The Terminal

This weekend I went to Keystone Colorado to watch my big, Krissy marry Scott in the mountains. It was beautiful (more info to come in this weeks "Top 10"). Had a great time. Worst part of the trip? Getting up this morning at 4:00 a.m. for my 11:15 a.m. flight. I thought I had planned out my flight time perfectly. Not too early, not too late. WRONG. Thankfully to some cousins of Krissy's they gave me a ride back, but they had really early flights. I had to wait 5 hours to board my plane so I channeled my inner Tom Hanks (get it? The Terminal? Stop reading this and go watch the movie now if you don't know what I am talking about). Here's how my day turned out.

This picture is me at about 6:15 a.m. I couldn't even check in until I was within 4 hours of my flight time. Oh- and just in case you're wondering "Shanna, why didn't you just jump on an earlier flight?" I'll tell you why. Because I don't read the fine print. Apparently if you book on southwest.com and get the "web only" rate, there's not a lot of wiggle room in your ticketing and they'll charge you basically what your original ticket cost to change it. No thanks! My time isn't worth thaaaaaat much.

So at 6:55 I have some coffee. Caribou Coffee or something strange like that. No starbucks to be found. This is what my $4.76 got me.

Oh wait, this picture is deceiving. See below.

That's more like it. And I think it was burned. Oh well, it did the trick.

As I drank my coffee and played with my phone I was looking around thinking Geez, what's with all the people around me eating Burger King? I thought Colorado was like super healthy? Turns out I had decided to park in a little Burger King cafeteria (guess you order on the other side). Yuck.

At 8:10 I go check in. I waited until 8 because I wanted to send a post card and needed a stamp(yeah, there's a post office there) but then I realized after all that waiting that I had packed my post card in my luggage. Whoops. So I check in and my "seat" number with Southwest is B53. Basically that means that like 113 people get to sit before me. I checked in 5 hours early?!?!?!? I've seen on Southwest's website that you can pay $10 for early bird check in, and honestly it just doesn't mean that much to me because I generally fly alone. So I post about it on facebook how silly I think that is that alllllll those people got up and checked 24 hours in advance and paid $10 and come to realize that you only have to pay the $10 if you check in MORE THAN 24 hours in advance. Who knew? Apparently everyone but me. Or atleast 113 people anyway.

THEN it's time to go through security. I hate airports, I really do. I think I've told you before that I think they're the most inefficient multibillion dollar industry I've ever heard of. Smooth sailing is a rarety. I don't like it. So I look at 1 of 2 security gates and this is what I see. Awesome.

Something I notice while going through security is the stupid hats people wear on vacation. WHY?? Oh WHY do people wear stupid hats for vacation? So help me if Matt tries to roll out to our honeymoon in a sombrero I am writing an entire blog about it. Speaking of awful decisions... Matt bought camoflauge CROC flip flops this weekend. He's always such a good dresser. What. Has. Happened. He even sent me a picture like it's cute. No sir. No. 1st order of business as wife, operation get rid of the ugly flops.

So after going through the security that either nightmares or jokes are made of, I decided to have some breakfast. Found me a nice booth, ordered something random and enjoyed. Did I mention that I only got 3 hours of sleep all night? I don't think I did, I didn't feel very good so I couldn't get to sleep until after midnight. Needless to say with the altitude and lack of sleep, I was feeling a little fatigue. Nevertheless, I was the politest little Okie a waitress could ever ask for. Now most of you know I've had just about every legal job under the sun that a college student can have. I've walked several miles in a waitress' non skid shoes, so if I get mad about customer service (which you guys know how I feel about that), then they must be pretty bad. I don't even mind slow food because I know it's not the waitress' fault. Not full cup? I'll give it a few minutes. What I am intolerant of is rudeness. I feel like I should teach a class on the concept of tipping. I know a thing or 2 because tips essentially paid for my entire college experience (Thank you Chili's and Sonic). This girl that I had was all kinds of not nice. I still tipped her because I really don't have it in me to stiff someone, which I think might make me an enabler, but whatever. I did leave her a note and it read: "I am sure that there are all kinds of assholes (sorry, but it's true) that come through the airport, but I couldn't have been more polite despite my exaughstion. In the future- a smile goes a long way."

However, I will say the food was delicious and I think that was the best apple I ever ate in my life.

So I'm walking around just checking things out and I see this ------>

This thing spins and your kid is supposed to walk around and around it til they tucker themselves out. Hilarious! "1st Bank: We're here to help."

Finally after wandering around I board my plane. And where am I sitting? In the front row. You see, people always sit with one seat in between them because we're Americans and we like our personal space. Consider you personal space invaded my Miss B53. 3rd one off the plane. Success!

This blog entry may seem like I had an awful day and really I didn't. I've actually never had such seamless travel. Coming and going my flights left on time which is a miracle. I saw some interesting things. I am a little delirious and hope this even makes sense. Hope you enjoy! More adventures in Colorado to come!

Posted in: Updates