Skip to main content

An Unexpected Delight

Image
By
Yesterday morning, I was dreading the weekly drive to Philadelphia.  I am looking for yet another viola teacher for Johannah, and we had an appointment to meet with a good possibility.  However, this meant that I would need to park.  In Philadelphia.

Normally, I drive into the city (3 1/2 hours one way), drop off Glo at her lesson, drive further into the city, drop off Johannah at hers, drive back to Glo's and pick her up, drive back to Johannah's to pick her up, and drive out.  I might get out to walk one of the girls up to the door, but that's it.  There's no parking for less than $15/hour, so I'm stuck in the car.

I drove in last night, figuring that I would hope for the best, but if needs be, I would just drop off Johannah and let her evaluate the teacher.

What to my wondering eyes would appear, but...

A parking place!  The truck loading zones all become public parking at 4 p.m.  We arrived at 3:47, sat in the lane for 13 minutes, paid $2.50/hour, and walked two blocks to the Kimmel Center.

Woot!

Actually, it was quite lovely, because I got in a lot of walking over the next 2 1/2 hours, getting Glo and Hannah to their lessons (two lessons for Johannah last night), and walking with Glo to Krispy Kreme.  The weather was remarkably beautiful--50 degrees and clear.  Sometimes I think I could live in the city just for the convenience and fun of it all.  But then I think about my 11 acres and realize that I couldn't :-)

I found that getting out of my car for that time helped shorten up the drive home.  Seriously.  The drive home felt like nothing.  Maybe that's because I hadn't been sitting in the car for nine hours straight.

A parking place in Philadelphia and walking the streets at dinnertime?  An unexpected delight.

Comments

  1. John KennedyFebruary 6, 2012 at 2:27 PM

    I'm glad Mommy had a good trip to Philly and that she got a good parking spot!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Quest for Birkenstocks

By
One of the main reasons I go to Germany every couple of years is to restock my supply of Birkenstocks.  I started buying them when I lived there, and I basically can't live without them now.  It just about kills me when a pair runs its course and needs to be thrown away.  I think in my lifetime, I've thrown away only three pairs.  One that never was quite right (the straps were plastic and would cut into my skin after a long day), one pair that I wore gardening one too many times (the brown dirt stains wouldn't come out of the white leather), and the pair that I was wearing when I broke my ankle (they were an unfortunate casualty of broken ankle PTSD because those purple and blue paisleys go down as one of my favorite pairs of all time).  I only threw out the garden ones a couple of days before I left for Germany, because I knew I would be getting a new pair. The only store where I have ever bought my Birkenstocks is Hoffmann's in Speicher.  (Well okay, t...
2 comments
Read more

Like Dominos....

By
It all began with glare.  Simple, obnoxious, I-can't-stand-it-anymore glare. Our 60" rear projection TV in the family room was basically unviewable except after 10 o'clock at night.  The glare from the windows was making it impossible to see anything during my 10 minute lunch break each day, and something had to change. Too, the TV didn't fit in the entertainment center from Germany.  John, wanting bigger and better, hadn't considered that the space is only 40" wide.  For the past five years, I have been nagged by 6" of overhang on both sides of the TV stand. I went to Lowe's to price blinds.  $1,043 for five blinds, and that was at 20% off. I figured a new TV would be cheaper than that.  I was right, even with the state-of-the-art receiver and new HDMI cables that sly salesman told us we needed to have. But where to put the old TV?  It just needed a quiet, dark place to retire. Glo's bedroom.  Her TV was a relic from the paleoneoneand...
3 comments
Read more

Saying goodbye to KitTen

By
Last week, we said goodbye to KitTen.  Sadly, it was way too early for him to die. When I worked at Interlochen during the summers, I knew a medical assistant who fostered animals before they were put up for adoption by the local humane society.  She got a Siamese-looking kitten after I had already left camp and posted a photo of him on FB.  I reached out immediately. Growing up with Siamese cats, I really do love them.  I love their personalities, especially how vocal they are.  I adopted KitKat back when we lived in Dayton, but in a strange turn of events, a girl who was cat-sitting him before we left for Germany wouldn't give him back.  Since then, we've had mostly tabbies (with the GRAND exception of Hootie), so I was excited to start an adventure with another Siamese. We were living in PA at the time, so Mark and Allison brought him out to us.  Because he was going to be MY cat, I was determined to give him THE most perfect name, but in the end, w...
Post a Comment
Read more