Christmas Trip Rewind, Day 1: I Don’t Heart NYC

Why the rewind? No internet. My Grandparents don’t have a computer at their house, let alone internet service. Over the course of my four days in Florida, I was able to sneak out for a whopping 10 minutes of internet time at a local McDonalds in an attempt to stop the withdrawal seizures. Needless to say, that 10 minutes was broke down in the following ways: 5 minutes trying to connect, 4 minutes of downloading e-mail, 1 minute of catching up with the world’s news.

Ahna, Ezra, and my parents left two days before I did (I had to work) and were able to have Ezra spend a few more hours with family. They hung out for dinner in Daytona and spent some quality pre-craziness time with my Grandparents in Jacksonville.

Since I travelled separately, I had the wonderful opportunity to briefly visit the world’s busiest airport (everyone else took a direct flight to Orlando, then drove up to Jacksonville). Denver to Atlanta. Atlanta to Jacksonville. According to most statistics and studies, a lot of you aren’t as up to speed on geography as you should be…so a quick lesson. In between Denver and Atlanta, and Atlanta and Jacksonville is no state or city that starts or ends with New York. As a matter of fact, at any given time we are no closer than 1000+ miles. Yet the mass that is New York interfered with my trip to Florida and cut my time there by 1.5 hours. The pilot and co-pilot of my plane were late arriving into Atlanta because they were late leaving New York City. Argh.

Anyway, I finally got to my Grandparent’s house in Jacksonville sometime after 9pm and sometime after 14 hours of travel. While Ezra was already asleep, I was able to hang out for a little while and appreciate the city that was constructed in their living room – all out of Department 56 pieces that my Grandmother collected over many years. They love to put it up (as evidenced by my Grandfather’s first words about it after I arrived: “This might be the last year”) and we love to see it….especially Ezra. He loved chasing the train back and forth on the tracks and did especially well with the delicacy of the display.