Frenchy's Rant

Aspen. My winter vacation town. Even without Internet or Guinness, it still has charm. And now that the train wreck has been cleared, the internet AND Guinness restored, well… things are getting back on track.

Went out last night, to my new favorite Aspen hang out. Bentley’s. While not quite an Irish pub, at least the bartender’s don’t threaten their patrons, like some other local crappy pseudo-Irish bar does. Oh yeah… Congratulations McStorlie’s! For running out of Guinness for over three days AND basically being a bunch of shitheads, this GFY award is for you!

But that isn’t really the point of this rant. No. I am actually ranting against… old age. Mine. You see, every night that I’ve gone out in Aspen, I’ve been in bed before most fifth graders are. 9 PM is usually lights out. I’m only 36, for crying out loud!!!! It’s sad. It sucks… But it’s true. Tonight I was determined to stay out “late” and made it all the way until… 10:30! The music was so loud I had to shout until I was hoarse, and I just stopped having fun.

Ugh, There is absolutely nothing appealing about getting older… Depends and Geritol are just around the corner.

I might have to give myself a GFY award!

Overheard last night: “I never realized so many trains derailed until my Internet kept going out.”

What the hell? Is THAT why we can’t get online?

Yes, right now the whole town of Aspen has no internet. The culprit? A coal train derailment that not only tore up 1000 feet of track, but also cut Comcast’s main fiber optic cable. Must have been a hell of a crash! Losing the Internet by train wreck is so crazy that it just has to be true. Nobody could make that up.

For three days now we’ve suffered through the Great Aspen Internet Blackout of ’06. There is no access aqt all in town, in fact the only wireless access point that works is in the lobby of the hotel we use for our TV compound. And that access point is nearly always full.

Still, it’s only a minor inconvenience, really. It’s just the Internet after all. I’m tough, I’ll survive. I can always find something else to occupy myself.

At least McStorlie’s has Guinness, right?

Wrong.

The curse of Dr. Pepper strikes once again! McStorlie’s ran out of Guinness yesterday afternoon, and won’t have any more until tomorrow at the earliest. Not only does the Internet come to Aspen via railroad, evidently beer does as well. Now that… well that’s a serious problem. An Irish pub running out of Guinness is worse than that famous Irish restaurant (McDonald’s) running out of French Fries, for crying out loud!

McStorlies is perilously close to winning a Frenchy’s Rant GFY award. I can understand Comcast not having a backup plan for the Internet, but can’t one of the many unemployed Rugby players jump in their pickup truck and go find a few kegs for us??? Do I have to think of everything?

AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! This is turning into the worst vacation EVER!!!!!

It’s such a small world, really.

I am in Aspen enjoying my paid vacation also known as the Winter X Games. Yesterday I walked down to the local grocery store to get essential supplies (coffee and milk) I saw someone that I thought I recognized from the WWE TV Crew. I didn’t think he also worked for ESPN, so I kept shopping. I assumed that it was just someone that looked like the guy I know.

He tracked me down in the nacho aisle, and sure enough it was him. I asked what X Games venue he was working, and he gave me a puzzled look.

“Venue? What are you talking about? I’m here on vacation, skiing for the whole week. What are you doing here?”

He had no idea the X Games were in town.

What a coincidence that our time and location randomly intersected in the nacho aisle of a grocery store in Colorado, each of us in Aspen for different reasons. Five minutes either way and we never would have seen each other.

Right now, I should burst into the chorus of “It’s a Small World”, but I won’t.

Memphis Airport – Saturday January 21, 2006 – 5:50 PM

Yes, picture posts are cheezy, but the sunset was spectacular!

(I realize that the most direct route from Providence to Aspen doesn’t include Detroit and Memphis, but at least I got to see this sunset, and endure a child screaming and crying for my whole three hour layover. Happy birthday to me!)

Sometimes flying is just flying, a dull and boring method of getting from point A to point B. But other times, especially on a mostly empty plane, flying can almost be fun.

Her name was Vee, a largish black flight attendant on Northwest Airlines. At first glance, I could tell that she’d been a flight attendant her whole life. She started off with the usual, that creepy plastic smile that all flight attendants share. “And what would you like to drink, sir?’

“Coffee with milk, please.”

“No sugar?”

“No thanks.”

“Now you’re going to tell me that I’m sweet enough, right?”

“Of course.” I said, playing along.

Suddenly, she sat down next to me. She shot me a fiery look and said, “You know what you need? You need a black woman, that’ll straighten you right out. Mmmm-mmmm that’s what you need alright.”

What the??

The couple in the row behind me started laughing out loud, probably thankful that the crazy woman hadn’t decided to attack them. Little did they know that they were next.

Vee, my new seatmate, continued. “You know, all white guys fantasize about having a black woman. Trust me, I’ve dated all races of men, well, except for Asians, because they too short. They all admit it’s their fantasy. I see the way guys look at me on these planes. I been a flight attendant for twenty five years, and I know what these white men think.”

Even though I was starting to get a little nervous, I still played along. I replied, “Twenty five years? How is that possible, unless you started working when you were ten?”She batted her false eyelashes at me a few times, then threw her head back and let out a loud laugh that was somewhere between a cackle and a growl. The people behind me joined in. Their laughter soon got her attention. She jumped up and went back a row. “How ’bout you two? You married?”

They probably just wanted Diet Coke. They got more than they bargained for.

Now embarrassed, the man answered, “Uhhh… no… we’re just… sorta dating.”

To the woman, “Ooooh hunny, you need to make an honest man outta him! I been waiting fo’ a man to make me honest fo’ twelve years now!”

For the next ten minutes, Hurricane Vee stood there and gave us her philosophy of life and love. Strangely, it was almost fun, a bizarre connection shared between three strangers and all-knowing Hurricane Vee. We all laughed.

Finished serving the rest of the plane, and probably sharing her ideas with everyone else, she came back and sat next to me again. She asked where I was from. When she found out I was a Rhode Island native, she laughed again, that cackling growl rising from deep inside her. “Hunny, you ain’t never gonna find you no black woman in Rhode Island!! There ain’t any there! That’s what you need though, a nice black woman to straighten you out!”

After a few more minutes of advice from my new friend, she stood. She offered me her hand as she stood up, and I shook it. Her grip was firm and her eyes were still full of fire, framed by those long, false eyelashes. For a second, I was afraid she might drag me to the lavatory at the back of the plane and show me exactly why I need a black woman. Fortunately, she let me have my hand back.

With a smile and a wink, Hurricane Vee was gone.

She came back right before the end of the flight. “Miss me?”

Yeah, I just might.