A Very Long Kind of Day …

Thursday, September 19, 2024

Hello!

 

Up this morning at 5 am and out the door a bit before 5:30 am.  We were only a couple of miles from the airport, and R had filled the car up with gas last night when he went out to pick up a pizza that we ate in our room, so we didn’t have to worry about that.  The difficulty was really that they are doing road construction on the roads into and around the airport, and there were LOTS of orange barrels everywhere, it was pitch black outside, and the lighting was terrible!  So, it was definitely a challenge finding our way to the Budget rental car agency.

 

Got there, and while there were employees cleaning and filling up cars, there were no people to check us in!  Very surprising!  But, we were told to just leave the keys in the car, and the bill would be emailed to us! Neither of us felt really comfortable leaving the car without it being officially “checked in” but as we didn’t really have a choice, we took photos (again, still in the dark!) and headed onto the shuttle bus.  Well … I guess I had either no idea how big DTW is or have just forgotten … it probably took 15 minutes to get from the rental car place to the drop off for our Delta terminal!  Unreal!  As R said, are we in Chicago yet??

 

Through TSA without even showing ID (they just took our pictures, and said, go on in!) and to our gate in no time at all – even though the Delta terminal in Detroit must be at least a mile long! (They even have a shuttle train inside the terminal to get from one end to the other.)  We were just getting nicely settled when I noticed that suddenly, the signage at our gate was no longer for Kansas City, but had been changed to Hartford, CT.  So – had to move from gate 61 to gate 65 … even further down the corridor.

 

We always leave plenty of time – and we had at least an hour and a half, but we hate to be late!  At any rate, the plane was overnighting at the gate, and our pilots and crew came aboard, and soon we were boarding.  Very easy flight, and we were told we would be arriving about 15 minutes early!  Yay!  That is … until we were getting close to Kansas City!  Then, the captain came on the intercom and announced that the storm that had been expected to pass through KC had not quite passed through yet … so that we had to circle around the airport – and possibly divert to ST. LOUIS!  Oh my!  Of all the contingencies I had thought about, that was definitely not one of them!  So … circle we did … and did … and did.  And after about 45 minutes, suddenly the landing gear came down – which we, at least, felt was a really good sign!  About 15 minutes later, rather bumpily, we were on the ground!  -- in Kansas City!  Yay!!!  Whew!!

 

The pilots definitely did a good job in getting us down.  One of the flight attendants, as we were exiting, said he really didn’t think we’d make it; so glad he was wrong!  At this point, we were now about an hour late, but truly, it didn’t matter – we got there!

 

Off the plane fairly quickly and walked right out to the terminal parking garage.  So nice to see our faithful blue Subaru Forester again, and the rest of our luggage!  Everything just fine and waiting for us!  Again, the way cameras and computers are these days … by the time we got to the exit, we didn’t even need to scan our entry ticket – the computer read our license plate, knew when we entered, how long we had stayed, and computed our parking fee!! Oh my!

Heading out of KC!

Some lovely scenery in Kansas!

Basically, no real traffic to speak of as we headed out of Kansas City.  Emmy our (GPS) guided us to the Kansas turnpike, which is a toll road, but they’ve make that all automatic, so we’ve no idea at this point how much our tolls were – we may be able to log in and set up and account and see, or, we can wait for them to send us the information in the mail!  They’ve deactivated all their toll booths effective July, 2024, so you just sail right on through!  Lovely roads, and no problems or real traffic to speak of, all the way from Kansas City, to Wichita to Oklahoma City.  Exited at Bricktown (a district in the southern part of the city) and found our way to the Homewood Suites, where we like to stay when we’re in the area.  We’re in room 1123; lovely suite, albeit cold, but what else is new?

 

OKC skyline entering town!

Made it to OKC!

R set up the computer and I got the luggage reorganized…cleans in one bag and dirties in the other.  Hopefully, I’ll be able to do laundry tomorrow when we get to Anna’s!

 

We walked the block over to The Old Spaghetti Factory at 5:30 pm for dinner, and had a very nice meal.  We started with salads with blue cheese dressing, and then R had spinach ravioli and I had (what I usually have!) the Manager’s Favorite – pasta with any two sauces – Mizithra cheese and rich meat sauce.  All of R’s disappeared, so I’m assuming he liked it! I’ve got a bit leftover; maybe for breakfast?!

Garlic/cheese bread

Salads with blue cheese dressing!

My Mizithra cheese and rich meat sauce!

R's spinach ravioli!

 

Back to the hotel after that, and I’m blogging now.  I have to admit that I am REALLY tired, and wanting to get to bed early, so that we can get an early start tomorrow!  We’re heading to Anna Marie Hetman’s new house in Horseshoe Bay, Texas, which is in the hill country outside of Austin.  It’ll be SO good to see Anna again!

 

So, goodnight for now!

 

Much love,

m

xxx