it's official...booked again...

[cshollingsworth]

hi all!

yes, it's official...my precious little husband booked our room reservation and flight times for our trip to philadelphia in september.

we are staying at the marriot convention center in philadelphia. we've been there before, but we drove the last time. i enjoy philly very much...especially the food vendors on the sides of the street. YUM! my favorite place ever was joseph poon's where the chinese food was the best i've ever had. we ate seabass that was out of this world! i'm for sure going there again. :D

also, don and i had to spend 2 days in nashville, and on the drive we had to pass by the airport on the interstate. i looked up and saw a very cool looking southwest plane that was painted with checkers on the front end of it and stripes on the rear with a southwest tail fin...i was smiling at it and all of a sudden i thought to myself (for the first time ever) "cool! i wish i was on it!" feel free to let your jaw drop and be taken totally aback. :lol: ya'll know you are gonna be hearing me whine and cry and say i've made 20 trips to the bathroom and omg i wish i would have taken the bus and i'm thinking of dashing off and getting a cab to the bus station...so, just be prepared for it come september. :rotflmao: until then...i'll hang out here and talk about how cool i'll be on the plane rides!

[WillFlyToDisney]

But the REAL test will be the next time you see a Greyhound bus driving down the road - will you look at the bus with the same level of awe and say "Gee I wish I was on THAT!". Methinks not.

You've come a long way, Courtney. :)

[cshollingsworth]

nope, methinks there's no way i'll be looking at another greyhound and wishing i was on that puppy! :tongue: it was freaky!

everytime don and i see a greyhound (saw several in nashville) he kind of looks over at me and grins. not to mention the little joke on me came up last night at dinner at the palm downtown with some of don's telephone colleagues who were on the plane i got off of that infamous day. oh well, i guess i'll go down in history as the bus-bride. :blush: *LOL*

[WillFlyToDisney]

Oh man you ate at The Palm??? I have been invited there a dozen times but never have been able to make it. :rolleyes:

[acuradriveronr3train]

Let me know if you want any suggestions of what to do in town. Since I don't drink alcoholic beverages, I can't give you any suggestions on what bars to visit or what restaurants have the best wine or what local brews to try. And I don't eat cheesesteaks, so I'm not in a position to tell you whether the place that wants customers to speak English (Geno's) has better ones than the place across the street (Pat's). OK, I've eliminated the important stuff, but there's still more to the city than that.

That Marriott looks great. I pass it a lot, but I don't think I'd be able to afford staying there if I were visiting town. The best way to get from the airport to the Marriott is to take the train to a stop called Market East. That's only about a block away from the hotel.

Oh, and the Greyhound station is only a block away from Market East in another direction, in case you want to look at busses anyway!

[EyesSkyward]

Oh man you ate at The Palm??? I have been invited there a dozen times but never have been able to make it. :rolleyes:

I've never eaten there either. It's just a few blocks away from the Greyhound station, isn't it? :lol:

Seriously though, congrats on having your shiny new plane tickets, Courtney. You're gonna do great! :thumbsup: :pompoms:

- Jeff

[Barb-SAN]

hi all!

yes, it's official...my precious little husband booked our room reservation and flight times for our trip to philadelphia in september.

..... i looked up and saw a very cool looking southwest plane that was painted with checkers on the front end of it and stripes on the rear with a southwest tail fin...i was smiling at it and all of a sudden i thought to myself (for the first time ever) "cool! i wish i was on it!" feel free to let your jaw drop and be taken totally aback. :lol:.....until then...i'll hang out here and talk about how cool i'll be on the plane rides!

Courtney....I just had to smile when I read that! Doesn't it seem like some sort of a Miracle when your perception shifts like that? I've had a similar experience....and just marveled at how and why our outlooks can change so dramatically. I'd love to know what's really changing in the brain. Someday the researchers will probably be able to tell us that....maybe new connections are actually physically forming in the brain, which is why it takes awhile to get over the fear.

I think that participation on this board is helpful, because as we try to encourage other people, we are also telling ourselves those same positive messages. It's said that the way to really learn any subject is to try to teach it to others! (As a teacher, I imagine you know that!)

It's cute that Don's friends refer to you as the "bus bride"....at least they all know you wanted to marry him enough to travel all that way on a bus to meet him at the altar! :lol:

Barb-SAN

[noflyingfan]

I think the Bus Bride thing is romantic. Think of yourself as one of those princesses whose father got a handsome sum for their hand and had to take a wagon or something pulled by horses to another country to marry some prince with lots of money.

As for Philly, my favorite thing is just walking around and looking at old stuff. The Liberty Bell is not that impressive (it's much smaller than you'd think, although people were shorter back then, so maybe it evens out), but seeing it is free, and having Independence Hall in the background is pretty cool.

My sister lives in the Philadelphia suburbs, and over Christmas my boyfriend and I flew there and spent the day in the city with her and my brother-in-law, and the best part was going to the art museum (where the Rocky steps are) and seeing all of the tourists running up. My boyfriend did it too, and made me take a picture of him with his fists in the air like Rocky, and I was a little embarrassed till I saw everyone else doing it too.

[EyesSkyward]

The Liberty Bell is not that impressive (it's much smaller than you'd think, although people were shorter back then, so maybe it evens out), but seeing it is free

Plus, isn't there like a big crack in it? Maybe if they charged admission, they could afford to get it fixed. :)

- Jeff, who would totally run up the Rocky steps if he went to Philadelphia!

[noflyingfan]

Exactly, Jeff!

Don't run up the Rocky steps unless you're really up for it. Just walking up was bad, and I run regularly. I can see why Rocky was so happy when he got to the top.

[acuradriveronr3train]

I didn't see the Liberty Bell until I was 24 years old, so I was big already. My parents never took us to Philadelphia, even though we did a lot of other historic touristy places up and down the East Coast (such as Williamsburg, Boston, and even Pennsylvania Dutch Country). Little did I dream that I'd end up moving there the year I turned 34, and if I'm still here in another week and a day, I'll still be there at 54 (shh, didn't mean to say that number).

Personally, I think it says something about Philadelphia that its symbol is something that's broken. I remember in the mid-1990s, the Philadelphia Inquirer announced a new column about the city was going to debut on a certain date. I decided that I'd contact this new columnist after he'd been writing for a week or so and tell him that we should start a campaign to get the Liberty Bell fixed. But wouldn't you know it, in his VERY FIRST column, he said that we must never fix the Liberty Bell. I was too late already, darn it!

[cshollingsworth]

i've been out of town a couple days (marietta, georgia) and just looked on here at your relpies. :)

there is something called the "clothespin" in philly that i think is cool to look at.

we've ate a couple places there, mccormick and schmicks (if i spelled that right) and also we ate at the darkhorse saloon and then we stumbled upon joseph poon's in chinatown thanks to a great conceirege when we stayed at the PSFS building two years ago. i'm salavitating just thinking about that gorgeous white seabass right now.

kelley and jeff, the palm is outstanding. do try the salmon when you go there...it is as big as your plate when they bring it out. it's soooooo good! normally i can't finish a big meal in one sitting, so i sometimes give don some extra off my plate, but not at the palm! it's so good, i just sit there and gorge myself until i'm done. :tongue: one of our friends couldn't finish his food so they kindly wrapped it up for him in a foil swan. i was hoping he would accidentally leave it and i would swoop it up for a midnight snack of lemon-butter salmon. :)

nashville is fun sometimes (despite seeing the infamous jim reed man on a trip down broad...yikes!) jeff, you will know what i'm talking about here...

we visited tootsie's orchid lounge and also went into a place called mike's soda shop and had ice cream. after recently going to new orleans and hanging out in the french quarter, broad st. in nashville looks a bit like the kids play area at mcdonald's. :lol:

[EyesSkyward]

nashville is fun sometimes (despite seeing the infamous jim reed man on a trip down broad...yikes!) jeff, you will know what i'm talking about here...

Heh, heh... You know, I think of you whenever I pass by it now. :D

http://takingflight.us/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=725&stc=1&d=1144422641

- Jeff

[cshollingsworth]

oh thx jeff...i was hoping it would be awhile before i had to see that little fellow again! :rotflmao: