IND-PHL
I left for the airport immediately after class on Friday afternoon, having checked in and printed my boarding pass from home. (Yes, this Princess can travel light, when necessary...) I drove the hour to the airport, parked in long-term and walked to my gate just in time to board. Perfect timing! IND is not a fun place to hang out once you're past security... I see my gate just ahead and also see people boarding. I walk up and check the board (It's not electronic, but the kind like gas stations have where they must put up each individual letter. Ugh.), which says this flight was leaving for St. Louis. Hmmm. I turn to the woman next to me and politely ask if this is really the flight to Chicago. "That's canceled," she huffed at me. Obviously unhappy, I let her be.
I debated in my head what to do. All of the gate agents had lines, so I reached for my phone and called M. After a minute of both of us being frustrated, he decided I should go wait to see a gate agent and he would call AA Exec Plat. When I got to the gate agent, he told me the only flight he could get me on was a Continental flight to Newark, NJ (EWR), the problem being fog and zero visibility in most of the cities out East and Chicago. I called M to see if that would work, because neither of us wanted me to have to wait until the next day to fly out. He said to take it.
A minute later he called back because an AA Exec Plat rep was on the phone saying there was another flight that didn't require him to drive to EWR. Woohoo! But our excitement was quickly quashed when she realized a gate agent had given me a ticket on CO... Now my ticket was in the hands of CO... *duhn duhn duhn* We decided we didn't want to play with fire, and getting me to the East Coast was our main objective, so I remained on the Newark flight.
I walked from my cozy AA terminal over to an unfamiliar terminal that was home to CO. I checked in with the gate agent, and we had a lovely chat about law school, Oregon and her daughter starting school in Bloomington next year. I felt a little more at home, although I was frustrated that I had some time to kill before boarding. I spent some time whining on the phone to M about how much I missed him, until my friendly gate agent announced that our flight would be delayed "until further notice," at which point the subject of my whining turned to CO and other flight issues.
After wasting an hour waiting to hear news, I realized that our flight crew was also hanging around the gate waiting to leave. M and I decided this was a good sign. I spent some time laughing at disgruntled patrons whining at the gate agents. Lord only knows what they wanted them to do about the fog! Anyhow, there were 2 flights scheduled to EWR that evening, but even though they ended up collapsing one into the other the flight wasn't full.
We finally boarded the plane, so I was able to call M and tell him to start driving up from PHL. The dear had put us in the Westin by the Philly airport because I wasn't supposed to get in until 11, and he'd already checked in, so we were kind of stuck driving back from Newark in the middle of the night. I was so glad to see him when I got to Newark, though. I had to remember that even though we had to spend 2 hours in the car, it was still time I was able to spend with him instead of in some hotel room in IND.
We had to stop somewhere along the Jersey Turnpike (WTF is a "turn-pike" anyway?!) for gas, and I was in desperate need of some sustenance, so we pulled over into one of the little business stations. These are odd things; I'd never seen one before. They are little pull offs with a gas station and one building housing about 4 fast food restaurants and a mini-mart. They are odd to me, but convenient and practical as they avoid forcing you to leave and return to a toll road.
So, back to the story. We pulled up at the gas pump, slightly irritated as M would have preferred to stop in at the building for food first, but we had trouble navigating the parking lot (Unfortunately, the NeverLost GPS doesn't help in parking lots, and is quite useless when it constantly is shouting, "Continue on current road."). The poor gas pumper guy is confused when Michael opens his door. We knew Jersey is a full-service state (hee!), and I haven't asked M, but I think he was just going to walk with me inside. But the gas pumper guy basically stands there until M got back in the car, making small talk in his funny accent. M pulls out his wallet and is shoving money into my hand, while I am just staring back at him. He kept telling me to go inside and get my food. I kept refusing. I finally told him that I was not going into that place at 12:30 at night in BFE Jersey. I explained that I understood he would never, ever ask me to do that under normal circumstances, but that I also understood he was very tired. (Keep in mind this was also after he told me he had considered moving a large sum of cash from his wallet into his sock. Yeah, I was so not tempted to go in there alone!) So, after we got gas, we ate a few arrows, drove into a little construction lot on the side of the building and parked. I was just glad to get my chicken fingers and get out of there.
I don't know if M really understands how appreciative I am of everything he does for me. It's incredible that he finds ways to see me even if only for 2 days at a time, and still makes me feel special by not rushing through the weekend. I thanked him many times for driving to EWR to pick me up, then driving us back down to Philly. It really does mean a lot to me that instead of suggesting I stay in Indy for the night, he was willing to sit in the car for over 5 hours (He had to circle in EWR for a good 45 minutes!). I am so lucky to have him!