The Trip Home

Well, this was left a bit late, but here it is.....

Left the house a bit after 1030am 21 Dec for the Honolulu airport for the trip back to Seattle. (My son lives less than 5 mins away from the HNL airport) Got through checking in my bag, paying the $15 to check it, getting my seat assignment, all the usual etc. Got through security, they didn't even blink at all the yarn and Addi Turbo's, and went to get a cup of coffee and a danish and a bottle of water.

Sat down at gate 58 and started to knit. At 12pm they made an annoucement. Gate changed to gate 31. Gate 31 is the farthest gate away from gate 58 that it is possible to go, minus 3. The gates go up to 60 in the wing that I was in. to get to the lower numbered gates you have to hoof it quite a distance. So pack up the knitting and start walking ..... got to the new gate at 12:30ish. Long hot walk. While waiting to board the news about the plane in Denver is being shown.. Lovely.

Anyhow, get on board, get my carry ons stowed and turn to sit in my seat 26G. There is a bag in the seat that wasn't there when I was putting my yarn under the chair; I assume the young fellow that put his bag there is waiting for me to get out of the way so that he can get to the middle seat. Nope. His boarding pass has him in the same seat as me. Hmm... and... HE IS NOT MOVING THANK YOU VERY MUCH. THIS IS HIS SEAT. We discuss it with a stewardess (there was a flight that was cancelled (HIS) and the pax have been put on our flight). She had me move to another seat since he was loud and vocal about his refusal to move, 3 rows up and in the next section. No problem, still an isle seat. I'm not going to complain. Little irritated about his attitude, but... I have a seat and it is an isle so it is all good. I had nice seat companions too. A lady from Eugene, OR and a fellow from Tacoma on the other isle seat. (we were in the center isle)

Got to SeaTac on time (9:10pm) give or take 5 mins. Snow. Lots of Snow. We are on the ground but stopped. Not moving to the terminal. Snow plows... have to plow us a way to the terminal First they tell us 15 mins. Ok, fine, no problem. I call my ride at the cell phone parking lot and tell them it will be a few mins probably. My ride has just pulled into the cell phone lot. Cool! Told her that I would call back as soon as I had my bags. As soon as I got off the phone, the Pilot comes on the intercom and says that the delay will mostlikely be another 45 mins. And so we wait. Then, we have a delay because they don't know what gate that we are going to get to go to. Mind you it is now well past 10pm and we are still on the plane. Finally they get the plane up to the drawbridge thingy. They can't get it all the way to the plane so there is a bit of a gap. And it is icy. Lots of people are grumbling. I am just glad we are on the ground and safely at the terminal. Get down to baggage claim. It is now about 10:45pm. Still snowing outside off and on. Get to Hawaiian's bag carousel;. Wait. Wait. Wait some more. Nothing new about the waiting ... heck, we have been waiting since 9 pm. Finaly a bag or two starts to show up. Then the carousel stops. About 5 mins later it starts back up and for the next 20 mins everthing is good. bags are starting to show up, slowly it's true but they are begining to show. Yea it is only a bit after 11:30pm and we should all be getting out of here soon. Right? Not so fast.... When there are still about 50 of us left standing around the carousel it grinds to a halt and this time it doesn't start back up in 5 mins. Not so good. Eventually we go enmass to the Hawiian bag agent... Poor, poor lady. It is Late, people are cranky and they want their stuff. She gets on the phone as she is clueless to why there are so many without baggage. She thought that all the baggage pods had been brought up and unloaded already. Her conversation with the ground crew: Is the plane empty? (yes it is.) Did some stuff get left behind in Hawaii because of the gate change? (No, all the pods made it.) Ok, then why do I have a crowd of people here with out their luggage? (Oh... Well a pod is stuck in the snow. We should have the bags there in about 15 mins.) Bag Agent Lady wants to know why she wasn't informed of this and who was the idiot that got it stuck in the snow? (She looks like she wants to rip someone a new one) Alright, so word is that the bags will be here in the terminal in about 15 mins. Ummm... It's after Midnight and still no bags. 15 mins? Someone can't tell time. 12:30 still no bags. One of the fellows from our plane said to the bag agent that he could probably get a group of pax together and go fetch our bags quicker. (He may have been correct) Another anouncement... Bags should really be here in 10 more minutes. Um yeah right. Ain't no body holding their breath. Finally got my bag off the carousel at 1:10. Called my ride who has been waiting at the cell phone lot all this time bless her heart, and let her know that we were (Finally) ready to roll. Knitting kept me sane through all the waiting around.

Did I mention that it was snowy out? Got home about 2:40ish; I had to go to work in a few hours. What a treat. Alarm clock set for 4:30am, so just stayed up and toughed it out. Went to bed at 5pm and slept for 12 hours. About 5 mins late for work the next day. I had hit my alarm off and went right back to sleep.

Oh, and Happy New Year Everyone!

I plan to Knit in the New Year... if I can stay awake that long.