Back in the U.S.

Finally! Well the departure from London heathrow proved to be much more of an adventure than expected! The delayed flight boarded 3 hours late as expected and it took a long time to leave the gate and then came the announcement that it was a very busy time to be leaving so there was a 20.30 minute wait to take off. The next thing I knew the captain was announcing that we were cleared for take off, so I'd had a short nap. We started on the runway and then were told we were going back to the gate for mechanical difficulties! Guess I'm glad they were discovered before we were in flight! We were never told why we were delayed again, but 3hours after the expected departure we finally left London! 6 hours later than expected! What a mess it was for the majority of the 400 passengers on the 2 level jet who needed to make connections! I was lucky (?) that I'd already decided to spend the night in Chicago because it was a mess when we got off the plane and reps were trying to find people to give them their new rebooked tickets. The luggage had arrived on an earlier flight so it was there to welcome us. To make matters even worse so many international flights had arrived at the same time that the immigration line was through the large room and down the hall to the escalator where we came down. Yes, travel is a hard undertaking these days.

The flight was originally departing just before 8 am so the first meal was supposed to be breakfast. The omelet served at about 3 pm left a lot to be desired! the man next to me was a game rep from Sweden and he was missing meetings all over because of the connections so his itinerary was going to have to be changed for at least the first three days of the trip. He always travels internationally so wasn't upset. The movies they offered weren't any I really wanted to see, only a couple of new releases, nothing like the old days when most of the movies were the new releases. Cutbacks everywhere! I was glad I had loaded a few movies on my iPad, definitely a cool thing to be able to watch that! I tried it for the first time on the eurostar and it was pretty funny. I couldn't hear it so kept turning up the volume and then realized that people around me were all staring. Pretty embarrassing! The man next to me was French and was on his way to Lille from London, the first stop, because his mother's Id had expired the day she got there and she couldn't get home so he was going to meet her but not sure what he was going to do. He offered to help me and showed me how to push in the jack much harder than I'd done. Nice man.

Well the severe thunderstorms have subsided and it appears that my flight will actually leave today and home is only a few hours journey away!!