An hour prior to my flight, all keyed up to go, nervous, excited and I will admit, slightly terrified; I kissed the kiddos and the BFF goodbye and went through security. Or tried to anyway….I thought I had gotten all the metal off, but no, I forgot my belt. Then, I forgot my keys and tin of Burt’s Bees lip balm. Then, I forgot my iPod. Finally, I got through the detector…only to get nabbed for random security screening. This was simple, I had to let them run a cloth over my hands and scan them for chemicals. This is humorous because the only chemicals I mess with are used to clean the bathroom and, to be honest, that doesn’t happen very often. While I am glad that there is so much security, leave it to me to get caught for random additional security. I am the most innocuous woman in the world. I’ve seen COPS way too many times to screw this up.
Remember how I said an hour before my flight? Yeah, not so much. My flight was nearly an hour late, eating up my one hour layover to my connecting flight and though I ran with all my might,not a small feat in my current physical condition, when I got to my gate to board my flight from Houston to London, it had been gone for five minutes. To say this put a damper on my plans is a small thing.
Let’s just talk about the complicated process of rebooking all new flights. You wouldn’t think it would be very complicated, but I booked through Cheap Tickets (hey, it was cheap) and when you book with them, if you miss one flight they cancel the rest. This includes your return tickets. Another lovely complication is that my flight out of London is on another airline so the follow-on airline had to be contacted in order to guarantee me a seat. Well, Egyptair was closed. So we rebooked all my flights aside from the flight from London to Cairo and then the returning flight from Cairo to London.
Good news, kinda, I got a discounted rate on an airport hotel with a shuttle that still cost me over $70, but hey what’s $70 when you only have $1000 and you have to buy textbooks, right? On top of this, I had to buy the meal that was going to be served on the flight I missed. Thankfully, there was a Jason’s Deli (can we say pastrami and rye, Hello!). Enough about how broke I am.
If you are going to stay at an airport hotel, Econolodge is pretty okay. I got a non-smoking room on the ground floor and was expecting a dive where I wouldn’t want to turn off the lights and I would need to sleep on top of the blankets. What I got was a large very clean room with a king sized bed. There was a slightly separated space with a couch, coffee table, and a small table set up as a desk. The room had a large television, a microwave, a refrigerator and a teeny tiny coffee pot (the only improvement needed; a larger coffee pot. The restroom was very clean and spacious as well. Seriously though, even if it had been a dive, there was a Jason’s Deli in walking distance, enough said.
I woke up, well woke up would be extremely inaccurate, because I was too stressed out to sleep, but I finally got out of bed and went to the lobby to partake of the continental breakfast. I don’t know how any one else sees it, but I have always thought it should be called the the prepackaged, been here awhile breakfast. I enjoyed two pieces of toast with strawberry jelly, a cup of coffee, a tiny bowl of raisin bran ( I had forgotten how yummy that is) and a donut from Officer Donut (love the name, the mascot: a donut dressed as a cop.) Oh, I also had three more little cups of coffee.
After checking my Facebook, I packed up and took the shuttle back to the airport where I made it through security on the first try. Woo Hoo! I went to the desk where I had been helped the night prior and everything was situated. I have flights and my bag should (fingers crossed) end up in Cairo at the same time I do. The only big negative is that I will be missing the first day of orientation at AUC.
So, here I sit. Near a huge window in the concourse food court. I have just enjoyed a way too expensive but oh so delicious Greek salad and small portion of chicken ziti salad and yet another (this time large) cup of coffee. I got lucky and found an organic restaurant/kiosk which when compared with other places was equally expensive so I went the yummy, veggie route. I really enjoyed that salad, it may become a new staple in my food regimen. This cup of coffee is equally phenomenal. I have to wonder though; would the bottom of the pot, found at a truck stop, may have been there for a week cup of coffee taste just as good considering how tired I am? Like the tootsie pop owl says, “the world may never know.”
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