Thursday, May 10, 2012

And Now It's History


Herodotus, Father of History 

The trip home was harrowing.  There was a delay getting out of Athens due to a bird hitting the engine on the inbound flight leaving a dent in the casing.  As a result, the Greek officials would not clear it for take-off.  It was clear the British pilot believed the damage to be well within the permissible limit for safe travel, but he had to contact the BA people in London to get beaurocratic permission to fly.  By the time we took off, everybody but me and Dwight were worried about making connections in London.  Dwight and I figured we had plenty of time since we'd requested wheelchair transport to speed up our connection time.  BA and American Airlines between them managed to queer the whole process and as it turned out, we were the only people on the flight from Athens NOT to make the connection to the DFW flight.  Instead, AA routed us to Boston where we would spend the night and continue our journey Sunday morning.  Bummer.  We missed a visit with my sister and her family in Dallas, among other things.  Airlines were being airlines.  We spent 24 hours either in an airport or an airplane.  At least TSA saved us from dastardly terrorists; we went through 3 security checks. 

Once we arrived in Boston, we discovered AA would not hold our bags for transfer the next day, so I had to contend with two 50 pound bags in addition to our carry-on bags.  Fortunately, they had trolleys available. Not wanting to complain about everything, I have to complement the wheelchair attendant in Boston.  She wheeled us all the way through the airport, and being concerned that we had no place to stay, wheeled us across the bridge, through the parking lot, to the Hilton Hotel, waited while we checked in, and wheeled us to the room.  We looked forward to a few hours of sleep.

After an uneventful Sunday, we arrived in Durango, were met by our son Sam and our dog Ollie.  How good to be back in our Colorado mountain home!  I think Ollie was as tired as we were after spending a jolly holiday with Sam and making many doggie friends in Telluride.  We're now all recovering and returning to life as usual.  Is there anything better than coffee and the Durango Herald in the morning, a fast internet connection, lunch with friends, and day-to-day duties?  Life is sweet in paradise!



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