A Brief Note about Connecticut because, well, I said I would

Well, I said I was going to write about Connecticut so I will. I’m in the Jet Blue terminal at New York’s JFK airport about 36 hours before Hurricane Irene is projected to hit New York City so that’s kind of dominating things. I moved my flight from 9am Saturday to 8:25pm Friday night just to avoid any unforeseen chaos here. The subway will shut down at noon Saturday and people are being told to evacuate low-lying areas. All of the people at the ATMI office seem fairly nonchalant about it but I hope they’re all ok. The lawyer who I work with, who lives on the coast in Greenwich, Connecticut, is talking about having a football game with friends during the hurricane.
So anyway, I’m outta here.
Now about Connecticut. It’s a nice-looking green state with lots of high hills. The weather is quite fantastic as the highs are in the mid-80s. Of course they pay for it with the winters but still. I didn’t take much time to tool around Danbury, the city where ATMI’s HQ is located but I did notice a few things:
- If you want Italian food, you can do worse than be in Danbury. Within a mile of my hotel there were four pizza joints, three Italian-style delis selling sandwiches and an Italian-style chain called, I believe, Banucci’s.
- Danbury is very pedestrian unfriendly. Sidewalks are a rarity as are crosswalks. I tried to walk to the Banucci’s last night, which isn’t even 1/3 of a mile from the hotel, and had to cross a four lane road in the dark twice each way because to stay on my side of the road I would have had to walk on top of the guardrail over the Still River. Though I guess if you’re under snow for 1/3 of the year there’s not too much walking going on.
Um, that’s about it for Danbury. So since this post seems kind of short, here are some things I’m looking forward to about being home:
- Seeing my own wife and kid. I’m tired of seeing everybody else’s though seeing the antics of well-behaved kid four and under never fails to make me smile.
- Not having to pack up my stuff in my suitcase every day before I leave. I don’t like to leave a mess out for the cleaning lady and also would like to make it difficult for her to steal my prized Porco Rosso DVD if she were so inclined.
- Home-cooked food. Italian food and grinders are nice but it’s time for some of Jennifer’s cooking (I can cook too but she’s taken over that job full-time).
- The Texas triple digit heat. Oh wait, wrong list.
- Turning on the radio and knowing which station NPR is.
OK, my flight’s going to board soon and I need to go buy me some dinner to take on the 3.5 hour flight home. I’m looking forward to being back. My next trip will be probably be a two week jaunt to East Asia but at least I’ll get 3-4 weeks or more at home. Texas ho!
POST-SCRIPT: That was one of the bumpiest flights I’ve been on in a long time. It’s like the pilots were going out of their way to get close to the hurricane. When you’re having trouble seeing the wing at 38,000 feet you’re in something weird. Boy was I glad to be on the ground.