The Good, The Bad and The Burgh: My Travels to Pittsburgh Part 6

Ok full disclosure, I walked away from writing these posts in May. I came back today expecting to simply recap my journey back to Green Bay from Pittsburgh on Sunday. Wrong, because Part Five ended on Frida, which means I have all of Saturday to recap and I honestly don;t remember as much as I would like to, but I'm not going to let that deter me. So here we go, the epic conclusion, Part 6.

Goodbye to the Burgh

Saturday March 26, 8 a.m.(ish)
Now we had to wake up early on Saturday because one of our school chums was reading their paper early and as they had come to support us at our readings we would go support them, despite our lack of sleep.

So as I'm writing this I realize I can barely remember what we did that day, we might have gone to Bruegger's bagel for a late breakfast/early lunch but then again it could have been another day. I also might have gone to Dunkin' Donuts, again I can't remember. I definitely did both of those things but I don't remember when. So with a major lack of anything to actually say about what happened during the day on Saturday let's skip ahead to Saturday evening.

Saturday March 26, 7 p.m. (ish)
The weekend culminates in a gala dinner and bigwig speaker. The dinner is very nice everyone gets dressed up and awards are handed out. Some people from St. Norbert won some awards which was actually pretty awesome considering how many people were there, yours truly however walked away empty handed.

Dave Eggers, nice hair

The keynote speaker was a man by the name of Dave Eggers. Dave wrote the screenplays for the films Away We Go and the film adaptation of Where the Wild Things Are. He is also the author of the book Zeitoun about a man who stays behind in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina and then helps those stranded with the use of his kayak.

However the most interesting thing Eggers shared (fun sidenote: he apparently demanded an ungodly amount of money and a first class ticket for his appearance) was his work setting up writing centers around the country. From San Francisco to New York Eggers has established open writing centers in impoverished areas to help children develop writing skills. The centers are free and generate revenue by sharing space with a specialty store. For example: The San Francisco center is dedicated solely to selling pirate themed items, while one in New York sells time travel equipment.

Overall it was one of the better lectures I had witnessed during the trip, and other people seemed to like him too given the line that formed around the ballroom waiting for his autograph.

However I, and some of my other compatriots went down to the hotel bar (it was still before 11!) and I discovered I do not like scotch (at least not from the rail). Then we called it a night because we had to get up early again to catch our flights out.

Sunday March 27 8 a.m. (ish - get it? I don't actually remember what time)
We got up and got out, a non creepy concierge helped grab us a cab to the airport, a Chrysler 300 with a leather interior. Unfortunately I did have to pay for this cab ride.

We aited to board out plane, this time to Detroit, and found two of our professors and a couple of our schoolmates would also be on it. The flight took off and landed without too much trouble.

We made our way through the Detroit airport, passing through this lovely tunnel.

Trippy, no?

This flight was delayed however and then we had to get a new plane because the one we were supposed to fly on was broken. They gave us some coupons for 50 dollars off our next flight (which according to one of my profs who tried to use it, don't actually work, thank you for flying Delta.) and five dollar voucher to use in the airport. Most people went to some hot dog place, but I didn't think I could stomach a dog so I bought some pretzels gum and orange juice.

We finally got to board and got back Green Bay safely. I dug out my car and then went to Culver's where all my troubles were rewarded with the new Three Cheeseburger: two patties three different slices of cheese, all delicious.

Oh my, well hello there

And there you have it, eight months and six posts later my trip to Pittsburgh and back.

Let's break it down real quick so that my titles to these posts make sense:

The Good

• Diverse music in bars
• Sam Adams on tap pretty much everywhere
• The South Side

The Bad

• Poor travel conditions
• Early bar close time
• Lack of good/interesting places to eat in downtown area

The Burgh

•  Coleslaw on sandwiches
• Strange obsession with dinosaurs
• The Penguins

Hit the comments with your comments.

Where I have been, and where I am going

Hello and welcome back.

It's been a while, but here I am still alive and kicking. It's been about three months since my last post, and many of you may be wondering:

Where has he been, what has he been doing, what secrets is he hiding, etc, etc.

To answer the first: College, the whole time, minus a brief jaunt to Madison and Minneapolis which we may or may not get to.

To answer the second: A lot.  Two words I wished were one, and hoped that by simply spelling them as such for most of my life, someone would finally give up correcting me. (A failed experiment to say the least.) You see that little slogan on the right there that says " Just an average guy with too much time on his hands"? Turns out that second part isn't as true as I had envisioned.Again we can get into specifics later but for now let's just say I have been very busy, and also there has been very little striking my interest to write about. Writing emails and press releases and taking notes and correcting papers all day is exhausting, but I feel I am on the mend, or at least sucking it up a little. So we'll try and start this again. I won't make any promises on what I'll write about because I never seem to come through, but I will tell you what I'd like to write about and then we can see if I follow through on any of it.

As for the third: Many, and someday I might share them.

And as for the etc., etc.: you're just going to need to be more specific.

Here's what I'd like to write about:
1. Despite having taken the trip 8 months ago, I'd really like to finish up my Pittsburgh posts especially since my blog partner in crime: Raymond, writer of The Hot and Bothered Effect (see sidebar) has made a claim that he would like to contrast my opinions of the city with his own. (Although he has also seemed to take a hiatus from his writing as well.)

2. I'd like to do a little halfway followup to my SNL Wishlist I posted back in May, specifically how I'm doing on my host predictions (spoiler: not well).

3. I'd also like to followup on what I've been watching on Netflix, because I know that's what you're really here for.

4. Might profile another one of my friends again, although that was kind of lame I think.

We'll see what else happens, the posting of the pop-culture stuff got a little dull, but I'm certainly not going to stop. However I got some more positive feedback when I do more personal posts so I'll probably throw out a couple of those too.

It's all about "feeling it". You get that writing bug and then you spew it out. That's what I'm doing, spewing. We'll see how long it lasts.

Come along with me, hit the comments tell me what you want me to say, I just might listen.