Where the wind....

comes... well, you know

Preface (probably slightly boring as most Preface's (Prefaci?) are, but required reading to understand what follows)

Well, we (I’ve) almost recovered from our whirlwind (pun intended) weekend jaunt to Oklahoma.   Funny, when we told people we were taking a trip there, the almost uniform response was:  “OKLAHOMA!  in MAY?”   Well, yes.  As I briefly mentioned in the last edition, our grandnephew (tough to sort out these titles) was graduating high school, and all of the Otto clan was also attending resulting in sort of a family reunion, so MFO was keen to go.  There were a couple of boundary conditions that made it a bit more challenging.  MFO was signed up for second session of “Protecting your Documents”, the workshop on disaster response concerning archival things.  That was taking place again at the B&O museum from 8am to 4pm on Thursday, the day BEFORE the graduation in Oklahoma.  And, at the other end of the stack of the books, believe it or not, she was to receive yet another pair of rewards from the County specifically recognizing her contributions to the Historical Preservation Commission and also her work with the Newtowne Neck State Park master plan development.  SO, that meant we could not leave BEFORE the workshop ended Thursday afternoon and had to be back the following Monday evening.  (Isn’t this riveting reading?)  So we turned it over to the capable talents of the Cole Travel folks and they set us up with flights, rooms, and a car. 

Now before proceeding, (if I haven’t driven you off already); one more thing.  It’s easy to blog and blab about a plate of pasta or servers wanting to know if you’re still working on that (which will come eventually) but covering a family event is a bit sticky because I am very reluctant to ever post pictures of relatives nor kids here.  SO, I’ll have to be kind of circumspect in some areas. 

Okay, to begin the odyssey I get in the MOMSTER and head for Baltimore, waaaaayyyyy ahead of time, but I find it hard to sit around for hours just waiting for a departure time.  Since I had done the trip before, I made it with relatively little trouble and then sat for an hour or so waiting for MFO.   We got to BWI about two hours before our 7 something take off.  Parked in Long Term A, making note of the location of the MOMSTER

Another nuance this time was driven by my knees and a tight connection in Atlanta (right on the way to OKC, right?).   Our travel person said, I’ll just order a wheel chair for you.  Swallowing pride along with Advil, I accepted.  Apparently it’s flagged on your record or boarding pass or something.   Turned out it’s not a bad deal.  Straight to security past lines, “pre check” is almost guaranteed, and you get “driven” right to the gate.  A new experience.  Only cost is tipping, which I usually do on the extravagant side.  One short story, and then we’ll move on.  The young man that guided my chair in Atlanta was a football player for maybe Georgia, some school that made you take notice anyway, but he blew out BOTH acl’s near the first day of practice.  End of career, now pushing wheel chairs in airports.  Sure there might be more to the story.

Anyway, we boarded (first, another benefit) and got aisle aisle seats on Southwest.   We had to sit in the penalty box at BWI for a while but eventually took off for Atlanta.  Besides bags of peanuts and (bad) pretzels, this was dinner (for which the $5 fee was forgiven because the flight attendant''s card reader wouldn't work (on either of my cards):  Her quote: "This piece of....(deleted)!"

We arrived in Atlanta a few minutes AFTER our flight to OKC was supposed to board, but as usual, one delay, all delays and we made connections easily (with the help of the acl guy).  By the time we got to the Hotel, it was well after one (am) local.   

Kind of a leisurely wake up on the day of the Graduation, and we went over to Enterprise to get the rental auto.   Apparently they don’t “pick you up”.  Turned out they were strapped for intermediate cars and we wound up with a “premium” 2015 Cadenza.   Nice ride.  So, armed with phone GPS, printed out Streets and Trips, direction, maps, we struck out for our destination of Henryetta, Oklahoma, about 90 miles east of the City.  Saw lots of this, and Casinos practically every ten miles.  Native American territory, you know.

We finally got to Henryetta

 Of course you know of Henryetta because it is the birthplace of Troy Aikman (there’s a trivia winner for you).  The town dates from 1885, and for a while was a coal center, then glass manufacturing, but today there’s not much left of the downtown,  with lots of vacant buildings, but there are still a few interesting places.  One of which was a “just right” restaurant which we’ll cover in a later edition.

Sorry FOJTY, didn't get to sample

And this right next to the Hotel:

The Hotel was a Day’s Inn, welcomed by “that guy” you see on TV

which was nice enough with a big atrium where the “clan” could gather and let the younger set run around.

while this may be boring as advertised, it kind of sets the background for what turned out to be a very enjoyable trip for us. For once not in a big city, but a peaceful rural setting, including real live farm animals (MFO’s nephew has a farm besides his regular day job).  Plus we got to talk with the side of the family which we don't see often. It also included two notable dining experiences, the “just right” place in Henryetta, and a lousy, well, "interesting" one in OKC the night before we returned.  In between, our host provided some great homemade food, for which we were occasionally

DFD