Live from Lancaster

(Photo added 7/31 after return to home computer.)

Good Morning -

I'm here live at the Lancaster City Library, which means that this will be short, sweet and pictureless.

If you could see the Virgen I made last night, you would see an Airtran ad with blue skies and a flying plane as the background for the Virgen and a clip from a Nino's menu, the wonderful local sub shop here in town that my partner dreams about when she's away.

Yesterday was all sorts of travel and flight. The shuttle was fine, and, I think because we had used some of my partner's credit card miles to get my ticket, my seat on both flights were in business class. I've never sat in that section and was simultaneously delighted and embarrassed to have a cool juice in my hand while the rest of the passengers schlepped past me to their holding cell in the back of the plane. Such is unreflected privilege.

Once I landed at BWI, I met up with my partner and we hit the road north to get to "the county" - what I call Lancaster county when I'm too tired to pronounce it correctly - which takes all the concentration I have to be able to say "Lanc-as-ter".

We're staying at a friend of my partner's in Lititz because he's off working a camp. It's a great, old house in a post card town that was established almost 30 years before our country (which is probably why the ACLU lost when they tried to sue the town for having a Nativity scene in the town square (the town beat them by selling the square for $1 to the insurance company on the corner, which made it private, not public land - you can do these things when you've been organized since before the Constitution (which you can find shredded in W's office trash bin).

Last night, we got our subs, and walked them down to the park where we sat and ate while watching the ducks in the pond. Please know how rare any of these activities are in Tucson - especially in the summer - sitting outside to eat, a park with grass and ponds, ducks (who generally need water to live), etc. It was delightful.

Today we went to Central Market (links to be added with photos when I'm not under the librarian's gun), and now the library and then Chinese for lunch, and Green Dragon market in Ephrata (also the home of 10,000 Villages, where we'll also go), and then dinner with a friend of my partner's at Country Table.

I don't know that I'll be able to post every day - this is a rather special occurrence to be downtown and near the library - so we may have to wait until I get back on the 31st to catch up with stories.

Until then, here's magic, grass, ducks, ponds, and good cheesesteaks with sauce to all.