I'm writing from wine country, CA. Dude. This place rocks. The last time The Husband and I were here, it was almost 10 years ago exactly. It was the trip where he asked me to marry him.
So, we're back and some things have changed quite a bit. For one, our entire trip was not planned out to the second in glorious detail (our nickname for the yesteryear trip was 'TOE' --Tour of Exhaustion). It's been quite the opposite. For another, we have considerably more funds to do this trip right this time. Last time, we were on a very. tight. budget.
I wasn't planning on posting, but, LORD, the material I have so far on this trip just begs to be posted.
The flight out.
We flew out of Dulles. Since the last time I flew out of there, they seemed to have improved their security line process considerably. No longer was there a line snaking out right behind the ticket counters, but you go down to a shiny new area where you are processed. It seems like an improvement, the space at least, but for reasons unbeknownst to me, some worker dude had a bunch of us detour down a different line path. This path was THE WRONG PATH. It took forever. Then they directed us to other sub-lines, and people were entering these sub-lines from the other end. And we barely moved. And others were flying through the lines. By the time we got to the terminal, we had like 15 minutes before the flight was scheduled to leave. Grrrr. New anti-terrorist measure: create such gross inefficiency that people can not make their flights. Actually, wondering whether that worker dude had an official TSA badge. MAYBE THIS IS ALL A PLOT.
We had to stop and get coffee and I thought it was probably a good idea to get some breakfast to go since it was a 5-6 hr flight and only food for purchase (a.k.a $5 box of blah) and ordered a breakfast sandwich at Dunkin Donuts. Here, the terrorism plot continued. The guy fixes both our coffees then pauses as if to ask himself, "Now what do I do?" I said, "The sandwich! Do the sandwich!" Suffice it to say that I ran ahead to get my seat while JP offered to wait for my sandwich since I had the middle seat and he the aisle.
Time was ticking. We had less than 10 minutes. I ran and got into line, looking back nervously every few seconds to make sure JP made it. (He did)
But, when I got to my seat, the overhead storage areas were pretty full. I looked around, tried to move people's coats around up there to find room for my bag. I saw that the storage area just behind my seat had some room. A small flat bag with a jacket took up a large space. Of course, I'm holding up everyone else at this point and feeling not cool. I started to try and rearrange the space and the woman below - a gray-haired woman doing a crossword puzzle - looks up at me and says, "I don't think your bag is going to fit. LOOK AT IT UP THERE. There's no room."
I was flustered. I said, "I think if this bag was stacked, there would be room."
She looks up again from her puzzle and looks directly at me with icy hate, "I don't want my bag stacked."
I looked at her. She was pure evil incarnate. Satan. Satan doing a crossword.
I didn't know what to do. There was no where else to fit my bag. I just stood there. Like a statue. Frozen by Satan.
The guy behind me saved me. He said, there's room in that overhead compartment. I said with gritted teeth and a smile, but she doesn't want her bag stacked. He understood and stepped up to rearrange her bag, saying, well, we need to make room for everyone's bags, and then made room for my suitcase, put it in, and went on his merry way.
I love you stranger!
Finally, I sat in my seat, and told The Husband of my adventures with She-Devil (who was sitting directly behind him), just loudly enough. I'll see your nastitude, and raise you some passive-aggressiveness!
Next chapters...Renting a hybrid and trying to burn gas.
Wine ta$ting
and more!
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