Five years ago I wrote my first blog post in an effort to tell the stories of my travels. From the memorable mishaps, to the people I met, and the stories that still make me shake my head and smile. Many of my stories have involved plane travel and in the 75 flights I've taken since I started writing this blog nearly all of them have been uneventful. Until 10 days ago...
Let me start by saying it's been a really long time since I've written a blog post. An embarrasingly long time actually. It's a silly story that basically can be summed up by saying I ran out of media space because I uploaded too many pictures, which resulted in my having to delete many of them and in the process realizing I never organized the thousands of pictures I had uploaded to begin with. All very uncharacteristic of my uber-organized personality. Needless to say that took time- a lot of it- and it's still a work in progress.
But...I have really been feeling the itch to write again for a while. I just needed that one story to kick myself back into gear. That happened about a week and a half ago when I posted a real time flying experience on my personal Facebook page and the comments that ensued made me realize now was as good a time as any.
Picture this...
I'm sitting on a plane. At the gate. At Washington Dulles, my home airport. A mere 12-minute Lyft or Uber ride from my house. A plane that was initially delayed because Dulles was down to only one runway earlier today due to the insane winds here. I knew that before I arrived at the airport. But, the inbound plane that was I due to fly on arrived earlier to Dulles than expected so departure was pushed back to not far after original time.
I'm sitting on a plane. It appears boarding is complete, but the doors are still open. The flight attendants are still walking up and down the aisles. The pilot announces that we are waiting on the catering truck to arrive but would leave without it if it didn’t show soon. The catering truck arrives and maybe ten minutes later the pilot says, “so the catering truck broke down behind our plane and is currently sitting there with the hood up and we can’t push out because it’s in our way.”
Y’all I can’t make this stuff up.
So yes, I’m sitting on a plane, at a gate, at Dulles. And yes, I still love travel, because patience and flexibility when it comes to travel is my motto!
But wait, there's more.
It gets better, as we're sitting there waiting on the maintence crew to fix the catering truck, a flight attendant makes an announcement saying, “This is a destination check, this plane is going to Seattle, if you’re not traveling to Seattle, now is time to get off this plane.”
Noone gets off the plane.
Instead, more people board the plane who would have originally missed this flight. Thanks to the broken down catering truck blocking our path. Lucky for them!
I'm still sitting on a plane. At a gate. At Dulles. With a broken down catering truck blocking our path. I pull out my Chick-Fil-A that I grabbed for dinner and planned to eat once we got in the air, because at this point it does not look like we're moving for a while. No one will make me put my tray table up any time soon, right?
Now, flight attendants walking up and down the aisles are counting people and basically taking attendance. Some are calling out names over the loudspeaker. "If Mr. So and so is here, please ring your call button." No joke.
My phone bings. United has sent me a text asking if I wanted to change my flight. Yep, I’m still sitting on the plane. Um, no thanks. I'm good. I'm now eating my dinner and I don't want to confuse the flight attendants as my name is not one that they have called.
I really can’t make this up.
Oh, did I mention I scored the exit row? So if we need to abruptly exit- I’m on it!!! And yes, still United loyal here. S**t happens and this will make for a humorous blog, if I ever get back to writing it. See, I am! And hopefully you're laughing.
According to the actual departure on the trusty United app we took off just after 7pm. Which was nearly two hours after our original departure of 5:15pm which was delayed until 5:50pm then changed to earlier, then delayed, and delayed again. Well, you get the point.
Fortunately, I did not need to assist with any emergency exits and the emergency exit row is now my new favorite row when I can't snag an upgrade with my lowly silver status. And the flight once we managed to take off was as uneventful as the 70+ flights before it in the last five years.
So, there you have it. My first blog post since April of 2023. It's good to be back. I'm kicking 2025 off with what will be my most epic solo adventure yet and it takes off in exactly 60 days. So that gives me two months to tell a few more of the stories I've accumulated in the meantime. I promise I won't make you wait too long. Until the next time, safe travels!
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