Hello and it's good to back on the blogosphere :)
Okay, so, I spent this past week going back and forth between Wisconsin and Illinois for the Thanksgiving holiday and for the wedding of my older brother. One might think, "Oh, a week off from work to have Thanksgiving with the family of your brother's fiancée (now wife) and for the wedding! How relaxing!" Oh, how I dreamt of relaxing! We baked and cooked for all the people who were coming into Wisconsin the day of Thanksgiving, then after that, we had to do all things wedding: rehearsal dinner, tuxes, shoes, manicures, pedicures, hair, make-up, pictures (I slipped and fell into mud when we were taking wedding party pictures and barely missed getting mud onto my dress), so on and so forth and it was all so beautiful!!
Anyhow, though I enjoyed myself greatly at the wedding, the wedding itself and all things related are not the purpose of this blog.
This past Monday was the day that a majority of my family left Wisconsin and left all things cold, wet, cheese, and beer related to come back to the great and beautiful Land of Enchantment known as New Mexico. First, we flew out of Milwaukee to Pheonix (why there was no direct flight to Albuquerque, I don't know), then from Pheonix to Albuquerque. Well, we had a nearly two hour layover in Pheonix, so we all had lunch and hung out, and sporadically, a few of us decided to take a walk before our flight home. My cousin, Andrés, and I were a couple of the first people to decide to take a stroll (anyone who knows the two of us will agree that we can be a dangerous pair, due us not always being the most observant people).
First, we stopped at Starbuck's for coffee, then we walked wherever there were those escalator-like walkways (I saw a guy who looked very much like Robert Downey, JR on one of them ... I didn't say anything 'cause I didn't want to embarress myself ... it probably wasn't him), then we strolled into the Borders that was there in the airport and schmoozed with the employees there and we both made a purchase, then I bought a bottle of water and he looked around in the electronics store. Then Andrés said that we should probably head back (I'm assuming that he looked at his cell phone (I have not concept of time because I somehow forgot my phone charger at our hotel in Illinois, therefore, was forced to let my cell phone die a slow death)) and it's at this point that everything gets interesting.
We head back in the direction that we came from and when we got to the corridor that we had made a turn in was when we realized that we had not only walked away from our gate, but had completely walked out of customs and past security into the main concourse (which is why we were able to go to Borders and buy stuff). So, the only way for us to get back to our gate was to go through security ... again. Now, Andrés was smart and had his boarding pass and I wasn't so smart and didn't have my boarding pass, so we were pretty sure I wouldn't be able to get through without my boarding pass, but we still decided to ask if I could still get throught without it ... it was a no go. Andrés decides to go through security and wait for me and I decide to go down to the 2nd level (security and all of the boarding gates were on level 3) and go to the airline check-in and have a new boarding pass printed (mind you, I have no concept as to what time it is and no concept as to how much time I have, all I know is that I need to get a new boarding pass and get back to my gate as quickly as possible).
When I get to the check-in line, there was an employee directing people and he asked if I had any luggage to check in and I told him my pathetic story and he said just to go back up to the 3rd floor and go the kiosk and he said to either insert my driver's license or debit/credit card into the kiosk and it should allow me to print a new boarding pass without having to enter my flight confirmation number, so I went back to the third floor and followed his directions. The stupid kiosk wouldn't do anything. So I tried again. And again. Every single time I entered my driver's licensed into the kiosk, it only gave me options for rapid rewards or enter confirmation number, and a couple other options I don't remember, and I was definitely not going to insert my debit card out of fear of something getting charged to my account. I then attempted to my dad on the cell phone of a stranger who was nice enough to allow me to use his fancy blackberry (it took me a little while to figure out how to use the stupid machine) just to get my dad's answering machine.
I go back to the airline's check-in and the man who gave the directions to me sees me walking back to him and we get back to talking and I explain what happened and he directs me to the "express check-in" outside (mind you, this the end of November in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the sky is overcast and the temperature is 40 degrees F at best), so I go outside and stand in the extremely short line of the express check-in and take notice of an extremely attractive employee (how could I not notice? He was very handsome and had the most beautiful eyes). So, there I am waiting for the next person to help me when Mr. Handsome walks up to me and asks how he could help me (many things crossed my mind, but I decided to stick strictly to business), so I responded that I lost my boarding pass and all of my things had already been checked on, so if he print me a new boarding pass, that would quite nice. So he prints me a new pass and says to me with a straight face, "So, it's $25 for a new boarding pass, and that's without tax, then there's gratuities, which would be quite nice if ..." and while he's saying this, I'm thinkging, "No frieking way! Are you kidding me?" There many other things that went through my mind, but I'll keep my blog child friendly. I reach down for my wallet, I'm still looking at him and I must have this look that says "Take back your statement or go to hell," because before I get my wallet out, he smiles this big smile, begins to laugh, and says he's kidding, and tells me to hurry to my gate before the plane leaves and God bless.
So, I then sprint up the stairs to the 3rd level and get to security, then right when the officer finishes checking my id and boarding pass, the security supivisor, whom Andrés and I had spoken to earlier about me possibly getting through security without a boarding pass, comes rushing over to me saying, "Ma'am! I've got your boarding pass! I've got your boarding pass!" Bless her soul! I think she was stressing about me getting through as much as I was! What happened was, after time kept creeping by and I hadn't come through security yet, Andrés had ran back to our gate and got my boarding pass and ran back to get it to me. I get through security and didn't put my flops back and Andrés asked why I didn't put them on and I responded that there was no way I could run with them on, so we run back to our gate and we were the last two people to board the plane.
What a lovely way to end vacation.
