Er, I mean, my coffee with Peacebang while she was on layover between flights.
Okay, at the risk of sounding like an overeager fan/sycophant/stalker, she really is funnier (and skinnier) in real life.
Lizard Eater and Little Warrior stalked, I mean searched, for Peacebang in a Really Big Airport, finally, thanks to cell phones, meeting her in the International flights area, which was the only one with no security checkpoint to get through. It's a good thing, too, because those security people were already looking suspiciously at Little Warrior and I think if I'd had them page "Peace Bang? Ms. UU Peace Bang?" it might have set up one of those TSA incidents you read about in the alternative press.
(Stops and realizes ... wait, so the only part of the airport where a person with no ticket can sit and have a coffee with a ticketed passenger is the International area? Let's ponder that for a moment, shall we? Okay, moving on.)
We wound up talking for hours and she was not only incredibly patient with all of the seminarian's questions about ministry, more ministry, and how I should cut my hair, she seemed happy to have Little Warrior climb all over her, try on her shawl, and jabber away. PB even did an Oscar-worthy interpretation of The Grumpy Old Troll Who Lives Under the Bridge that was upstaged only by her version of The Cowardly Lion, which you should ask to see whenever you meet her.
One of the things that comes through loud and clear is that this reverend LOVES her congregation, y'all. Just about any praise was deflected ... it's always thanks to her DRE, choir, staff, congregants. I'm madly jealous, both as a layperson without a minister, and as a potential minister.
Lots, lots, lots of great ideas swimming through my head, so much so that I got on the wrong road driving home. It was worth the extra tolls.
I'll feel better, though, when she logs on that she's in Amarillo, as we wound up talking longer than either of us planned on. And she had to go back through security (we'll be writing a country song titled, "Do yew luv me enough to go through security to see me?") and the word might have gotten around that she had been meeting a couple of shady characters in the International section.
I too would have sure loved to have been a third set of boots at the table during your three-hour airport layover...but I'm trying to imagine the airport...DFW? ABQ? or maybe even Houston International? Like PB, I also have a hard-won set of authentic Texas boots I earned (complete with "spurs") during my four-year minstry in Midland just a few hours south of Amarillo at the "base" of the panhandle. When those terrible "blue northers" used to roll down the Great Plans from the Arctic, we'd complain that someone had "left the door open again in Amarillo." And remember PB, all this waltzing and such aside, you simply must, must, must sample a little authentic West Texas Haut Cuisine (pronounced "hot Quiz-zeen")...like the Whataburger and the Taco Villa...just so you can say you have. Hell, you don't even have to swallow if you don't want to! But my taste buds are getting nostalgic just thinking about it....
ReplyDeleteomg, I passed a Whataburger today!
ReplyDeleteOkay, if you go to Whataburger, here's the thing you MUST get:
ReplyDeleteketchup.
I'm not kidding. There are people (like my SIL) who move away from Texas and they miss that Whataburger ketchup on their fries. Just mentioning it can bring on fervor, "Yes, YES, it's the best ketchup in the world!"