Cleveland Rocks!

On Friday night as we sat at the gate for our flight to Ohio and waited to board the plane, Jose, Nick, Heather and I managed to offend nearly everyone in the area with the following:

“Why are we going to Cleveland again? Is there anything good about Cleveland? Oh well, at least we’re getting the hell out of Texas…”

However, after an absolutely fantastic 48 hours, I’m happy and a little bit surprised to report that the song is actually true — Cleveland does rock!

We flew in on Friday night and spent the late evening hours hanging out in the breakfast area at the Holiday Inn Express. Not the most auspicious start to the weekend, but it was all we had. Saturday morning came bright and early with a return to the breakfast area for cinnamon rolls and coffee. It turns out that not a single one of the four of us is really that much of a morning person, and we sat at breakfast for an hour trying to wake up.

We headed downtown in search of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. As we arrived, we realized that the museum was right next to a small airport right on Lake Erie that happened to be hosting the Cleveland National Air Show all weekend! Very exciting. There was a balcony at the Hall of Fame where we were able to sit down and watch the aerobatic performances for a little while — we could see the end of the runway without a problem. It was a great view.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame turned out to be really cool. I had pictured just a bunch of signed guitars, but the whole place was very well done. Someone (and probably many someones) obviously put a lot of time and effort into getting that place going, because the amount of items that they have in their collection was really impressive. Yes, there were lots of guitars, but there were also tons of other items. The red jacket that Michael Jackson wore in the “Thriller” video. A sheet of paper with Aerosmith’s lyrics to “Walk This Way,” along with plenty of other lyrics scrawled on paper by other musicians. Costumes from various tours and music videos — Madonna is one skinny woman, judging from her clothes. John Lennon’s report cards and doodles. Bono’s first guitar. Receipts from Elvis’s hotel stays. Johnny Cash’s tour bus. Pieces of the plane that crashed, killing Otis Redding. Plenty of stations with headphones to listen to music, and huge displays of tour posters, CD covers, album art, and photographs.

Sadly, photos weren’t allowed, but it was a great museum, and I’d highly recommend a visit if you find yourself in Cleveland. We were only able to stay for a couple hours, and we could’ve stayed for more. I mean, we didn’t even see the actual Hall of Fame exhibit, which was a movie and multimedia presentation! But we did see the Thriller jacket, so, you know, priorities.

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and MuseumWe had to leave the museum a bit early because we had to find a mall. Why, you might ask, did we need to find a mall? Well, Nick managed to leave Houston with only the shoes on his feet. Which were old worn out sneakers. Which probably wouldn’t have gone very well with the nice pants, dress shirt, and tie he brought to wear to the wedding. We set out on foot to find a mall called The Galleria that was a short walk away. We found the mall, but it was strangely empty for a Saturday afternoon. Most of the stores were closed, and the whole thing looked slightly abandoned. One of the few people in sight was working in an art store, and she recommended that we try Tower City Center, an 8-10 minute walk farther from where we’d left our car. It was 2:00. The wedding was at 4:00.

Off we went. We arrived at the mall, which was much more of a mall than the first place, and Nick was able to find some shoes at Payless while Jose and I went off to search for a black belt. (Jose had forgotten his, which was funny enough but paled in comparison to Nick’s forgotten shoes.) The only ones we found were at Brooks Brothers, and they were $88. Needless to say, Jose went to the wedding without a belt. We speed-walked back through downtown and got to the car at 2:40. Nick drove like a Texan and got us back to the hotel right at 3:00. We calculated that we needed to leave by 3:30 to make it to the wedding with some time to spare, and we hurried into our respective rooms to iron, primp, and get dressed. We were back in the car at 3:35 and headed to the chapel, which was about 8 miles away.

It was a nerve-wracking drive, but we knew we’d make it. It would have really sucked to have come all the way to Ohio only to miss the actual wedding ceremony. We finally turned the corner onto the chapel’s street and breathed a sigh of relief. The chapel was only a quarter mile down the road, and we could see the steeple. And that’s when we saw the train.

Just before the chapel, a train was crossing the road. We could see the steeple of the chapel just beyond the train tracks. It was so close, and yet so far. We came to a stop behind at least 10-15 cars backed up in front of us, and the fact that there were so many cars ahead of us reassured us that the train had probably been passing for a while, and would end soon. It was 3:51.

But the train kept going, and going. It was 3:54, then 3:57. The clock clicked to 3:59, and then 4:00. Panic set in.

“This is unbelievable!”

“This is the longest train in the entire world!”

“I can see the freaking steeple!”

“Melissa is going to absolutely kill us!”

At 4:01, a second train appeared. A second train. There were two sets of tracks, and while the first train continued to slowly pass, a freaking second train joined the fray. At 4:02, the first train finally ended, but the second train was still passing.

“You have got to be kidding me!”

“I cannot believe there are two trains!”

“I’m going to throw up.”

“Melissa is going to kill us and then revive us, just to kill us again!”

At 4:04, the second train finally ended. We had sat in the car for the longest 13 minutes of my life watching two trains pass between us and the wedding chapel.

Jose watches the never-ending train s-l-o-w-l-y passWe parked and ran across the street to the chapel. Thankfully, we were not the only guests stuck behind the train, as there were at least a dozen others running across the street with us, and the ushers and grandparents were gathered at the front of the chapel laughing at the absurdity of it all. They, of course, had been able to see the train as well (apparently the train passing lasted for 16 minutes all in all), and the wedding was postponed by 15 minutes to let everyone arrive.

The ceremony was lovely, and afterwards we blew bubbles as the newlyweds came out of the chapel to board a limo bus bound for the reception. Melissa’s “aunt” made this amazing piece of artwork that was posted on the back of the bus, a drawing of Matt and Melissa and all sorts of things significant to them and to their lives. It was really cool.

Jose, Nick, Heather and I wandered down the street from the wedding chapel to check out a covered bridge and small park and decided that Cleveland really wasn’t so bad after all. We drove to the reception past lovely houses and tall trees and green fields and started to realize why Melissa likes Ohio so much.

The reception was held at a country club. The hors d’oeuvres were tasty, dinner was fabulous, and the reception was one of the most fun that I’ve ever attended. The DJ did a great job on song selection (maybe Matt and Melissa helped) and everything was perfect for dancing. Maybe it was the open bar with much joked about “top shelf liquor,” or maybe it was the fact that we knew we’d never see any of those people again except Melissa, Matt, Kelly and John, but we danced like crazy. We even got Jose and Nick to join the crowd! Each time any of us tried to sit down for a breather, Kelly would appear to pull us back in. At midnight, the DJs finally wound things up, but people lingered for another 20 minutes. I figure that’s the sign of a good reception — when people stay even after the music stops.

Jose and me at the receptionWe didn’t even get to sleep in the next morning, since we were off to Melissa’s house at 11:00 for lunch with the family, bridal party, and other out of town guests. It was great, but we could only stay for an hour. From there we headed back downtown to see Indians take on the White Sox at Jacobs Field.

The weather was absolutely gorgeous the entire weekend, and it was pure heaven sitting at the baseball game under the shade of the upper deck’s awning, feeling the breeze off the lake and watching some baseball. The air show was still going on, and the Air Force Thunderbirds highlighted the show during the 8th inning of the game. We could see them in formation as they flew around downtown to do their stunts over the lakefront airport. Every so often, one of the planes would fly past such that the shadow crossed the baseball field, which was just too cool.

At one point, the crowd in the upper deck of left field started to shout and cheer. The Indians were losing 8-0 at that point and there wasn’t much to cheer about, so we were confused for an instant — and then the roar of 6 F-16s shook the stadium as they flew directly overhead, the shadows of 6 military jets streaking across the outfield grass. I’m sure it was hell on the pitchers to concentrate amidst all the engine noise, but it was awesome for the crowd.

We had such a great time in less than 48 hours that it was almost sad to have to drive from the stadium to the airport. I’m now officially sorry that I ever made fun of Cleveland.

I put a set of photos on Flickr, and you can enjoy them here as well.