Journey Here

For the most part, the trip here this time was okay and mostly uneventful. However, I have learned that having 3 or more hours of waiting to do at any one stop is like Hell. I will have to avoid flights with overly long layovers next time.

The last flight came after what was scheduled as a 4 hour layover. However, my flight from Chicago to Toronto was early and then a weather front in SJ caused my flight to be delayed from a takeoff of 9:55pm to 10:40pm. With the time change going to AST, I was already supposed to land at 12:45am, so this delay was pushing me back to nearly a 2 am arrival time. And then, when  they finally announced what was going on (I had gone up and spoken with someone at the desk, which is why I knew about the delay and what was going on and found out the chances were "poor" they could get us to SJ), they said that they were thinking about taking off, seeing if the weather cleared as they traveled to SJ, and then landing at Quebec City if it was not clearing enough to land for refueling and "further consideration." Er, excuse me? You want to take off, hope that you have a place you can land, and then turn around and land in a much smaller city, with fewer hotels and other options for our continued travel? If the runway in SJ didn't clear, they even said they might then fly us back to Toronto from Quebec City later that night. Ugh!

I determined that if the chances of the runway didn't improve, then I would opt out of this marry-go-round and find the hotel that M had researched for me and just try again in the morning (Toronto had an 8 am flight that would get me to SJ by just shy of 11 am AST). However, the next announcement, over an hour and a half later and very nearly the time we should have been boarding the plane was that we were waiting a bit longer, and that they chances of getting through to SJ were "fair." I told M I was going to risk it and get on; I'd speak with her whenever/wherever I landed-- hopefully in SJ at 2 am.

This flight was uneventful and we did manage to land in SJ early in the morning. M had driven the borrowed Aztek, which has either all-wheel or four-wheel drive over the icy roads to come get me, nearly spinning out of control once along the way. We took a different path back, took it slowly, and she got me home safely.

Sunday we spent a lazy day at home adjusting to having me here. The snow outside is pretty thick-- I'd say close to a foot on the unshoveled and unplowed areas. We shoveled the driveway and back porch a bit so M could go to work on Monday.

The time shift struck me last night/this morning-- I had trouble falling asleep until after 2 am and am very tired this morning. It always takes me a little while to adjust either way. But we are hitting our routine and happy to be together.