Tuesday, January 10, 2012

BA Flys Home From Texas

Yesterday had one focal point for me.  To pick up my wife at the airport in Manchester, NH cleanly and on time.  She was returning home from a reunion weekend with one of her high school buds who lived in Del Rio, Texas.   BA ( I call my wife BA because well she is a BA when she gets her back up) - Anyway  BA left Del Rio at 6 something AM central time.  She landed in Houston, collected herself and took a train to another terminal to catch a flight to Newark, NJ to connect with a flight,  that if everything fell into place, would end with wheels down in Manchester, NH at or in vicinity of 3:45 PM, Eastern Standard Time.

Long day of travel for my wife and a long time for me to stay focused in order to successfully pull off a wife pick up at the airport.  Both of us were under pressure.  I certainly was as I have been known to be as many as 5 minutes late picking her up in the past.  You want to see BA put her BA suit on, be late.  SO when she told me to keep my cell phone close and goddammit, turn it on this time.  I slept with the damn thing shoved in my jockey shorts set on vibrate,,,,,,uh nevermind .... you get the picture.



BA is a very organized woman.  I am a very disorganized man.  That we have somehow managed to survive in the same house for over 30 years now, well, I am still trying to figure that one out.  BA does not suffer fools well.  But for some reason in my case, she issued me a free pass.  Although she sometimes forgets and I end up wounded and beat up after walking into her field of vision. But I'm used to it.  I just pick up my battered ego and put it back on.

Okay so the stage is set.  All the players are in place.  The wife with the hair trigger attitude.  The clueless, yet lovable husband, and a supporting cast made up of indifferent and oftentimes malevolent airline industry people.  Of course anything that could go wrong ..........did.

At just shy of 10:00 AM I get a phone call.  She has not even boarded the plane in Houston yet that was supposed to have already left.  Apparently bad weather in Dallas kept the crew there and it would be twenty minutes before they were in the cockpit of the plane BA was to take to Newark.  BA finally gets on the plane and wouldn't you know it, the crew brought that bad weather from Dallas with them and the plane sat on the tarmac for 2 1/2 hours waiting for the thunder, lightening, and rain to move along little doggie.

BA calls me from the airplane and lets me know she will be missing her connecting flight in Newark.  She has no clue when she will be in Manchester now, but she knows it won't be by 3:45 PM.  So relax Mike, she'll call when she gets to Newark. 

Relax?  Riiight.  I start sweating bullets as I consider what kind of wife I will eventually pick up.  The loaded for bear wife who will lash out and make the drive home a true misery?  Or will miracles happen and somehow she will have gone through some kind of bliss as she crossed one time zone into another.  Or maybe she will find a way to get drunk and all I'll have to do is pour her into the pick up.......Nah - it's going to be misery.

Around 3:00 PM the phone vibrates and I pull it out of my jockey shorts.  She has landed in Newark after being seated on a plane for 6 1/2 hours for flight that should have taken 3.  She is eerily calm on the phone.  She says matter-of-factly, " The next flight to Manchester is 9:45 PM and I won't be there until 11:00 PM."

Stunned at her calm demeanor, I have nothing smartass to say and say okay keep me posted.  20 minutes later she calls back.  The flight is now leaving Newark at 11:15 PM and she won't be in Manchester until 1:00 AM.  Again the voice talking to me that is stuck and will be stuck for 7 more hours in Newark, NJ is calm.  She tells me to get some sleep, I'll need it.  She then cuts me some slack and says she will call as she is getting on the plane.  I can leave then.  Her 1 1/4 hour flight  and my 1 1/2 hour drive will almost be good timing.

Get some sleep?  Sure thing.  I've been here before when her trip had gone off without a hitch and well, I think I still have some scars.  I lay down and try to sleep and all I see is my wife's angry face and it's looking at me.  I considered loading a few belongings up in the pick up and driving south to the Smoky Mountains and becoming an eccentric hermit living in the burned out trunk of a storm downed tree.

She calls around 11:45 PM.  I hit the road by 11:54 PM.  Conditions are clear and the roads are empty.  I land at Manchester at 1:15 AM.  My wife has been there for 25 minutes.. Uh Oh....................

But oddly her 22 hour bad day thumped all the anger right out of her.  All she wanted was a bed to stretch out in and please drive sanely.

Yes Dear............................................................

10 comments:

Mr. Charleston said...

Dang Crum! A vibrating phone in your Jocky's. I see visions of a new phone app and gazillions of dollars...

yellowdoggranny said...

she is sooo going to kick your ass when she reads this..

BBC said...

Well she can't blame you for all the problems if she is a decent woman at all.

Randal Graves said...

Now you know exactly when to plan your best & brightest bouts of dumbassery. Just think of the clusterfuck you'll be able to pull off the next time your wife goes on a trip.

Kulkuri said...

Years ago The Old Lady was flying from Reno to UP on the Tundra. The plane circled the Twin Cites for so long because of weather that it had to land in Minot, ND to refuel. I had to drive for two hours to pick her up at the airport in Duluth, MN instead of the local airport.

Tom Harper said...

Sounds like you got off easy. This time.

"Stunned at her calm demeanor" -- ah, the trap. The calm before the storm.

Demeur said...

Could have been worse she could have been trapped in Texass for days with weather. We've seen that before. Seem to recall a few nasty snow storms in the NE that mucked things up for days.

Ol'Buzzard said...

I know I have a short attention span: but I couldn't get my mind working past Del Rio, Texas. When I was growing up in the rural Delta of Mississippi (before television) I would turn on my radio at night and Deel Reeio, Texas would come booming in. Had to be the most powerful transmitter in the south - Country music when it was still country.
the Ol'Buzzard

susan said...

A few too many flights on Agony Airlines and US Scare put me right off flying unless there was no other choice.

The Blog Fodder said...

More posts about your wife. This was wonderful. Often wondered what kind of saint you were married to.