Sunshine State, Weather Gods, Cabin Fever & "42"

* Made a trip down to Orlando last week. Stayed at the Walt Disney Swan. Wherever you go, its Disneyland. Disney owns the place! But I liked it. Of course, I bought a bunch of Disney stuff -- most of them silly but what the heck!

* When I left Lexington, I was gloating over the fact that I was going to warm, sunny, tropical Florida. Lexington was freezing. Ah, freedom for a week! Alas, I didn't pray to the Weather Gods. The temperatures in Orlando were in the mid-twenties for most of my stay there. Sigh. So much for escaping freezing weather. Nonetheless, it didn't deter a bunch of us from going to Universal Studios one very cold evening. "The Simpsons" ride was easily the highlight of the trip!

* The minute I landed in Orlando, my cell phone died. No life. Zilch. Zip. Nada. I tried many different avenues of getting it to work. Finally, I abandoned it and decided to have fun without it. It wasn't that difficult to manage without a cell phone. I actually enjoyed the freedom conferred on me.

* When I got back to Lex, of course, the wrath of the weather gods pursued me. We had an ice-snow storm two days back. Driveways were iced up and the roads were slick. We couldn't get out of the house. Our satellite dish couldn't pick up any signals. No TV. No cell phone. Sitting at home for three days without seeing anyone else other than S gave me cabin fever.

* Which brings me to my last point -- "42". The combination of not being able to venture out + no TV + no cell phone gave me tons of time to do some reading. I've been devouring "The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy"! And I am becoming a cult fan! Currently reading the fourth book of the series -- "So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish!". If you want to know what "42" means, go read the book.