We were having dinner when the flashes of lightning started.

Though early August, it was still technically the rainy season in Tamarindo, Costa Rica. Verdant, lush foliage surrounded our rented mansion of a house. The 18 of us were there to celebrate Kameron’s 30th birthday — or so we thought —  and it was our first night together as a complete group. Three sides of the giant kitchen/dining/living area in the house had expansive panoramic folding glass walls that we left open during the rain. There was enough overhang that we did not get wet.

Looking out over one of the two infinity pools towards the beach at Casa Alang Alang, our rented house in Tamarindo, Costa Rica.

The lightning’s pace became quicker and its menace deeper. Water poured off of the Tahitian-style roof of the house, some into one of the house’s several “infinity” pools, and some careening down the hill towards the beach a few hundred meters away. Soon, the sky was almost continuously lit by white flashes, and the closest ones were only a fraction of a Mississippi ahead of their stout BANGs.

I was sitting with Kameron, Casey, and Kyle, and we were enjoying the fruits of the house’s chef’s labors. Naturally, the discussion centered on Nature’s show and its ramifications. “At least the power hasn’t gone out,” Kameron observed.

Five seconds later, the power went out.

In theory, the house was supposed to have a standby generator for exactly such occasions. In practice, it did have a generator — but it refused to start. Candles were lit; ice cream was served. The lightning was all the more impressive when it had no meaningful competition from artificial lights.

Several hours later, the storm died down and the electricity came back.

Over the next week, we went surfing several times at the break in front of Tamarindo, lounged around the pools, and explored the area.  Costa Rica seemed relaxed whether we were in tourist traps or far away from any signs in English.

One exception was a delivery truck we encountered while driving back from Playa Negra to Tamarindo. The dirt road was narrow, rutted, and deeply potholed. We seldom exceeded 40 km/h in our rented Land Cruiser, but this guy seemed to be doing double that. He was all over the road; sometimes in his lane, sometimes in the oncoming lane, sometimes hugging the very edge of the shoulder. At first it seemed random, perhaps even suicidal, but gradually it became apparent that he was driving with intent. His route cleverly avoided the road’s faults, and his journey was much smoother than our own.

The biggest surprise of the trip came the morning of our second full day.

I got out of bed around sunrise and stumbled upstairs to the kitchen, half asleep and making a beeline for the coffee pot. Before I could get there, Casey and Kameron handed me a card in an envelope. “Should I open this now?” I asked, and they gave a warm response in the affirmative. The card told the story: the theme of the day was not to be a birthday celebration, as we had been expecting, but rather, a wedding! Instantly, I was awake; happiness is a powerful stimulant. I gave my congratulations to the two of them with a smile.

After spending the morning sailing on an 80ft schooner, including a stop for playing in the water in a secluded cove, we returned home for the lovely, simple, gracious, poolside wedding ceremony. In hindsight, I suppose a wedding made sense, since both sets of parents for the grooms were part of the group of 18, as was a grandmother, an aunt and uncle, a brother, and a close family friend — plus all of us who were the grooms’ more direct peers.

A delicious multi-course dinner followed, and joy abounded. A celebration of good living, past, present, and future.

Spring is in the air. The sun is shining, the snow is melting, and the jackets are resting in the closets. It reached 48 degrees at my house today, two degrees shy of a record, and the temperature got me thinking about my plans for the summer.

The high-level list goes something like this:

• Convert my easy button into a magic 8-ball easy button
• Bike at least 1000 miles
• Attend some type of goalie camp or lessons
• Backpack Isle Royale for about five days
• Backpack on the Superior Hiking Trail a couple of times during weekend excursions

The last two items on the list hint at what’s been on my mind this weekend. Visits to Philmont and the BWCA sealed my love of the outdoors when I was younger, and I want to re-engage in those activities while I’m still able. There are few things more relaxing than being out on the trail in a forest, beyond the reach of cell phones and the Internet, with everything required for survival strapped to one’s back.

I’ve had some bad flight experiences in the past, but at least I always ended up at my destination. A woman on my San Luis Obispo to Phoenix flight today wasn’t so lucky.

Most of the sparsely occupied flight was uneventful, save for the flight attendant in training making a poor go of the announcements. I relaxed by polishing off a few more chapters of Founders at Work while occasionally glancing out the window at the mountainous landscape. Everything seemed perfectly fine for everybody on board until the flight attendant announced our pending arrival at Sky Harbor.

“What?!” screamed a woman from two rows behind me. “Why are we landing in Phoenix?” Obviously, the flight was landing in Phoenix because the flight was from San Luis Obispo to… Phoenix. The increasingly flustered woman called for a flight attendant and demanded to know why the plane wasn’t landing in Las Vegas. The source of the confusion became apparent after the flight attendant looked at the woman’s boarding pass stub.

“Well, here’s the problem,” he said, “this flight goes to Phoenix, and your ticket is for a different flight that was supposed to go to Las Vegas. Not only that, but this is an America West flight, and your ticket is for United.” That’s right: the woman got on the wrong flight. I’m not sure which is worse: the fact that she flew to the wrong city or the fact that nobody noticed.

Fortunately, there are many flights from Phoenix to Las Vegas, so I’m sure her trip had a happy ending.  She also learned a valuable lesson: I doubt she’ll ever get on a future flight without triple-checking both her ticket and the plane.

12:15 pm – My phone rings.

Me: “Jeff speaking.”

Other person: “I’m just calling to confirm your flight to San Luis Obispo for 5:00 today.”

Me: “Wha… I’m flying where? Today?!?”

 So, yeah, I found out that I was flying to San Luis Obispo, California less than five hours before the plane departure.  Got to love last-minute business travel.  The real miracle is that my luggage made it to my destination plane during my 15-minute layover in Phoenix.