Observations at an airport

I flew from Portland, Oregon to Phoenix, Arizona for a quick weekend trip to see my parents and to help them out with some things they needed helping out with. (They're getting old. I notice it more and more every time I see them. But that's for a different post.)

I love being in airports. You can just sit there and take in all the weirdness. But first, I get to the Economy lot Friday afternoon and it's almost completely FULL. Why? I've been there at Christmas and it wasn't that full. This was President's Day weekend. I never knew so many people traveled to celebrate George's and Abe's birthdays. Am I missing something here? I drove around for a good 5 minutes before I found a spot, and it wasn't in my usual area where I like to park. You see, there's this one place where you can park that is halfway between 2 bus shelters. You walk to the left to get on the shuttle bus at the "W" shelter, meaning it's the last one where they pick people up before heading to the terminal, but when you return after your trip, you can get off a the "B" shelter (you got it, the 2nd stop when coming into the parking lot from the terminal) and walk to your car. It's a great trick, and I'm quite sure I'm the ONLY person who has caught on to it. Yeah, right. But alas, I couldn't pull my magic this time. I had to park in "H", where you can't cheat the system. Oh well. So I got to ride the shuttle halfway through the parking lot to pick people up. There was the cute little 3 year old boy with an animal backpack who was so excited to go on his trip. He was telling everyone who would listen, "I get to fwy on da big ehpwane to Gamma's!" Then there was the lady who was headed to somewhere in Northern Alaska where it was *GULP* 45 degrees BELOW zero. She was happy that she remembered not to wear earrings this time, as apparently she had had a lobe-freezing experience last time. By the way, she said that her brother's dog sled team sleeps outside on top of their doghouses. Those are some pretty hearty huskies. But I digress. Then there was the skinny guy who had a suitcase bigger than he was and couldn't get it up onto the shelf where you're supposed to stow your luggage during the grand parking lot tour, so the female driver had to come back and hoist it up there for him. I'm quite sure everyone on our bus got a little chuckle out of that one. The guy just put his tail between his legs and sulked quietly to the back of the bus. So finally we made it to the terminal, where Alaska-lady tipped the driver. Hmmmm, I had never even given that a thought before. Now I'm going to feel guilty next time when I don't tip. Thanks, IcyLobes.

So I'm in line for security, and there's this large team of what I guessed to be 13 year olds dressed in soccer uniforms and carrying matching backpacks with embroidered names. I didn't see a whole lot of supervision and thought to myself how I'd hate to be on the same plane as them. But I didn't have too much time to ponder that thought, because I had to strip off watches, bracelets, shoes, and all my spare change and place them in a plastic bin. Isn't that fun. I'm always just a little bit scared going through the metal detector. I feel like it's going to alarm really loudly, everyone will turn to see who the terrorist is, and they'll have to strip search me right there in the security area. It never happens, but it's a fear for about 5 seconds every time I fly. So I grab a Tall-White-Chocolate-Mocha-No-Whip at Starbuck's, (You have to know the lingo or they'll ridicule you and throw you out) and proceed to my gate where, guess who's there ... the soccer team. Oh lucky me. There must have been 30 boys, and I swear I only saw 2 adults with them. But they ended up to be well behaved, so I have no complaints.

Southwest Airlines has always used the cattle stampede method of seating, although they've improved it quite a bit lately. You either get an A, B or C boarding card and they've always been numbered 1 through 60 for each group, but the numbers never meant anything. Well now they do. They have these poles with numbers on them and you have to stand relatively near your number. So instead of lining up an hour before the flight so that you can be one of the first ones on and get that coveted window seat in the exit row or whatever you like, you can now sit down until the announcement is made for you to queue up. I'm sure people cheat and stand near the 10 when they're a 40, but nobody checks so it doesn't matter. As long as you don't try to get in the A group when you're a C. If so, I'm quite sure you'd be beaten to the ground and tossed in the luggage compartment.

This post is getting too long. If you're still with me, God Bless You.

I always get to sit near the chatty Cathy. This time she was a realtor who felt the need to solicit business during the flight. Thank God I had my NotAn-iPod so she didn't hit me up, but I could still hear her talking the ear off of the guy in our row. Maybe he was in the market for a house, I don't know. They did end up exchanging numbers. Don't worry, they were both married. On second thought....

So then I get to the Phoenix airport and my Mom calls to ask what terminal I'm at. Well, I have no idea so I ask the rental car lady. I'm at Terminal 4, I tell them. Mom says they're at terminal 1, then I hear Dad say no, we're at 2. Mom says but this is the first terminal we came to! Dad gently reminds her that there IS no terminal 1. Hmmm. So finally they find me and we're off. We had a great visit during which I fixed their indoor/outdoor remote sensing thermometer, their answering machine, the ringers on their cordless phones, their squeaky faucet knobs, called their Internet Service Provider and straightened out some issues, installed a printer/copier/scanner/fax machine that they did NOT need but insisted on buying a couple weeks before I came, and used a special drill bit to drill a screw hole in the brick to hang a painting. Whew! And I was only at their house for 45 hours.

I'm getting tired of typing so I'll make the return trip shorter. (Ok, I heard you all applauding)

So I get in line for security in what appears to be the shortest line. Yeah, that never works. The x-ray machine lady was as slow as molasses in, well, February. People in the longer lines got through much faster than I did. Isn't that always the way. But I had gotten there plenty early, so I just went with it. At my gate, they had a high table, like a bar, where you could sit and plug in your electronic items as well as your computer into a USB port. So I decided to take advantage of that service and charge my cell phone. There weren't a whole lot of chairs so I sat at one right next to this bar thingy. Well, a guy comes by a few minutes later, digs out his laptop, and he's eyeing the bar, eyeing me, looking back and forth and I'm wondering what the heck. Then he asks me if I would mind moving so that he can plug in his laptop and sit in the chair instead of a barstool because he has a bad back. What?? That takes nerve. So the lady next to me was nice enough to move over one (nobody asked her to) so that I could move over one and the ballsy guy could sit down and compute in comfort. He gets everything all plugged in, and I said "I wonder how many people are going to trip over that cord." Because the cord was laying across the floor right where people enter the gate area. He politely chuckles, then lays his laptop on the chair while he goes to throw something away, and sure enough, a couple walks by and I watch her stilletto heal catch the cord and nearly pull the laptop to the floor. I was nice enough to grab it before it fell, although part of me wanted to see it go flying across the room. The guy then says, "Yeah, maybe you're right" (Ya think?!?) and moves to the bar area where he shoulda been in the first place. I moved back to my original seat so as to be closer to my cell phone. Later I sneaked a peek to see what was so damn important. It was a friggin' GAME! He caused a near-miss stilletto vs. laptop fatality so he could play a GAME. It takes all kinds.

This was cute. On the plane I sat next to a lady and her 5 year old daughter. I was in the aisle seat and the daughter was in the middle, so I talked to her quite a bit. (I'd rather talk to her than the realtor lady!) The flight was fairly late at night, so the girl ended up falling asleep with her head in Mom's lap. Not long after, her legs ended up being draped over my legs. I just smiled at the mom and mouthed it's ok. I thought it was cute.

I walked in my house at 12:15 am and had to get up at 6:00 am. I thought I'd be tireder (is that a word?) but I wasn't. And I still went to the gym that night! Yay for me!