jetjunkies

January 17, 2024

This blog is for Kathryn H. and the rest of the Zoomers who are probably just as bored as I am.

We had one of the longest trips home I can remember. Leaving Barcelona at 11 am we arrived home at 4 am the next day. About 25 hours with a very long layover in Miami. It was initially suppose to be a 5 hour wait, but with the flight crew missing and we had to wait another 2 hours for replacements to arrive. There was a bar across from the the gate and I was hoping that no one got so drunk the flight was disrupted. Luckily it was so late by the time we took off that everyone just fell asleep.

Don’t think I’ve ever been in the Portland Airport at 3 am, so eerily empty, cold and quiet. We hustled down the newer concourse D that seems like a mile, but isn’t. We were lucky to have our bags come off the carousel early and we rushed out into the freezing cold (22 degrees F) to hopefully find a cab. You may know that the airport is undergoing renovations and the cabs aren’t where they used to be waiting. There was a not too prominent sandwich sign with an arrow indicating the location of taxis. Once I spotted where they were, there were only three cabs waiting at that time of morning. The driver got my bags in the trunk and was climbing in the car when I realized I’d lost Pete….thought he was right behind me. I was rapped on the passenger side window to let the driver know that there was one more passenger while looking wildly around for Pete. I finally spotted him in the distance heading in the opposite direction, so I bellowed…not something I love doing and thankfully he heard me. Finally on our way home, we were bundled in as many warm clothes as we had readily available. Daniel our driver was great and navigated the snow and ice with aplomb. He got a frantic phone call on the way that there were no cabs at the airport and a plane full of people. We were so lucky not to be stuck waiting for a ride.

At home we hadn’t left any heat on, not realizing there would be an Arctic blast while we were away. With the radiant heat from other units in our building it was still 64 degrees. We bundled into bed at 4:30 am and arose to an even colder apartment. Let me just say that concrete takes a long time to warm up, once it gets cold.

Very few cars or pedestrians out today. It is so icy and the freezing rain keeps falling.

It is so strange traveling, walking miles everyday, seeing or re-seeing beautiful places and learning interesting things and then coming home to being trapped in our home. Pete actually got up and drove to work yesterday morning, before more freezing rain started. I dashed to the store when he got home, because of course we had emptied the refrigerator before leaving on our trip. Plus I was feeling like making a big batch of soup with the cold weather.

I was looking out the window with all the unpacking and cleaning up done, bored and twitching, with Pete giving me the side eye. There were the poor crows flying around trying to keep from freezing. They are very resourceful and I bet know of every warm air vent in the city. Why they don’t migrate, I’ll never know….I do as much as I can.