Thursday, September 25, 2014

There's No Place Like Home--Again

Promptly at 7:30, a cab showed up at Jeri & Phil's house, and we all went outside for the goodbyes and off to the airport.  It was sad to say goodbye, but I was ready to come home.

As we left and started to get into the rush hour traffic, I noticed that the leaves were starting to turn a vivid color.  It will be weeks before they are at "peak" but it was nice to get this preview.

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The cabbie quoted us $40 for the ride to the airport, saying it would depend on traffic, and then he proceeded to weave in and out of back roads and by the time we reached the airport, our bill was only $34.50.

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He had a conservative radio station talk show on, and the callers were all attacking Obama.  The cabbie said something about he didn't know about Obama.  He said "I guess he might be a nice person."  I said "I think  he's a nice person."  He said "Well, I guess we have to disagree..." and then he turned off the radio station.

We walked through the front door of Logan airport and a guy at the United counter, seeing me with my cane, immediately asked if I would like a wheelchair and when I hesitated he pointed out it was a long walk to the gate so, heck, yeah!  He stamped my boarding pass and sent me to sit down and wait for someone to help me.

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A very nice lady from Ethiopia (whose name started with "G") gathered all of our papers and IDs and rushed us through Security, pushing everybody aside and even unpacking my computer for the screening.  Then she took us to the gate where she settled me into the disabled seat for pre-boarding.  I dunno if I was taking advantage of the system or not, but I was sure happy for her assistance and for knowing we would get to board first.

We had 2 hours to wait because we had arrived so early, so we had breakfast and then, just before the plane boarded, Walt took his last chance to get some of that Boston clam chowda.

FootPlanejpg.jpg (126415 bytes)When we were all crammed into our seats, Walt and I had aisle seats opposite each other.   The woman sitting next to me made herself comfortable and spread her stuff out all over the floor.  Now I'm the last one to criticize spreading and cluttering, but I did draw the line at her relaxing with her right leg across her knee and resting her dirty flip flop and her bare foot on my knee!

Naturally I took a picture and then posted it to Facebook before we had to turn off our electronic devices.

Not one to complain, I did finally get up the nerve to ask her to move her foot. Other people's feet kind of creep me out anyway and I did not relish having that woman's foot in my lap for the flight.

She responded somewhat icily that she didn't realize what she was doing and I thought she sounded like a real bitch, but fortunately, as the flight went on (and there was no repeat of the foot-in-lap incident), I discovered she really was quite nice, though she got up so many times!  It's always a big production for me to haul my body out of the plane seat and it seemed I had to keep doing it over and over again.

However, I can't really complain because Walt had two guys sitting next to him who got up continually.  He may have spent more time letting them out of their seats than he did actually sitting in his seat with his seat belt fastened.

Despite a delayed departure time, we arrived in San Francisco on time, happy to see black clouds rolling down the hills (supposedly the first rain of the season will hit the Bay area tonight...not sure it will move far enough to give Davis a much needed drink, but any water is welcome!)

Walt was trying to rush home to get to a 5:30 meeting, but though we managed to avoid as much traffic as possible, the backups were just too much and by the time he would get to the meeting in Woodland, it would be just ending.  Besides, he's been in transit for hours and was exhausted.

So we are home, my laundry is finishing up, tomorrow I have to visit my mother and pick up her laundry and then work at Logos.  The week just past already seems like a dream, but such lovely memories.  But now I'm going to go climb under a Chihuhua and get some sleep.  It's 3 a.m. Boston time.

2 comments:

Harriet said...

Just a memory? It's a good thing you took pictures. 8-)

Mary Z said...

Glad you had such a good trip. We're hoping to see some fall color next week.