Spring Break!

My spring break officially started on Friday at about 10am. (I love my job!) What am I doing for Spring Break? You ask? well, I am escaping, like Clint Eastwood in that Alcatraz movie. It's way past time to get out of Wilmington for a while. I'll be heading to Orlando. For years my friend Jen and I would alternate trips. In the summer I'd go to Orlando to visit and in the winter, she's come up to Macon to visit. (Yeah, I know, birds go the other direction.) For the past couple of years it has been as easy, but we've made due. There was a cruise, several ETB concerts in Brunswick, her coming to help me past for my move to Wilmington, and this past summer she came up for a week to see Wilmington. (I still haven't posted pictures or a recap of that visit, though someday I will.) Since the local tiny Airline provides direct flights from Wilmington to Orlando for an "advertised" price of $19 each way, it took me 2 minutes to decide to go to the land that Mickey built. I say "advertised" for the ticket price because they will tack on so many fees it's insane. When you pick you seat, you have a choice of $10, $12, or $15 seats. That is in addition to the $19 ticket. Where are the $0 seats? Probably on the wing. Not over the wing, I mean, out on the wing, holding on for dear life. As we usually do, Jen and I have plenty of cool things planned. We'll see how it works out. On Tuesday, we will be road tripping up to St. Augustine. We'll be going to The St. Augustine Lighthouse which is ironic since when Jen came here to visit last summer we saw, climbed, or visited three different lighthouses. Also in St. Augustine, I hope to stop by The Fountain of Youth. Since I had another birthday a little over a week ago, I am going to try the mythical "undo button" and get bit a big frosty mug full of Youth. (Which should also be helpful since I have a 20 year High School reunion coming later this year and of course everyone wants to look like they did in high school.) There's plans to hit the old Fort, the shopping district, and perhaps go see Flagler College (no, that's not for educational reasons, it's supposed to be beautiful.) The evening will wrap up with a visit from Courtney and Sean who are driving down from Jacksonville to join us for dinner. Wednesday is entirely focused on one thing: The Shuttle Discovery is due to launch that night. So here's where I'll be on Wednesday: Shuttle Discovery Night Launch - The funniest bloopers are right here If the video above doesn't play Click HereThis will be either my 3rd or 4th shuttle launch. The first one I saw was way back in about 1990, while on a high school ROTC trip. Because it was an ROTC school trip, and it was early 90's we were given very VERY close access to the launch. After 9/11, there's no way the average Joe could get that close. Don't expect any of my pictures to come close to what you see above. We'll be chilling at a Jetty park near Canaveral. Oddly enough, we literally "cruised" right past the park a couple of years ago, while on board the Sovereign of the Seas. And double coincidentally, the day we left port, NASA was launching a communications satellite and we got to see it (and feel it) from on board ship, just prior to leaving port. Thursday is fairly wide open. There's been some talk of SeaWorld so we can go play with some fish. But that evening we should catch up with my friend Jarrett who lives down in Orlando. Friday afternoon I fly out of Orlando and back home. That leaves me roughly 2 days to enjoy around here before heading back to work on Monday. Spring break is roughly the half way point in the semester, so it's all down hill from here. I better make the most of this Spring Break. I won't get another break for a while.