Travel Day - Heading Home

When I got up this morning, I went and hung out at Starbucks for about 30 minutes. Lobby call was set for 1pm, so I had plenty of time. Stopped at the 7-Eleven on the way back for some last minute Japanese goodies. The 7-Elevens here r-o-c-k. All kinds of cool things you'd never expect…

For example, the package of dried squid I bought. I figured I'd want a souvenir snack to take home or maybe for some time later today. On the near-two-hour ride to the airport, I tore that sucker open and the instant I did, about 3 people on the bus started in with comments like "Holy mother of god, what the hell is that smell?"

So, OK, it was a little pungent, I guess. Everyone was laughing their ass off and talking smack. Gotta give credit to Mark Wise, he was the only person on the bus willing to try a taste of it. I kept waving the package near Sooner, who was totally grossed out by the smell of it. Someone in the back said it smelled like a vagina with a yeast infection.

Which I guess it did.

Hey, it tasted good.

We had a 4:50pm flight to LAX. Pretty uneventful. I watched a couple of movies and slept maybe an hour. LAX to St. Louis was OK, too. Mark Wise was with me on that flight because he lives in St. Louis.

Upon landing in St. Louis, I found out that my flight to Raleigh was cancelled. Mark was kind enough to let me crash at his house for the night, so I treated him to dinner at Chuck's Bar & Grill, a place in his neighborhood. By 9:30, I was falling asleep, so we headed back to his house and I crashed on the couch in the basement.