Pair the Board

It’s been a good week.

It started with my trip home from Poland, last monday, an impeccable voyage from start to finish. I was with SAS for the first two legs like I mentioned in the first post about it. The long haul was Copenhagen to Dulles, a little over nine hours flying time if memory serves. I was scheduled for a cruel six-hour layover but I had already been eying up other possibilities. SAS/United had a 5:45pm scheduled to RDU which gave me about 70 minutes from the time I walked off the plane at 4:35pm.

I made it through passport control pretty steadily for a Monday afternoon, though the minutes were agonizingly ticking away on the clock. Luggage took forever. Snagged them from the conveyor belt which seemed to be humming along unusually slowly today. Straight past the German Shepherd and the pair of Customs officials in the middle of a chattering conversation. Dropped the two bags on the re-check conveyor and hoofed it.

I tried to walk as fast as I could without looking like a moron, all. the. way. down Terminal F or E or something. My mythical early flight home was parked on the exact opposite end of Terminal D or E or something else. The next one over. Just across the horizon. They were connected end-to-end and it was a friggin’ haul.

It was at least a 30-minute walk at the half-running pace I was setting. I got to the gate out of breath at 5:35pm and walked up to the middle-aged lady scanning the last few tickets. Laney was her name, I remember now. She rocked. As she fed tickets into the little ticket taker, Laney smiled genuinely and told me that there were empty seats and she could probably get me on there. Sure enough, after the final few people had cleared the line, she printed me a shiny boarding pass, shuffled me through the door and closed it behind me.

On board, in my seat, and in the sky before the sweat had even dried from my brow. Six hours magically becomes ten minutes.

I was home in a snap, and at Blinco’s for Golden Tee and Monday Night Football very shortly thereafter. Ah, back it up though for one second, back to the airport. I had deplaned and walked straight into the United baggage office near the conveyors. I showed my two bag tags and asked her if she could make sure my bags got on my original Dulles->RDU flight since I had caught the early connection. I would just come back and pick them up when the flight from the future landed. She punched away at her antiquated computer and told me that my bags showed up as “arrived” on her screen. Well, sweet lord. I had to wait another long while at the conveyor, but sure enough, my two pieces of luggage came rounding the corner, one behind the other like a little train of joy. Still don’t know how my bags made that connection with the way things worked out. No clue. Awesome though, a big thanks to United Airlines’ baggage service.

Anyways, loitering around the house in a vegetative state for the next few days, I finally had a chance to exhale and relax and untangle from a long three weeks of work. Lots of lining up ducks into rows. I finally got the entire EPT Warsaw gallery up, and Aruba is up there on the Photos page as well. Expect more to come soon as I continue to fill in this website. Check them out and let me know what you think.

Out went the weekend in a blaze of fantasy football glory. I didn’t even have to sweat the Monday game in any of my three leagues. Total domination. Looking really strong in the one I run with Chris. Tomorrow is another massively busy day of laundry and packing, which seems like all I ever do anymore. Not that I’m complaining. I’m off to Vegas on Thursday for some WSOP shenanigans. Can’t wait. Good luck and safe voyage to Donnie too; he’s in the early-going of a cross-country trip from Massachusetts to Sin City as he moves out there.

Jealous.