Trip to Seattle: Day One, Part 1

I left on Thursday, August 14, for a trip to Issaquah, Washington. I signed up for a journaling workshop--taught by Teesha and Tracy Moore at their home studio--and it started on Friday evening. I went a day early so I wouldn't be worn out from traveling, and so I had time to drive around and look at the scenery. I had not flown since November/December, 1997, so I was a little apprehensive about the security checks and the horror stories I've heard about delayed flights.

The nearest airport is in Birmingham, Alabama, and my flight was scheduled to leave at 10:40 a.m. By 9:30 a.m., I had parked in long-term parking, checked my bag, gone through security, and was sitting at my gate waiting to board. The security check went fine...even with the shoe check and the search of my purse because of the bottle of contact lense solution. Contact lense solution is exempt from the three-ounce rule, and my bottle was less than three-ounces anyway, but I understood--since you can't tell it's contact lense solution through the x-ray scanning machine. We boarded on time and took off a few minutes early. There were only two of us in the three-seat row, and I was eavesdropping on my seatmate's phone conversation. She was talking to someone about genealogy computer programs, and that gave me a opening for a conversation. She was a lovely woman, and we chatted about genealogy and crafts for most of the hour-long flight to Dallas.

I changed concourses and gates successfully in Dallas, and ate a sandwich from a restaurant near my gate. There was a couple waiting to board a plane, and the wife became very agitated when she learned that she was occupying the middle seat of a three-seat row. She was not a small woman, and she knew she'd be crowded. The more she talked, the more sure I became that we'd probably be in the same row...I'm not a small woman, either. Their group boarded before my group, and as I walked down the aisle toward my seat, I saw them...waiting in my row. I tried to be still and quiet for the entire four-hour flight, reading my magazines and listening to my MP-3 player!