This weekend I got to fly home for Stephen's high school graduation. I knew going into the weekend that it would be super busy filled with parties and events to attend but I never imagined that it would turn out like it did.
I finished up spring term on Wednesday by pulling that all nigher Tuesday night and taking my final and turning in my paper on Wednesday morning. After that I rushed home packed and drove to the airport. My flight was supposed to leave around 2:30 so I was there with about an hour to spare before my flight.
Everything was running on schedule and we boarded the plane on time and were taxiing out onto the the runway. We were literally the next plane to take off when all of a sudden the pilot comes on the speaker and says that our crew has exceeded their time limit (whatever that means) and we have to turn back to the gate. Unfortunately there was no gate to go back to, it had been taken by another flight and we were told that we would have to wait on the runway for 45 minutes while another flight boarded and took off. I quickly called my dad and he got on the phone with United and tried to change my flight. He successfully got me a later flight out of Denver where I was supposed to fly into so that I could make the connection and fly into BWI just a little later than expected. No big deal. It was when we had to get off the plane that they told us that the airline would have to fly us in a new crew and that they wouldn't be there until 8:00PM that things took a turn for the worse. The later flight that my dad had made me was out of Denver at 7:00PM and that was the latest flight that they had but I wasn't going to be able to leave Salt Lake until 8:00.
I immediately called my dad again and he told me to run out through security to the main United desk to book another flight that would get me home before the next day. Apparently this posed quite an issue for the airline because when I finally got up to the counter, after about 15 minutes of listening to one of the employees take a personal call and the other fiddle around with some man's luggage, there was no way that I could get from Salt Lake City to any airport anywhere near D.C. that night. The man finally booked me on an 8:45PM flight to Los Angeles where I would then take the Red-eye to Dulles.
To bide my time in Salt Lake I went to the other terminal and ate at Squatters Pub where I was sitting next to my whole entire flight crew just laughing away and having a great time. I on the other hand was not having a great time knowing that I had already been at the airport for 6 hours and still had 2 more to go.
I was SO happy when I the flight to LA took off and I thought to myself...I'm actually going to make it to DC in time for the graduation. I was thrilled. That was until we sat on the runway for 40 minutes after landing in LA waiting for a gate. I was livid at this point. I could see our gate and I could see the gate that I was supposed to catch my flight to DC. I could see that flight to DC already starting to board and I could see that I was still on the other plane.
We finally pulled into the gate and I grabbed my stuff and ran. Thankfully I made it to my plane with a minute or two to spare but it was close. I sat next to a pleasant French-Canadian man who was very interesting but by this point I had already been up since Tuesday morning and I was ready to get some sleep. I even took a Benadryl to make sure that I feel asleep but the boy in the aisle next to me had different plans. He talked the whole night...even when I turned my head away he still kept talking. I was so glad when I walked off of that plane and my dad was there to pick me up. I felt like he had saved me.
It was already 6:30AM when I got home and Stephen's graduation was at 11:00 so there was really no way that I could get any sleep. I got something to eat and ironed Stephen's graduation gown and pants and then took a shower and headed off downtown to the graduation.
The graduation was great and Stephen was so happy. Justice Scalia was the speaker and had a lot of interesting things to say so sitting through the ceremony was not too bad. After we went to lunch I then helped Katherine coach at Highlands. By the time I got home from that it was time to help my mom with All Night Grad Party. She was doing bag check the whole night and I had already been up 72 hours so what was another 8. The whole night was fun for the kids and they had so much energy so it was not difficult for me to stay up. At the end of the night they had the grand prize raffle where Stephen won a new Macbook!!! He was already happy that he won $50 to Coldstone and this was just the icing on the cake. He is still smiling from ear to ear about this new toy of his.
Friday morning was the first time that I got to sleep since Monday night so I got a good 4 hours and was on to my next assignment. I really don't remember anything that happened on Friday other than I know I was busy and later that night I went out with my friends Kim and Steve and saw Karate Kid at 10 and didn't get home until 1:30AM.
Saturday was an early morning because the swim team had their time trials. I went to that and helped input some of the times until it was time for my friend Kaitlin's baby shower. After that I got right to work helping my mom with the Turtle Silent Auction she was in charge of that night at the swim team social. I ended up falling asleep for about 2 hours in the middle of helping, but by then I had really hit a wall. I could not function at all. My brain was just so slow and my body just ached. I ended up going to the Turtle Auction where I bid on this wonderful pink turtle sash (used as a belt) and won. I got to see a lot of old friends and parents of friends that I had not seen in a while.
Sunday I went to church and came home and fell asleep. My family had gotten me sick not sleeping for 5 days didn't help that much. We had a great Father's Day dinner and as soon as I was done eating I fell back asleep.
In my original plans I was supposed to go back to Utah very early Sunday morning but because of everything that happened I got my flight switched to Monday. On our way to the airport on Monday my mom and I were driving on the airport road when all of a sudden we ran over a very large rock and our tire went completely flat. We called my dad to come get us and take us but he was a little ways away so we tried to call Stephen and Katherine at the house. We called and called and called and no one would pick up any phone. We tried the house phone, we tried their cell phones but nothing. By this point my mom was super frustrated and we were losing hope that I would make my flight back to Utah.
At the very last minute, my dad came speeding down the road and we drove...very fast...to the airport. With a toss of my hair and a batting of my eyelashes I convinced security to let me bypass the line and made it through security in record time. As I ran to my gate they were doing a final call for my flight and I literally ran to my seat on the plane. I squished my Vera Bradley Weekender bag into an already filled overhead compartment, buckled my seat belt and we were off.
When I got into Salt Lake, I planned it so that I would go from the airport to my class at the Salt Lake Center, the auxiliary campus downtown. I got there with a little time to spare so I got my new ID card and waited outside the classroom. The rest of my class showed up...all 4 people...and we all sat in the seemingly over sized classroom. We got to know everyone a little and soon enough it was 20 after and the professor had yet to show up. Just then a man came into our classroom and informed us that the professor thought that the class started on Wednesday and that we were free to go back home. In any other circumstance I would be glad to have class canceled but this rubbed me the wrong way. The rest of the class had driven 45 minutes to get there and now had to drive 45 minutes back in traffic with nothing to show for it.
Today I slept all day. I woke up early made myself some cereal and went right back to bed. I think I need a vacation from my vacation.
Vegas anyone?
1 comment:
This made me exhausted just reading it! You are amazing girl! Like Heidi Klum says, "I don't need sleep now, I will sleep when I am dead." .... at least I think she says that. P.S. My moms knows an air traffic controller lady and she explained the whole "the flight crew has gone over their hours" thing to us, cause that happened to us too. The flight crew can only work a set amount of hours in a week so that they don't get super tired pilots falling asleep at the wheel and such . So once they have met their max hours, they legally can't fly anymore. You would think your pilot would have thought about that before be pulled onto the runway. Sorry your trip was so hectic, sounds fun though!
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