More travel

Ah, Pittsburgh in December. I'm in the frigid mountains for work this week. I need to visit this city when it's actually warm. Every time I come here it's cold, grey, and dirty. It'd be nice to see the city when it's warm, grey, and dirty.

I'm staying at an interesting hotel. I had been concerned because my higher-up boss wanted me to start staying in cheaper hotels on the road. I found that funny because it's not like I'd been staying at wonderful five-star hotels complete with fuzzy robes and in-room hot tubs, etc... I've been staying at Holiday Inns and such.

But, whatever. I was worried about this place, but it's not too bad. Besides having to waste my new laptop's ability of wireless, I'm doing alright. Tonight I ate in the hotel's lovely restaurant. Actually, I ended up sitting with a bunch of locals in the bar. Not too bad a place, the usual dark wood paneled walls, dimly lit, the latest edition of Golden Tee, a bar-top video poker game, a tv blaring the news, and then a hardened group of locals lined up at the bar.

It was interesting to watch them watch the news. They grunted about certain things (John McCain criticizing Donald Rumsfeld), yelled about others (another guerilla siege in Falluja "That place'll never be calm"), laughed at some parts, and then turned the channel over to Jeopardy at 20 past the hour so they could shout out the wrong answers. I had a fun time watching.

That's all for now. Will post more soon.

Thanks for all the comments about loud neighbors, they're all hilarious. I think my favorite "over-hearing the wrong part of a couple's discussion outside your window" phrase is the following (heard while in my first-floor apartment in Boston):

A man and a woman are chatting at about 3am - both are obviously drunk. The guy is telling the gal that no matter what she does, he'll always be her friend. It was annoying until I heard him say the line, "I don't care if you have an upside-down orgy, I'll still be your friend."

Now that's friendship.