…We stay hungry, we devour our Thanksgiving dinner!

After my pre-Thanksgiving weekend and the two days of class, Thanksgiving break has finally arrived. Last year, due to COVID-19, finals were virtual and Thanksgiving and Christmas break were merged into one long two-month break. I went home then, so I’ve never experienced Embry-Riddle during break time.

I did miss my family. To me, Thanksgiving break was a little too short and a little too late for me to want to go home- I’d be seeing my family in two weeks, and I saw them when they came to see me at the SWE conference earlier this year. The only family members I hadn’t seen were my cats, but I got plenty of pictures of them over the break, including this one, where my cat is curled up in my windowsill.

It was also really quiet here, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I did a lot of homework on Wednesday and Thursday, and also made a trip to Walmart on Wednesday. It was, as I predicted, pretty packed. I ended up getting my groceries (hopefully through winter break?), including my favorite holiday treat: eggnog. I know that “Is Eggnog Good?” is a hefty debate topic, but I’m on the side of eggnog being good.

Thursday was Thanksgiving. One of my other friends had also stayed for the break, so we decided to go to dinner at IHOP. For those on campus without access to a car, the Boundless All-You-Can-Eat dining location also does a Thanksgiving dinner on Thanksgiving Day, and from what I’ve heard, this year’s was really good. At IHOP, I ended up trying the new Winter Wonderland pancakes with blue marble-looking frosting, and they were delicious.

After IHOP, we checked FlightRadar24 and found out that a Delta flight was on final approach. So the two of us jumped in the car and tried to get to the airport’s cell phone lot to watch it come in, but we got held up by several red lights. We did end up seeing it come in as we were waiting, and it wasn’t the worst spot ever, but we couldn’t hear it well, unfortunately.

Friday was pretty uneventful too. I ended up going to Steak n Shake for a very late 9 PM dinner with the same friend, getting a chocolate milkshake. We ended up driving around Daytona for a little bit, and then around campus. It was like a ghost town- everyone was gone, and even though it was 10 PM, there were NO cars in the student union parking lot. Usually, on a weeknight, people are still doing their late-night studying, so you’d see at least a few.

We parked facing the runway, and the most unusual thing about the break was the lack of flight training going on. We were there for a decent amount of time and barely saw anyone going in and out. The flight department was officially shut down on Thanksgiving, but flight training continued on Friday. It was unusual to see maybe one ERAU plane in the entire amount of time we were sitting there.

Saturday and Sunday were also quiet. On Saturday, people started coming back from break, but the bulk of people arrived on Sunday night. By then, the halls were lively again, and I’d see people as I passed by instead of standing in a seemingly-abandoned ERAU.

Did I miss my family? Yes. Was I glad that I stayed for break? Also yes. I got caught up on a lot of my homework, and I had plenty of time to do it so I wasn’t stressed about doing it all during one short time period. I had two thermodynamics homework assignments, an essay draft, physics, and math homework to do which I all successfully did over the break.

It was also very nice to sleep in until 11 or 12 each morning and not have to worry about attending or missing classes. The break was definitely needed before the push to final exams, which are in about two weeks. The last day of finals is December 15, and I, unfortunately, have one during the last time period of the day. It’s fine, though- I’ll be studying hard over the next few weeks.

I’ll see you in the next post… and hopefully at Riddle! (We’re having a preview day and family weekend in the spring semester, so I might see you there!)