Travel and the Call of the Blog

I visited the state of New York for the first time, Ithaca in particular. I gave a talk to the Future of Minority Studies Summer Institute on using blogs as a means of bridging the gap between academic research and public policy (it was at Cornell this year -- there had been a session the day before on the challenges of being a scholar-advocate, and I followed up on that theme). The invitation to speak came out of the blue, I do not study the issues this group is concerned with, but people said it went well.

It was greener, colder, and rainier than I expected. It reminded me somewhat of Eugene in terms of greenness and climate, though you could tell it was more humid than Eugene, but the buildings were much older and there were no fir trees to speak of. So it was obvious I wasn't in Kansas anymore, or Eugene for that matter.

Due to the rain today, my flight out of Ithaca was canceled, so I sat all day expecting to go to Philadelphia on an alternative flight, then as far west as I could get from there. But after waiting six hours, that flight was canceled too. So I decided to get to a bigger airport and got the last seat on the flight to Newark, NJ which is where I am now. I scheduled a flight to Denver at 7:00 a.m., 4:00 a.m. my time (just past bedtime for me), and get to Eugene around 11:30 tomorrow morning. Long as I have internet access, I'm happy (or at least not yelling at ticket agents).

Fun day. One thing did make me stop and think. After waiting all day for the flight to Philadelphia, I thought it was going to go at one point and I was writing the post at the time. I found myself hoping the plane was delayed a bit so I'd have a chance to finish it and post it before I had to board. That was after waiting all day. Then I realized how crazy that is.