You thought I was kidding when I said what a day!
The day started too early for a Sunday, alarm went off at 8:15am, had to get up, get ready and head to the airport, amid the teeny flurries. I did have to stop at Walmart to pick up a patch for my jeans, pook, wish certain parts wouldn’t rub together!
Before I left, since everyone was still sleeping, and why shouldn’t they be at 9am on a Sunday! I wrote a note on the bathroom mirror for DCMsquared.
Got to the airport, parked at the lot in the row I was told to park in and waited and waited and waited, in the wet snow, for the van to pick me up, I finally walked down to the other end, slid a little and all the driver said was “My driver didn’t pick you up?” Nope. No apology, nothing? Nice. But I was on the van, warm and heading to the airport.
(Ooh, the original Willy Wonka is on TV, I’m happy! Cheer up Charlie! Of course, I have a whole rant on some of that movie, but I love it!)
I had an experience that was a first for me…
I am waiting in the sky priority line to drop off my bag and the guys behind me are talking about trying to get to their flight, it’s hard not to overhear some conversations. I asked what time their flight was, they were trying to get bumped to an earlier flight, I told them to go ahead of me, I had plenty of time before my flight. He thanked me and offered me some money, I told him no, please don’t, just pay it forward. He kept the money, then came back for his bag and said thank you thank you, me letting him jump ahead of me got them on the flight, I said no, he said get yourself a cocktail, I said I don’t drink! He told me to get a soda! Then he said they made it with five minutes to spare, then tried to get me to take the money again, said it was worth it!
He put the money in my pocket and took off, I looked later, it was twenty bucks! I have to tell you, it made me uncomfortable, I wasn’t looking for recognition, just trying to help someone out and you always hope someone will be nice to you too.
Off to my gate, got some breakfast and we actually took off on time, well, they closed the doors and we moved away from the gate three minutes late, is that a record?
One of the flight attendants had a bad attitude, nasty to the son of the guy sitting next to me and you could tell her politeness to everyone else was phony, bad form!
Took a taxi to the hotel, the driver was entertaining and pleasant, we had a very nice conversation. I asked where he was originally from, I knew it wasn’t Detroit. He told me we had twenty five minutes to figure it out! I asked a few questions and he really liked my first two questions, “is it warm and was it a long flight?” He liked that I didn’t make an assumptions about where he was from. It made what could have been a long boring ride enjoyable.
As we pull up to the hotel, I look and see a Caesar’s, I asked if there was a casino, we are across the river from Windsor, Ontario, I had no idea! Take a look, the water is frozen solid!
It’s so cold, I’ve upped the heat to 73 in the room and my are still cold!
I checked into the hotel, Marriott Renaissance Center downtown Detroit. It’s quite the facility! It’s on the back side of one of General Motors buildings, there are cars in a showroom, opposite from a food court! What? I got lost going to the food court, I should master it by the time I leave Thursday! (I promise, I will tell you why I’m here soon!) I grabbed some food, back to the room, put on my jammies and I opened the blinds, it’s snowing! Go figure!
The best way to end my day, aside from talking to you, of course…I had a wonderful phone call with one of my oldest friends, HW. We’ve known each other since grade school, became good friends in high school and then reconnected at our twentieth high school reunion. I know, I know, not possible we’re not old enough! Thank you!
The best was when she and her fiancé, FP, made their annual trip to Savannah and DCM and I drove to meet them, it was awesome!
She’s thinking about blogging, she had some questions and we chatted about blogging and word press and everything else that is going on. We finally had to hang up after almost two hours, got to get some sleep at some point!
HW is one of those friends, you can pick up the phone months, years, whatever later and it’s like no time has passed, never a quiet moment, no lag in or lack of conversation, you just pick up where you left off. She sounded great and we made very tentative plans for when I come to NYC, getting the gang together, since everyone lives pretty close, I can’t wait!
(Was someone on some serious drugs when they wrote the whacked out boat scene in Willy Wonka?)
Ok, big day tomorrow! Need to log off and get some rest! You too! Happy Sunday! I hope everyone had a great weekend and enjoyed the Beatles 50th anniversary tribute!
