession next to gate A38 at Newark Liberty. A man sitting here when I arrived saw me open the Air and asked about it. I explained that it's good for when I fly because it weighs half as much as the MacBook Pro. He says he doesn't fly much, so he asked me—get this: as a "frequent flyer"—about when he should be at the gate for a 9:20 flight. The answer is "not until the plane gets there." Wow, I felt so sophisticated.

I have a layover in Charlotte and plan to drink beer there. None this early in Newark.

More later.

Harry

Hi Dad,

Since I'm not Harold and I'm not on US Airways Flight 2698 today, I'm guessing that mobile phone call I just received was intended for you.

Your flight is behind schedule and is now rescheduled to depart at 2pm. You probably got that message already, but I wanted to make sure I told you just in case you mistyped my info into your flight planner!

Love you, have fun!

Kate

You're my emergency contact on this trip, Darlin.

I thought they'd only be bugging you if I had to be carted to the emergency room from the airport. That hasn't happened yet.

The delay at Charlotte worked in my favor. It left me time for a third pint at lunch.The beer drinking has commenced. I was overdue. The blue laws forbid the airport bars at Newark from serving before noon on Sunday.

Love you.

Dad

Ok cool. I figured it was something like that. Hopefully the new 2:30 time they just called me about has stuck and you're in the air!

Safe travels,

Kate

Atlanta, Here I Am

November 19

I woke up this morning around nine, feeling aged a bit but still doing fine. Buckhead can be one hell of a lot of fun.

But here’s what has happened so far:

At Newark airport, they can’t serve a drink until noon on Sunday. I wasn’t the only one frustrated by the blue laws. Maybe four other people came in and ordered a beer and left. One settled for coffee.

So I was thirsty by the time we got to Charlotte. I was happy, too, because I think we landed early, which gave me more drinking time. The gates were as far from each other as possible, which is usually the case. 

The departures board told me my connecting flight was delayed. Better late at the end than the start. Besides, it just gave me more drinking time. Best of all, the bar with the Sam Adams sign was right next to my gate. Damn, this was like Narita airport all over again.

I ordered a Sam’s lager and the guy on my left ordered a red beer--Bud light (could be anything else, I guess) with a shot of bloody Mary mix. That could give flavor to any of those love-in-a-canoe beers, so if I’m ever in Indiana again, I’ll remember to order that.

The guy on my right asks out of nowhere, “Are you going to Columbia?” No, Atlanta. He was curious because it seemed that we were on the same trajectory. It was the guy from Ruby Tuesday in Newark. His plane was two hours late, too, so he was doing what I was doing--killing time and making up for the New Jersey blue laws.

I told him that he had already made it onto my blog by calling me “frequent flyer,” but if that wasn’t enough, this coincidence would certainly do it.

Turns out he is a nomad named Ryan Ward. He doesn’t fly much because he usually moves from place to place to stay for several months at a time and goes by car. He is a sometime actor, director, and teacher. One of his recent jobs was directing a production of “Henry V” in Red Bank, N.J.

So there I was in my natural element, in a bar with draft beer comparing notes with another Shakespeare fan.

The Atlanta airport is called Hartsfield-Jackson. I haven't found out who the Jackson is. If this was Virginia, I would have very strong suspicions. But this is Georgia. So maybe there was another Southerner named Jackson.

I have changed planes at Atlanta before, so I know that you take the train through the airport because if you walk it’ll take so long you’ll get old. I came down here for a trade show ages ago, in another life. So I really don't know the place.

Once I was out the terminal door, I was lost. It must have showed, because a man across the road was telling me he could give me a ride to a hotel in his shuttle.

Now, I know better than to take a ride from a guy who is hawking rides. But I figured, what the hell?

He puts me in his van. There is a young woman waiting inside. I expect him to get ready to go, but no, he stands on the sidewalk with his cell phone. The lady says, “I’ve been waiting forty five minutes.” I gave the guy three. When I started to climb out, he tells me he’s waiting for his driver and mine’s going to be the first stop. “I don’t need to be first; I just want to get going.” So he drove. Maybe there was no other driver.

Important service tip: This Hilton (maybe all of them) charges $13 a day on top of the rent to use the Internet through a slow connection. I don’t know why, but I resent that. Especially when I consider Super 8 or Budget at $45 a night giving me fairly good bandwidth for free. Hell, it isn’t fast but it’s free at the Three Bear Inn in Marathon, N.Y.

I caught the MARTA train to Buckhead two blocks from the hotel. The station is deep underground and the walls are the living rock, with the bore marks and steel reinforcements. 

It was a bit of a wait at that hour on a Sunday, but the transit authority lady who showed me how to buy a ticket also told me to take the train to North Springs. This is the northbound Red Line.

I got out at the Buckhead stop and, not having a clue where I was going, started to walk. I was on Peachtree Road (not to be confused with Peachtree Center, Peachtree Street, or Peachtree Center Boulevard). Mostly hotels and malls. The restaurants look tony and not what I want. But then I started to see hints, like Dante’s Down the Hatch, a jazz club. The sign says it’s “behind the house.” This is a few hundred yards from the Ritz-Carlton. 

Then I see a lighted sign in a mall. All I can read is the one word I need: Tavern. It’s like a beacon across a murderous 20-lane intersection. So I obey the lights and get there just fine. The small print completes the name: the TAVERN at Phipp’s.

They only run two taps, Sweetwater 420, a local pale ale, and Peroni, the Italian beer. The second one seemed to be a strange choice, but there may be a reason for it. So after a pint of each, it was time for food. I bought the appetizer of seafood gumbo. I haven’t had gumbo in ages, and I was hungry. All I had eaten so far (and this was after 6 p.m. by now) was French toast in Newark and chicken wings in Charlotte. Oh yeah, and a few M&Ms from a bag in my pocket. The rest of my diet had been liquid. I drank water in Newark.

Anyhow, the gumbo was delicious, if too cautious. It required an ample dose of Tabasco.

It was shortly after the gumbo that I came back from the men’s room and found a young woman in my seat. She and her date were talking to another lady, so I offered the remaining stool to her. She can’t sit because she works in the place.

The youngster in my old place is Autumn; she’s 23 and works for a shipping company and has doubled her salary in the first eight months. Her date, Drew, belongs to the family that owns this place, the New York Steakhouse that I passed on Peachtree Road, and several other restaurants in the area.

She assured me, however, that she takes care of herself and is no gold-digger.

She is one of those extremely extroverted, firmly confident, delightfully foul-mouthed young people who can be all that and still be charming. She wants to start her own flatbed trucking company in Utah. The trucks would serve the Christmas tree suppliers during the season and then do something else the rest of the year. But she doesn’t want to live in Utah. The Mormons are not known as party people, so maybe she could live in Denver. I think you get the idea.

This is her third date with Drew, but they seem to click. Like she told the bartender: “He’s in love with me.” Who knows? she says, she could wind up marrying him. 

I didn’t ask what he thinks of moving to Denver.

I had lost all track of time and all my interest in it. Who cares what the hour is: I'm having a good time.

Autumn told me she suspected that three women who came into the bar together were in fact hookers. When they tell you they're from a foreign country, that's a clue, Autumn said.

Since the place was short on taps, I switched to bottles. I had several Sierra Nevada pales. Could be, lots of them. I’m not sure. The bar didn’t have any Belgian bottle-conditioned ales, but Sierra Nevada comes close. 

The bartender actually asked me if I wanted to drink from a glass. Hell, yes. If I can’t get my nose into the container I lose half the flavor. 

Autumn and Drew left sometime after 11. The hookers left. The bar was getting close to shutting down. I traded a little conversation with Olivier, a black guy from France. He was surprised when I told him I was from Montclair, N.J. His parents live in West Orange, so he knows the town.

He’s got a master’s degree and still hasn’t found a job.

After that, I remember there was a line of cabs outside the bar. There must be people there every night who aren’t going to drive. I was in no shape to try MARTA at that hour.

The hotel is in one of the world’s financial districts--the tall concrete and steel structures, a mix of hotels, office buildings, and parking decks. Today’s photo was shot from the window of my room on the 19th floor.

When I got here, the fan-shaped pool in the lower right had two kids in it. I figure they had to be kids. The air temperature was in the 60s. I have no idea what the water was like. It wasn’t as if they had fallen in, either. They were upright and wearing bathing suits. Maybe they were doing it on a dare. 

Harry

Harry, question:

Do you feel you lose much w/ the MacBook Air—I mean vs. the MacBook Pro in terms of, I don't know, keyboard size, memory, functionality, etc?

Karl

I have the cheap Air, with 64 gigabytes of flash drive, which is so far more than I need, Karl. 

The Air has no disk player, so I can't play DVDs on it. I haven't loaded Microsoft Office on it. There may be room on the drive, but I don't know. I use an alternative Apple program called Pages as my word processor. It cost me about $20 at the online Apple Store. The text program that comes with the computer sucks, as they always do.

I had to buy Pages for my other computer, too, to open those files and translate them into Word files, which is what the world uses.

Other than that, the Air's perfect as a lightweight second computer. Great for downloading pictures as a backstop and for e-mail from the road, which is what I need.

I started thinking a couple of years ago about an iPad for the job. Kate (my IT advisor) and I went to look at it. She was showing me how it worked and suddenly stopped: How do I do that? 

No way. If it stalled Kate, I'd never be able to figure it out, so I bought the Air instead. Among other important attributes, it has a real keyboard.

The Air is appreciably lighter than the iPad version 1. I never held an iPad 2, so I don't know how it and Air stack up on the issue of weight.

Harry