Back From Pittsburgh; No Zombies This Time

This past weekend I had a travel opportunity to once again visit the great city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Well, it was more of a pack-an-apartment-and-move-the-contents-back-to-Georgia-type trip rather than traveling for business or pleasure.  Come to think of it, we really didn’t have any free time at all on this trip.

The journey began bright and very early as my friend and I flew from Atlanta to Pittsburgh on a CRJ200.  The aircraft itself was pretty sweet, but when it comes to riding on the regional aircraft, I definitely prefer turboprops.  I flew on a Dash 8 this past November, and that was definitely a lot more fun.

One of the benefits to traveling first thing in the morning is that in addition to shorter lines going through security, the wait for takeoff is kept to a minimum.  In our case the pilot told us that we were first in line for takeoff.  We cruised along the taxiway, made the turn onto the runway, and then went to full power for takeoff.  We were airborne within a short moment and on our way north to Pittsburgh.

A solid blanket of clouds covered our view of the ground for the vast majority of the flight.  It wasn’t until we began our decent over West Virginia and eastern Ohio that the skies finally cleared.  Our landing in Pittsburgh was smooth, and we were greeted by blue skies and bitter cold temperatures barely above twenty degrees.  Ah, to be back in winter!  The sharp, cold weather was a great relief for my suffering allergies from our extreme levels of pollen back home.

That Saturday we made a stop at the famous Monroeville Mall to stretch our legs and grab some lunch.  The apartment was in Monroeville on the east side of downtown Pittsburgh, and the mall was only a few minutes away from our destination.  Besides, I was on a mission to purchase a Pittsburgh zombie t-shirt from an awesome store that we discovered this past November.

Monroeville Mall should sound a little bit familiar to fans of the zombie movies.  The original Dawn of the Dead was shot on location inside of the shopping mall.  The mall still attracts the horror crowds and supposedly zombie-related events still take place there each year.  I watched this movie the night before leaving for Pittsburgh.  Great stuff!

On the lower floor of the mall there used to be a store that not only sold zombie related merchandise, but it also housed a small museum dedicated to the horror movie creatures.  It was a nice tribute to not only the movie that made the shopping mall famous, but also zombie lovers everywhere.

The only problem was that the store was closed.  Not closed for the day, but the shelves were bare empty.  It was gone!  A small window display was the only evidence of the coolness that was once inside of the store.  I’m still thinking about going to the store’s website and purchasing a t-shirt that way, but the site itself stinks and the online store needs more work to make it user friendly.

At least the small koi pond is still in the mall.  As an FYI, this pond is visible several times in the original version of Dawn of the Dead.  As for the fish, I don’t know if they were there during filming of the movie, though koi can easily live for a very long time.

The remainder of Saturday and vast majority of Sunday was spent inside of the apartment preparing everything for the move.  We had movers scheduled to move all of the crap down the six floors and into the moving van for us, but they weren’t going to be there until Monday morning.  In the meantime, lots of stuff had to be organized and packaged for delivery.

I’ll admit that I sat back and only contributed a minimum for this part of the trip.  All of the content belonged to my friend’s sister and mother.  Helping people pack their belongings makes me feel creepy, and if I packaged things, the items would be widely scattered.  When it comes to actually moving boxes and furniture, no problem at all.  But as far as going through personal items and packing them in boxes, I’ll pass.  I feel bad about not contributing much help, but I know that just being there and offering consulting and inappropriate humor was a big help in itself.

After packing the truck, we had one more stop to make before beginning the long drive back home.  We needed a vehicle trailer.

The original plan for moving back home involved me driving the family’s car and following behind the rental truck.  We did this when moving up to Pittsburgh and my drafting technique worked great.  The only problem was that the car needed the front tires replaced (verified by mechanics).  The steering wheel had a bad shutter caused by the tires (nothing wrong with the alignment; that was checked while we were there) and there was a danger of having a tire blowout or other significant damage on the drive home.  Since most of the drive involved being out in the middle of nowhere, driving it home wasn’t a favorable option.  We went back to the rental dealer and loaded the car onto a trailer.

Driving a rental truck while hauling a car was about as exciting as one would expect.  Going uphill was a challenge in itself, let alone the significantly wider turning radius and extremely low gas mileage.  But we made it home safe and sound, and now everything has been unloaded and returned to the appropriate facilities.

As a whole, the trip to Pittsburgh and hauling everything back home was a success.  We had minor issues here and there, but flying up there was a lot of fun and Pittsburgh is a great city to visit.  I only wish that we had a couple more days to explore the city again, but time was definitely on the short side this time.

One interesting thing I noticed amongst the locals was something I refer to as the “Detroit attitude.”  When winter lasts forever in the industrial north, many people tend to develop unfavorable attitudes and can be outright unpleasant.  This attitude tends to last a lot longer in the city of Detroit, but other places can certainly feel the effects in the late winter and early spring.

Now don’t get me wrong.  We met a lot of very friendly people throughout the city.  But it was noted that a significantly higher percentage of people that we encountered had an unfriendly attitude when compared to back in November.

My friend’s sister is going to have to return to the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center for checkups every few months, and I might join them on a future trip.  Another chance to explore the city and help friends of the family get out and enjoy life again is fine by me.

Until then, the next trip out of town probably won’t be until this Fourth of July.  Lots of exploring waterfalls, boating, fireworks, and drinking are waiting, not necessarily in that order.  😉