After waking on Friday morning from a dream in which I arrived late to the airport and had to run to catch my plane, I headed into town to buy a new battery ($69.99) and earpiece ($19.99) for my cell phone and a new portable CD player ($49.99). Mein Vater had given me $100 the night before just because, and it went a long way to the purchase of these necessities. Yes, a portable CD player is a necessity as it gives me focus during those late night anxiety attacks. Returned home to discover the earpiece wouldn't work with my phone -- contrary to the word of the Radio Shack salesman. Mom went back to town and found an earpiece exactly like mine at the Alltel store, and we threw away the old one. Remember that.
About 2:15 we started loading the van and headed for the airport. My plane didn't start loading until 3:57, so we had plenty of time to get there, check my suitcase, go to the bathroom, and get something to eat. Arrived at the airport, and while Mom parked the van one of my attendants called. I put on my new earpiece and attempted to call her back. It didn't work. WTF??? Then to make things better, we must have entered a time blackhole somewhere. As I was standing in line to check my bag and get my boarding passes (which took fracking forever because of my wheelchair -- yes I know I get on the plane first, yes I know I sit in the bulkhead seat, my batteries are sealed, I need a transfer, blah blah blah), I looked up at the clock and was astonished (actually, mortified) to see it read 3:44. I still had to pee and get through security, but forget eating. Ran to the bathroom, peed, called attendant while peeing, and ran to security. The woman who felt me up (frisked) took her dear sweet time, then we ran for the gate all the way at the end of the terminal -- all to find out the plane was delayed. At first I breathed a sigh of relief and ate some nachos, but as more and more time passed I became worried. I had a little over an hour between flights in Dallas -- was I going to miss the NOLA plane?
Turns out our plane was delayed because of nasty weather in Dallas, so needless to say ALL PLANES were running behind. The new time for my NOLA plane (originally set to leave at 6:47) was 7:17. By the time I got off the Wichita plane and got to the NOLA gate (thank the gods I didn't have to change terminals -- a first for me), the departure time was 8:08.
Then it was 8:28.
Then it was 8:45.
Then it was 9:15.
Then they didn't bother changing it anymore.
We finally started loading at around 10:00 or 10:30. As we taxied toward the runway, the pilot came on to say we had a 45 minute wait for takeoff because of the long queue. Fortunately we only had to wait about 20 or so minutes, and we were FINALLY in the air. After landing, getting transferred, Barney putting my chair back together, transferring again, and riding home, I got home at around 1:15 a.m.
But there were some bright spots to the whole thing:
1. On the Wichita plane, I sat next to a woman whose daughter was in my sister's class in high school. I told her my name, and she said, "Oh, I thought you looked familiar." Her daughter moved to Nashville a year ago to break in to the country music scene and is apparently doing rather well. She has a gig in Boston today, is opening for an act at the Fair in September (mom couldn't remember who), and has several appearances over the next few months to promote her CD. I went to her website last night and listened to a couple of song clips. She has a great voice.
2. There are still really nice people in the world. One in particular is a woman named Jane who sat across from me on the Wichita plane and was also on the NOLA plane. As we all waited to leave Dallas, she shared her pizza with me, got Reba and me water, and helped me get situated in the plane seat after the airline idiots transferred me. There were also two other ladies waiting for the NOLA plane who helped me as well.
3. NOLA now has a wc-accessible taxi!! The shuttle had shut down by the time I got in to town, but the shuttle service manager had arranged for the taxi to take me home. It is a London cab (you can see what it looks like at http://www.taxiadvertising.com/liveried.htm) with a lowered floor and fold out ramp for wc access. The service's number is now in my cell phonebook.
Now it's back to the grind of finding new attendants and thinking about writing a fluctuating asymmetry review. Oh yeah, and figuring out how I'm going to get fish for my research.
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