We were driving from Richmond, Virginia, to Adelphi, Maryland this afternoon, and it was time for dinner. I suggested that, for old times’ sake, we eat at what we thought might be the only surviving Lum’s restaurant, but I wasn’t exactly sure where it was.

Fortunately, I now have Verizon Wireless Wide-Area Wireless service, so Jeff Googled (hmmm…wonder how long “Google” will need an upper-case letter?) for “Lums Restaurant Virginia” and found the phone number, which Diane dialed, only to hear the dreaded “dee-dee-dee, the number you have called is no longer in service” recording. All at 65 mph (and not one bit faster, in case any state troopers are reading this), which boggles my mind. Good thing I had passengers, though, so I didn’t have to type and drive at the same time!

So instead of getting off the highway in Woodbridge, where Lums used to be, we got off in Springfield. En route to the Springfield Mall, where I guessed we’d find something tolerable, if not good, Diane saw Osaka Japanese Restaurant, and we went there. It was pretty good, and much more interesting than the food court would have been!

I’m on one of my all-too-regular trips to Westchester County for yet another IBM meeting. As usual, I booked my outbound trip on AA 288, leaving SJC at 11:30am, arriving JFK 8ish, getting me to my hotel 9:30ish — later than I want, but less of a hassle than getting up in time to catch the 8:30am flight.

This morning, my taxi driver called me at 8, and I told him that he could pick me up early since I was ready. So I was at the airport before 9, and a quick glance at the flight monitor told me that the 8:30am flight hadn’t left yet. I dashed up to the Admirals’ Club and found that there were plenty> of seats available, so I grabbed one.

We took off around 10:15 and landed at 6:25pm. I was in my car before 7 (the AirTrain at JFK is a huge improvement over the old Hertz buses), enjoying my first Ralph’s Italian Ice of the summer at their Valley Stream location by 7:15 (well, I had to do something with my extra time), and at the hotel around 8pm, well before my original flight was scheduled to land (and even more before it actually landed; it, too, was delayed).

Tomorrow comes early, of course, but I have a better chance of getting some sleep this way. Maybe I should reconsider and start taking the early flight?