As they start announcing the boarding of the plane, I look up to my left and sitting next to me is a familiar face. It took me a second to recognize him, but it ended up being the smart little jewish guy from that show Numbers, the main elf from The Santa Clause, and one of the group of friends out of the Judd Apatow clan. I think his name is David Krum...something or other. Anyway, he saw my laptop up with the open blog, and made a comment about how I needed to include a editorial regarding US Air's asinine $25/checked-bag policy. I told him how I already had it covered, and that US Air is going down. We laughed for a second at which time they called my seating zone, so I got up, told him to take it easy and walked onto the plane. I never said that I recognized him, but I'm not sure that would've been a big deal anyway. Nice guy.One hour and forty-five minutes later we were still sitting on the plane at the gate, patiently waiting for the maintenance crew to fix one of the reverse thruster engines that seemed to have malfunctioned during their previous landing. It was stuck in the landing position and wouldn't retract, so the plane couldn't possibly fly while it remained that way. So, the crewmen took almost two hours to fix it while we all just sat there, watching the clocks as our connecting flights left Phoenix one by one.
Finally we were on our way, and we got word that a few flights, including my flight to Cleveland, were going to try to wait for us when we landed. I was already sure that I had missed my flight, but as it turned out, we landed in Phoenix at 12:12, just three minutes short of my 12:15 flight to Cleveland. We actually had transportation, one of those little electric carts, but it kept running out of battery and stalling...people walking were moving faster than us, so I just made a bolt for it. And you know what? Phoenix is a big airport. Like, really big. Try running from the C-gates to gate A-22 in Phoenix's Sky Airport with 65lbs of bags and see how it feels. It's like 3/4 of a mile at full sprint. I made the flight, literally as they were closing the doors, but damn. Oh yeah, and don't ever fly with US Air. Not only do they charge for checked baggage, fly broken airplanes, and not charge their transport carts, but they want $4.00 for a glass of water once you're on the plane. Four dollars! Screw that man, I'll just take a drink out of the bathroom sink.So I made it to Cleveland okay, but am I there now? Nope. I'm in Youngstown. Why? Because I get a voicemail from my dad as I get off the plane telling me that my mom fell down walking the dog, and now she's in the ER. I didn't even walk into my house. I just got into my car (that now has apparently transmitted a faulty ABS system while sitting my driveway doing absolutely ziltch for the past week) and sped to Boardman to see how my mom is doing. Luckily she'll be okay. No cuncussion, just some pretty ugly cuts and bruises over her face and hands. Turns out that Kino darted after a squirrel while she was walking him, pulling her straight to the ground in what looked to be a faceplant of epic proportions. She doesn't even remember it happening. She'll be okay though, just pretty sore for the next few days.
I'm heading back up to Cleveland in a bit to just relax. That's all I want to do is lay down on my couch, put in IronMan with its hours of special features, and chill out for the afternoon. It's been a long long week, and I haven't even had the chance to miss my girlfriend since I've been home. Thanks to everyone for following along on our trip. I know it didn't end in the most calm way, but then again, this would've been a much more boring read if it had. So, until our next road trip, whereever that'll take us, so long and thanks again.Genuinely,
Brian & Stephanie
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