Airports Are Gateways to Hell.

Finally, I'm back at it!  And you totally missed me while I was gone, huh?  I knew it.

For those of you just tuning in, I was on vacation last week. I went to Ohio to see my family and (what’s left of) my friends. I was excited to go home, but not so excited about the whole “getting there” part. I had to go to Denver International Airport, which is like the most enormous airport EVER. So naturally, I was a total wreck.


Well, we get through security and whatnot and arrive at our gate. Apparently the plane we were supposed to get on had been delayed, so we sat there for an hour. Now, I have a 3 year old child – and 8pm in a busy airport didn’t really get along with her. Suffice it to say that she was being a little monster, and had seemingly made it her sole mission to make me bat-shit crazy. We probably sounded something like this to the hundreds of people surrounding us:


Me: “Peanut, please come sit down. Do you want to color?”

Peanut: “No! I want some candy! Let’s go get some candy!”

Me: *sigh*
“No, you’re not getting any candy. It’s too late at night for candy. We’ll be on the plane soon, so come sit down with me. I’ll read you a book.”

Me: *pulls out like 8 books for her to choose from*
“Here, which one do you want to read?”

Peanut: “I HATE THOSE BOOKS!”

Me: (turning red with embarrassment, hanging my head)
“Get over here and sit down. Now.”
*Doing the super angry “I’m dead serious right now so KNOCK IT OFF” mom look*
*Pointing at chair next to me*

Peanut: (doing this weird throw-a-fit-while-walking thing)
“Aaaahhhhh I’m HUNGRAAY!”

Me: *sigh*
“Okay fine. Let’s go get some [fucking] candy.”



After an hour of this, we finally boarded the plane…and sat there for another hour. Apparently there were computer problems, then paperwork problems, then maintenance issues. Then the captain comes on the intercom with this classic (and not at all alarming, by the way) message: “This is bad. This is really, really, bad.”

*blink*

Awesome.

He proceeds to tell us that the airport we intended to fly into was closing all of their runways for construction. Our flight had been cancelled, so we had to de-board and make our way to customer service to get our tickets changed. At this point, it was nearly 10:00 pm. I had to drag the 2 carry on bags and the car seat back out of the plane and get in line. Where I spent the next 3 HOURS standing. At one point I imagined that if I were to get an X-Ray of my feet right then it would surely look like somebody dropped a glass vase and tried to put it back together with scotch tape. They hurt so bad I literally couldn’t stand, so several times I had to pop a squat and sit for a few minutes. Yeah – never wearing those shoes again.

The flight had been entirely full, and I was about halfway back in the line. There were no remaining flights out with that company for the next 2 days. I was hot and probably smelling like a big sweaty lumberjack – not to mention that I was completely exhausted, and at this point I was reaching nervous breakdown levels. My ride had dropped me off and left, and was 3 hours away by now. I couldn’t afford a hotel or a cab to get anywhere but the airport.

Finally I get up to the representative at the customer service counter – who, for the record was a total DICKWAD. He was totally arrogant and snarky and really just needed a swift slap in his wrinkly face. I would have been more than happy to oblige, but I thought it might hurt my chances on getting a decent replacement flight so I bit my lip. The next flight out was the following morning, and since there weren’t any direct flights it had a 2 hour layover in Charlotte, North Carolina. I wasn’t happy about that – but I just wanted to get to my mom’s house in Ohio and start my vacation. Plus I wasn’t totally batty about the thought of postponing my vacation. No way, dude. Not gonna happen.

This whole time Peanut is sleeping in her car seat on the floor, which I have been dragging on the floor behind me every time the line moved for the last 2 hours. The douchebag dude at the counter apparently didn’t listen to me telling him I had a child, and couldn’t see her from where he was sitting. So when he transferred my ticket for the next flight, he neglected to transfer HERS as well. And that’s when things got even more horrible and shitty and just grew into a big ol’ clusterfuck of problems for me to deal with. And that is a story for another day.