quesarah | A Memorable Christmas :\ (Reply)

Thursday AM: phone call from T's brother, informing us of a bad storm in Ohio region. Major snowfall plus ice was causing serious air traffic delays. T's mom's flight was cancelled, and as our flight to NC was routed through Cincinnati OH, we were advised to call the airlines and keep abreast of any changes. The airline said everything was under control, no changes to flights, our travel plans had not changed.

They lied. LIED LYING LIARS.

Cincinnati airport was under several feet of snow and ice. A few runways had been cleared, allowing some traffic in and out, however the actual gates had not been cleared and plane traffic in and out of the gates was crippled. As you can imagine, this was unwelcome news. After sitting on the plane about 100 yards from the gate for three hours, we were finally able to deplane. (Note: the flight from San Diego to Cincinnati was just over 4 hours.) This was obviously loads of fun, but it was made even more enjoyable by listening to the frazzled flight attendant telling her colleague that "it can't just be the weather! There must be something else going on! I can't believe they're not telling us what's going on!" Highly professional behavior from a woman who'd earlier been telling the same colleague the story of her voluntary committal to a detox program some 3 years prior. Super fun, somewhat frustrating, but we tried to take it all in stride.

Thursday PM: all flights out of Cincinnati canceled. The constant shuffling of planes from gate to gate has caused complete chaos in the baggage handling area. We are told that our checked luggage will be sent through to our final destination, we cannot take it with us that evening. We had nothing in our carryons but a few books and some trail mix, so this was unwelcome news. We tried to take it all in stride, though.

We spent 45 minutes on the phone with the airline to get rebooked on a flight the next afternoon. After securing seats, we spent another 45 minutes on the phone with most hotels in the area trying to find a bed for the night. As you can imagine, they were in short supply, but we did find one. Hurrah!

Friday AM: call from T's sister-in-law to tell us that our flight for the afternoon had been cancelled. She suggested we get a flight to another airport and they'd pick us up. We went to the airport and stood in line with the thousand other stranded passengers who all needed assistance with rebooking. Two hours later, still without having spoken to an agent, the fire alarm went off. All the weary passengers looked up, shrugged, and made no move to exit the terminal. Twenty minutes later, uniformed police informed us that we must evacuate the terminal. As you can imagine, this was unwelcome news.

Ten minutes in the freezing cold later, an announcement was made that it was a false alarm. A collective cry of "no shit" echoed in the winter air. Other than that, we tried to take it all in stride.

Another hour later, we secured tickets on the 2 o'clock flight to Raleigh Durham airport. (It was now 1:15) After racing to the gate, we saw that the flight at 2 had been rescheduled to 2:45.

It was later rescheduled to 3:10.

At 5:30 we landed in Raleigh NC. T's mom and bro picked us up at the airport and drove us the 2 hours back to Wilmington.

Saturday AM: T became sick with some mysterious bug that has affected not only her head but her stomach. (There goes Christmas dinner). I chatted with the ticket agent at the Wilmington airport who told me that all flights from Cincinnati are cancelled. They aren't expected to resume until Monday morning at 11am. As we are returning to San Diego on Monday at 6AM, this is unwelcome news. I tried to take it in stride, give the nice man our contact info and address back in San Diego, and return to T's brother's place.

Saturday PM: T's still sick. We have to go shopping tomorrow for some necessities, which include undwear and clean socks. I'm trying to take it all in stride. Right now, I think taking it in stride will involve having some more of the delicious food prepared by the family and popping open a cold beer.

God bless us, everyone.