Ms Packwood goes to Pennsylvania

So Pennsylvania was traveled to via Virginia and Maryland (all three states welcome you!) and it really was very scenic. It's about two hours to Carlisle and Carlisle is about ...20 miles? from Gettysberg. Or is it Gettysburg? I probably should know - it was a big deal around these parts, lots of things happened there.

I mention this first, though it was our last stop on the way back to DC as the photo is of course of Abe. (And I still haven't figured out how to get writing on top of a picture...) He's looking pretty good for his age I thought.

I feel I need to point out how cheap alcohol is in the state of Pennsylvania. It's absurd. I bought a bottle of shiraz at their liquor store (as in Penn wine and spirits are sold separately. Beer you can still basically buy at the corner store) and this very bottle sells for about $16 in Ontario (as I have bought it once or twice before). In Pennsylvania? $7. A pint of Guinness? $3.50 (I'm not even exaggerating...it was crazy) In comparison, the wine in DC would be about $11 so still cheaper for sure, but not insane. Just a bit of trivia for you.

We were staying in the guest house of friends of Bryan's (Pennsylvania fellow) - it was a two storey addition to their garage and full of antiques, so we were slumming it. The Gala itself was on the farm of a donor to the ballet school - it was the first fundraising event they had ever had and it was really charming. Most of it happened in a barn (music, silent auction, munchies) with a performance by the school in a tent outside followed by a live auction (I mention this as it will become important later...) Apart from the grass and barnyard nature of the location not being the best for someone wearing high heels (ahem), I would say it was all quite successful and the dancers really wonderful - superb actually. Since we had not paid for our tickets, we all thought we should bid on things (this is also important to note for later). I won a wine and cheese basket in the silent auction (consumed later that evening at the guest house), my FFF won a 1940s teacup (very cute and she was the only bidder!) and our Harvard fellow won a very fancy electric toothbrush of which he is very proud. Dental hygiene is important.

Harmless enough so far.

Well then we get to the live auction and there was one item which attracted our attention. It was a trip for 6 to Puerto Rico. Yup. So we bid. Not being completely stupid, we had set a cap on how high we would go and it of course was soon passed. However, this trip was donated by the owner of the farm (gala location) and at the very end of the evening he was thrusting wine at us to take home, after much sampling had occurred (it was very good wine I have to say) and we joked about how we lost out on the trip. He said "why don't you go as well?" As he owned the villa - 3 storeys, 3 bedrooms, rooftop pool with ocean views from 3 sides and a path to the beach - he could give away as many weeks as he wanted.

And so it seems we have a trip for 6 to Puerto Rico for a $1500 donation to the school to be taken sometime in 2010. Of course all of us taking the same week off might prove to be challenging...we'll see. But isn't that nuts??? More difficult will be selecting the 2 fellow fellows to travel with us...I'm sure there won't be a shortage of takers.

It was a whirlwind 24 hours as we all had to be back at KC yesterday afternoon for day one of the Board seminar. It's been interesting so far but I'm a little beat. One less great aspect to the guest house was the grandfather clock which chimed out each hour. As a pretty light sleeper, I woke each hour on the hour, so I have some catching up to do.

More later....

Strange metro fact #78:

Have I mentioned before how when a train is approaching the station, the lights imbedded in the platform begin to glow? About every second or third one will pulse for the minute prior to the train's arrival. In some stations it's a white light, in others a red. In the underground stations (which tend to be on the dingy side) with red pulsing lights, it's all a bit science fiction feeling, like the tunnel is coming alive. But bad 70s sci-fi not modern new sci-fi as it is very dated. The metro is a strange place.