9:00pm Wednesday November 23 – Snow falling. Plane de-icing. Hum …
11:45 pm, land in Atlanta, 11:46 pm board new flight to Tampa, 11:51 pm, push back from gate. 2:15am, declare to self never travel again on thanksgiving Wednesday. Grr.
9:40am Thursday November 24, Thanksgiving Day declare to self and swear to never go anywhere but Florida for T-day. Am riding bicycle thru beautiful, peaceful neighbourhoods, getting fresh air in lungs and sun on my face.
Flight 1010, scheduled to depart Tampa at 7:02pm. Marc and his parents left me at the Delta departures drop-off at exactly 4pm Sunday. Praising myself for being early and prepared with only a carry-on, I checked myself in at the patron-empowering self check-in kiosk and got my little boarding pass and felt oh so great. I was going home. To see my kitties. Departures board still reads ‘On Time’. I bought some extremely tacky Florida paraphernalia for the family back home, got a burger at BurBur Ding and checked the departures board one more time.
Oh-Shit moment numero uno: Flight 1010 delayed until 8:30. Have connection in Atlanta at 9:35. Definite conflict. Security is a non-event. I was so flustered throwing my 37 pound suitcase onto the x-ray belt; the guard pointed me in the direction of the Bacardi Bar. (Note to self: don’t be so transparent) I rush to gate 62 because if all the delays will make me miss my connection, I’ll just go back to Sarasota with the K-family since they dropped me off extra early just to get to the hockey game!!! (Read: sad and lonely stacy, cold and bored sandy, boyishly-adorably-happy marc, calmly happy gary) Actually, I was quite pleased to have the time alone and to be early and not worry at all about crowds. And, did I mention, I did a little shoppin’.
Gate 68 nobody, Gate 66 nobody, Gate 64 – holy mother of hell, fifty people in line, very unhappy. Gate 62 – “Ah…” The gods of travel are just assuming the shit squatting position. I am the fourth in line. Male Delta gate attendant says to me and man in front of me, “Sorry, I’m too busy, go to another gate.” Yep! Go away. I’m too busy with my two people here. Man in front of me and me, rush over to gate 65, conveniently located very far away. This plane is just boarding its last passengers to New York. However, this is the only available and still sane Delta employee in the E terminal. Stand there dumb-like for 20 minutes. Gate attendant who is largely pregnant says must pee and will return momentarily. Well, the flush suction on Tampa toilets must be phenomenal, 'cause she never returned. May your child be born with long fingernails and attempt to grab on. New gate attendant appears and man in front of me and me ask him to just answer a few questions for us because crappy employee told us to go away. All we want to know is … can we make connections? Both of us, yes. More or less.
Cool person numero uno: Matt. Matt is a sophomore at GW. He interns at the White House, is in PKE, from Clearwater, Florida and we had a fun, reminiscent I went to your college sort of talk. Am old. This kid is in college, and I USED to be there, and what the hell am I doing now? Whoa.
Buy magazines. Read magazines. Check monitor. Repeat.
Oh Shit moment numero dos: Eventually get on plane. Have aisle seat. Man next to me looks up at me sadly. Seat 12B is a big puddle as overhead is dripping into seat cushion. WTF?! Humph.
I very calmly got a flight attendant who graciously gave me three blankets, one of which was wrapped in plastic. Man next to me actually assisted and put plastic directly onto wet seat, and three blankets on top assured that my ass would be warm for the next week. Meanwhile … I examine the overhead bin and find a very wet backpack. I remove it from the bin and announce to a very uninterested and pissed off crowd, “Whose is this?” Ever have one of those moments when you hear your own voice speaking but simultaneously you know that no one else can actually hear you? Family across aisle claims bag and attributes leak to faulty fake-Nalgene water bottle. No apology. No comment. No surprise. Lots of not caring and lots of rudeness. I refuse to put said backpack back into bin, as it is small and belong under seat. Man in row ahead of me assists in getting my suitcase to the overhead. Flight attendant brings me large stack of paper towels as we attempt to jam three inches of absorbent cloth into a gushing geyser about a quarter of an inch wide. Dripping water begins to drip brown. Am wearing new fleece pant-suit. In WINTER-WHITE. I thank the man next to me, laugh. Get congratulations on calm demeanour from passenger behind. Secretly thank drug that is the Florida sunshine. Upon take-off, geyser returns and starts to drip on my head. Cool person numero dos: Man next to me (later identified as “Steve”) assists in creating umbrella of airline-grade napkins over my head. We curse the family responsible and give dirty look. Still, no comment from them.
Here is remnant of drip-stained tissue, you know, for proof, and sympathy:
The leak continued, but it broke the ice into a great conversation I had. Steve works for FEMA. An independent contractor doing work for FEMA. In New Orleans. He has pictures. He has seen it all. He has been there for three months. He is going back. Poor Steve, little did he know I am a sucker for natural-disaster recovery stories in intense detail. Please send good karma to Steve in seat 12A. Steve offers to send me some of his pictures. Am happy. Drink a coke, with rum. Feel better. Curse family across aisle and laugh at complete lack of all social graces. Think to self “have excellent material for insipid blog writing.”
Get on connection to DC. With home totally in sight, my next and final seat partner, enter Cool Person Numero Tres is a man about my Dad’s age. His son, (and this is where Marc goes totally APE) is the strength and conditioning coach for … the Pittsburgh Steelers. We talk football. He borrows and reads my new Rachael Ray cooking magazine. We talk about cooking. Nice man.
1:03am Monday November 28, home. Attacked by lonely and sexually charged cats. Proceed to unpack completely. 2:35am, get in bed2:36am, asleep6:30am, alarm goes off7:30am, get out of bed.
