Houston Adventure

I took a flying trip to Houston this past week -- both for real and in the idiomatic sense. I was still quite jet-lagged on Wednesday morning, waking up at 4 AM, but that certainly made me ready for the 8:45 AM shuttle to pick me up. When I arrived at the airport my 10:30 flight was on time, but by the time I had cleared security the departure time was suddenly 12:30 pm.  I inquired about my connecting flight and was told that everything going out of DFW was going to be late. I went back to a restaurant and had what would be called in Poland, second breakfast. My first breakfast had been around 6 AM and I was quite certain I would be more than hungry by 3 PM  when I might finally get to DFW f I didn't eat something.

We did finally leave around 12:30. The only good thing I can say about this delay is that I ended up in the sky at the right moment to see the sight above out of my plane window.

And yes, my connecting flight to Houston was more than late. I finally got to my hotel, a Courtyard by Marriott at the Medical Center area, around 9 PM rather than my expected arrival at 6 PM. The bed certainly looked good.

I went to the Bistro and got a sandwich and then went to sleep without much trouble. It had been a long time since 4 AM.

The next morning I was up before daylight in Houston. I went to the Bistro and got a yogurt and coffee.

By then daylight had arrived. I found these wonderful sights.

I asked the hotel to call me a cab. It only took 25 minutes for it to arrive!  When the cab did get there, the cab driver said he was "new to town" and didn't know the address I needed. I was at 7702 Main Street and needed to go to 1 Main Street. The obvious thing to me was to drive on Main Street until we got there, which after setting up two types of GPS he did.  Finally got to nearly the right address and I walked the rest of the way.

By this point I was wondering if all this inconvenience was going to be worth it. But a few minutes into the meeting I knew I was receiving valuable information.

When the meeting was done I found the weather had changed to pouring rain.

Here's a picture of the skyline of Houston from the Downtown campus of the University of Houston.

From here I went to the very nearby Metro station and bought a ticket. I rode it two stops.

I spied the above street art. Sorry you can't hear the haunting trumpet someone was playing on the street too in the midst of the rain.

The place I was to meet the shuttle to get back to the airport was right in front of me.

While waiting I kept looking at this building trying to figure out the use of the Roman numerals.

 Finally I struck me -- it's a Forever 21 store, a shop that is quite a favorite of the younger members in my family.

At last back to the airport. I spied this astronaut.

The moon landing is one of those events in my life in which I remember exactly where I was when it happened.

This astronaut has a cow head.

I read a nearby sign and found that the cow head makes this statue part of a fund-raising activity for children's health in the Houston area.

Predictably my return flights were late, too. I finally made into my apartment a little before 1 AM on  Friday morning.

The first thing I did was hit the computer to look at the on time rating for American Airlines. Its average rating is 80%; for me the on time rating was 0%. It's not so bad when one had one flight, but when one has connecting flights it's quite stressful, wondering if one is going to miss the next flight. But at least the meeting was very much worth it!