I'm quite less a fan of flying since my weekend trip to NY Saturday 8/15 to see my son at school. Friday was the day after the Big Blackout Back East. The heat was bad but man, the humidity was worse. I rode with another couple from Santa Rosa from the Newark airport to the school. On Saturday, after the Acceptance day parade, I waited at Trophy Point until my son was released. A very nice young lady from Cleveland struck up a conversation and I discovered what trauma the power blackout caused hotel guests in NYC. She and her party were awakened in the early hours and evacuated from the hotel.
It wasn’t long before Kevin walked up and I gave him a big hug from his family. I took a couple of photos, we chatted for a few minutes and then 2 more cadets appeared. My son, his cadet friends and I walked into town, had lunch in Highland Falls, and walked back onto the post. It was brutally hot and humid, so sitting in Tony’s air-conditioned restaurant was a pleasure. Ray is from El Paso and he fenced last year at USMAPS. The other cadet had a very Russian sounding name and a wonderfully inquiring mind. My son lost 24 pounds during Beast. The others lost weight too. Although each was in a different Beast company their tales of the rain and problems it caused were consistent. All three agreed the march back was hard on the body and the mind. Kevin explained his was not the honor company but had won the Warrior Forge competition.
Sitting among the cadets at West Point was truly a treat for me. At lunch, waiting for the shuttle bus, on the bus, and waiting for it to leave again, I overheard so many interesting stories and experiences from their view. We went to the PX (post exchange) where they purchased their $65 printers and $8 cables to go with their new Dell D900 laptops. Kevin bumped into many of his new friends there and outside while we waited for the shuttle bus back to his barracks. The jovial banter bordered on hilarious, as they told stories of their experiences from the previous 6 weeks. Kevin and I returned to the barracks and I waited at the Macarthur statue while he put his printer away.
We walked over to the 4th class club in Ike Hall, a 5-story performing arts center with a built-in cafeteria, big-screen TVs, arcade video games, juke boxes, stage, and sound system. Big, and this was just a side hall, not the main auditorium with a very nice view of the Hudson River. I tried to re-hydrate (I was boiling) and just relax for a while. I let my feet rest about half an hour before another of my son’s friends parents agreed to take us to dinner so we went off-post and had a wonderful meal, after a long wait, at the Hacienda in Highland Falls. While we were waiting, an upperclassman came over to quietly tell my son’s friend something. As they were talking the stares our cadets were getting from two other upperclassmen dressed in civilian clothes were fatal if not dangerous. I was not the only one to notice. After they left, Ryan returned to our conversation to let Kevin know some “correcting” activities were going to happen in a certain place, and he should make sure he did not go there. After I got home and called Kevin, I asked him if there had been any incidents in the foretold place. He said no, it was just a spoof.
Thankfully, Ryan's parents offered to take me back to my hotel room in Newburgh. A hailstorm damaged the power lines where I was staying, which made finding the hotel challenging. We tried this way and that but were turned back by the police barricades or yellow tape strung across the roads. We happened upon another driver in an SUV who asked where we were going. We followed them back to the main road and to the hotel. When I got to my room it was about 11 PM, but no electricity and no light. Without which I could not find my medicine nor did my C-Pap machine work (for sleep apnea). I just slept on top of the bed with my clothes on until 4 AM when I awoke. The alarm clock was flashing 12:00 so I called the front desk and asked what time it was. A Power Engineers convention and a couple of baseball teams were also staying at the Clarion. The evening before, when we had electricity, the kids were running all over the place till 3 AM. The night of the storm, the kids were all very quiet from 11 O’clock on. It was the engineers with their flashlights walking by the rooms every few minutes...
Sunday at 7 AM I was determined to avoid any more brownouts, blackouts, or blowout weather hassles, so I called a cab for the Newark Airport (1.5 hours away). $145.00 (including gratuity) and 50 miles later, got to the airport fine, checked my bag and settled in for a 5.5-hour wait. An hour before my flight I checked to confirm I was in the proper place and all was well with the world. And ye verily they said it was! Then a few minutes later, an announcement, my flight was delayed and then another few minutes, announcement, canceled. So I scurried around the large Continental terminal/mall trying not to panic and find a new way home. I did. It was the flight from hell so we won't even go there.
The balls of my feet were throbbing by then so I took my shoes off for the 5-hour flight home. My wife picked me up in Oakland instead of San Francisco and the luggage was? No one knew. When I got home I took off my shoes and I had torn open one of the blisters I developed trying to keep up with three Plebes at West Point and doing the mad dash from terminal to terminal. Standing in one line and then another. Definitely worth the trip to see my son, but I think I’m going to do a few things differently next time…
It wasn’t long before Kevin walked up and I gave him a big hug from his family. I took a couple of photos, we chatted for a few minutes and then 2 more cadets appeared. My son, his cadet friends and I walked into town, had lunch in Highland Falls, and walked back onto the post. It was brutally hot and humid, so sitting in Tony’s air-conditioned restaurant was a pleasure. Ray is from El Paso and he fenced last year at USMAPS. The other cadet had a very Russian sounding name and a wonderfully inquiring mind. My son lost 24 pounds during Beast. The others lost weight too. Although each was in a different Beast company their tales of the rain and problems it caused were consistent. All three agreed the march back was hard on the body and the mind. Kevin explained his was not the honor company but had won the Warrior Forge competition.
Sitting among the cadets at West Point was truly a treat for me. At lunch, waiting for the shuttle bus, on the bus, and waiting for it to leave again, I overheard so many interesting stories and experiences from their view. We went to the PX (post exchange) where they purchased their $65 printers and $8 cables to go with their new Dell D900 laptops. Kevin bumped into many of his new friends there and outside while we waited for the shuttle bus back to his barracks. The jovial banter bordered on hilarious, as they told stories of their experiences from the previous 6 weeks. Kevin and I returned to the barracks and I waited at the Macarthur statue while he put his printer away.
We walked over to the 4th class club in Ike Hall, a 5-story performing arts center with a built-in cafeteria, big-screen TVs, arcade video games, juke boxes, stage, and sound system. Big, and this was just a side hall, not the main auditorium with a very nice view of the Hudson River. I tried to re-hydrate (I was boiling) and just relax for a while. I let my feet rest about half an hour before another of my son’s friends parents agreed to take us to dinner so we went off-post and had a wonderful meal, after a long wait, at the Hacienda in Highland Falls. While we were waiting, an upperclassman came over to quietly tell my son’s friend something. As they were talking the stares our cadets were getting from two other upperclassmen dressed in civilian clothes were fatal if not dangerous. I was not the only one to notice. After they left, Ryan returned to our conversation to let Kevin know some “correcting” activities were going to happen in a certain place, and he should make sure he did not go there. After I got home and called Kevin, I asked him if there had been any incidents in the foretold place. He said no, it was just a spoof.
Thankfully, Ryan's parents offered to take me back to my hotel room in Newburgh. A hailstorm damaged the power lines where I was staying, which made finding the hotel challenging. We tried this way and that but were turned back by the police barricades or yellow tape strung across the roads. We happened upon another driver in an SUV who asked where we were going. We followed them back to the main road and to the hotel. When I got to my room it was about 11 PM, but no electricity and no light. Without which I could not find my medicine nor did my C-Pap machine work (for sleep apnea). I just slept on top of the bed with my clothes on until 4 AM when I awoke. The alarm clock was flashing 12:00 so I called the front desk and asked what time it was. A Power Engineers convention and a couple of baseball teams were also staying at the Clarion. The evening before, when we had electricity, the kids were running all over the place till 3 AM. The night of the storm, the kids were all very quiet from 11 O’clock on. It was the engineers with their flashlights walking by the rooms every few minutes...
Sunday at 7 AM I was determined to avoid any more brownouts, blackouts, or blowout weather hassles, so I called a cab for the Newark Airport (1.5 hours away). $145.00 (including gratuity) and 50 miles later, got to the airport fine, checked my bag and settled in for a 5.5-hour wait. An hour before my flight I checked to confirm I was in the proper place and all was well with the world. And ye verily they said it was! Then a few minutes later, an announcement, my flight was delayed and then another few minutes, announcement, canceled. So I scurried around the large Continental terminal/mall trying not to panic and find a new way home. I did. It was the flight from hell so we won't even go there.
The balls of my feet were throbbing by then so I took my shoes off for the 5-hour flight home. My wife picked me up in Oakland instead of San Francisco and the luggage was? No one knew. When I got home I took off my shoes and I had torn open one of the blisters I developed trying to keep up with three Plebes at West Point and doing the mad dash from terminal to terminal. Standing in one line and then another. Definitely worth the trip to see my son, but I think I’m going to do a few things differently next time…
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