Our trip to the airport in the wee dark hours of this cold and damp Atlanta morning was smooth and easy. I know, you're all shocked that some sort of Hager-crazy-luck-randomness did not occur! Quite possibly, this may be due to Lorra’s driving us to the airport, so we didn’t have to negotiate Marta. Once at the airport, mom and I decided to give each other early Christmas presents of travel neck pillows for our (nothing, if not extensive) flight from Chi-town to Hong Kong (HK from now on).
While waiting to board our flight to Chicago, mom and I started talking to the guy sitting next to us at the gate. He overheard us talking about how I am going to be teaching my class on Second Life while I’m in HK, and told us that he was taking classes at Emory and starting a franchise of his pizza delivery business south of ATL. I told him he should carry gluten free pizza crust, but he wasn’t very interested in that idea;-) He seemed a little surprised that I am a professor ( like everyone else who meets me in my non-school clothes). In taking off from Atlanta, we (of course) waited for a while to have our turn to take off. Gotta love Hartsfield!
After waiting so long to take off, mom and I were getting a little anxious about making our connection to HK. We kept looking at her watch and wondering how exactly we were going to make our 12:30 flight since it was already 11:45 and we were still in the air. I had visions of running through O’Hare with the mom in tow – not a pleasant image. But, when we asked the flight attendant about making our connection, the guy sitting next to us asked us if Chicago was on Central Time. We quickly both answered that indeed it was, totally missing why this information was at all important. Fortunately for us, this guy was really nice and pointed out that the time change meant that we still had another hour to catch our flight, which he was also on. Silly mommy and Lisa – telling time is so hard!
Even with the “extra” hour, we only barely made our connecting flight. The flight was already mid-way through the boarding process when we got to the gate. Mom grabbed some Mickey-D’s and on we went to longest flight known to man and womankind, as mom calls it. Once we got on the plane, we were surprised to see that our seats were in the dreaded middle section, which was most definitely not what I had selected when I booked the seats. Evidently, I should have paid more attention to the seat assignments when I checked us in online the night before. Doh! You can bet all the money you had before the stock market went crazy that I’ll be very careful about that on the way back.
Fortunately for us, the middle rows on the plane were only four people across, so, though we were in the middle of the row, there was only one person on either side of us. I have to say, though, that flying domestic airlines overseas pretty much sucks. When I flew to London four years ago on Virgin Airlines, I had my very own flat screen TV that was built into the back of the seat in front of me, so I could watch any movie or TV show that I wanted. And, they kept feeding us all the time – with really yummy food. On United, all we have to watch is one crappy projection screen at the front of the cabin, which mom cannot see and I can only barely see) that plays the usual assortment of bad airline movies. United has also been pretty skimpy in the food department. I’m glad that I had my bag of almonds and an apple to eat. However, I do totally give them props for actually having the gluten-free meals that I requested, even if they did give me salad dressing that listed flour as one of the ingredients.
The flight has been okay for me, but I think it’s been a bit hard on the mom. As many of you know, I can fall asleep anywhere fairly quickly. When we got all settled in to our seats, I took some Tylenol PM and then put on my neck pillow, earplugs, and sleep mask, and I was out for the count before take off and slept for a good seven hours. Mom, on the other hand, hasn’t really been able to sleep for more than a half an hour at a time. She also feels bad whenever she has to wake up the guy next to her to get up. I told her it’s not rude – it’s just the way it is – there’s no way for the people in the middle to get up without making the people on the end get up too. When I (finally) woke up, mom told me that she chatted with different people while I was sleeping. That’s my mom – can make friends and talk to pretty much anyone. After all, who doesn’t want a little bit of mommieness when you’re travelling:-)
As I’m writing this post, we are about an hour away from HK. I cannot wait to get off this frakking plane! Mom and I have gotten up and stretched several times, but no amount of plane-aisle yoga is going to make me feel better about being on a plane at this point. I just want to have space to lounge and real food. Mmmmm . . . Real food.
It does do me good to know that Sean and Mandy will be meeting us at the airport, which means no having to figure out how to get to our hotel after this amazingly long flight. I’ve been reading the guide book that Lorra got for me during my brief moments of awakeness, and I’m very excited about going to HK. I think it will be fascinating to visit this very different culture, not mention get the ol’ brother good and hitched (when your wedding lasts for a whole day, you’re really married, if you ask me).
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