Home Again Home Again

Well, after much frantic packing on Friday (why do I always wait until the last minute?), the realization that I had more stuff than luggage to put it in, and a very nice evening with friends I ended my first sojourn in Prague. Saturday morning bright and early, I got into a taxi that took me to the airport. The interesting thing to note about this is that a film crew and an extraneousness tram were also on my street, waiting with the taxi. I actually think they may have been waiting for the taxi to get out of their shot, but what do I know?

I got to the airport, waited and waited some more, until my flight left for Poland. The airport in Warsaw is a little bit scary, I must say. It made me think of what a communist era airport may have looked like (minus the shops). The inflight movie was "Wild Hogs," but I wasn't up for watching it. I think the only John Travolta movie I'll watch this summer will be Hairspray, and he won't even look like himself in that one.

Getting to New York's JFK was uneventful. Getting out of New York was a little bit of a hassle. JFK is so big, that I got a little lost trying to find the ticketing counter for my next flight, after leaving customs without problems. I finally found the United ticketing counter, only to be told that my flight to Dulles had been delayed, and that I wouldn't make my connecting flight to Dayton. I had no intentions of spending the night in NYC or in Washington DC, so the manager was helpful enough to get me on a direct flight from New York to Cincinnati. This flight would land me into Ohio 2 hours earlier than scheduled, which was great. Except that it was departing from the Laguardia airport, not JFK. I ended up taking a cab to Laguardia (on United's dime, no less!) in Saturday late afternoon rush hour traffic. I thought that drivers in Prague were crazy, but they're nothing compared to drivers in NYC.

I got to Laguardia around 6:20ish, and my flight left at 7:15. I spent most of my time in line at the ticketing counter, trying to get my boarding pass. Apparently, New York had been experiencing massive thunderstorms that had necessitated the cancellation of a lot of flights since Thursday last week. People were trying to get out of NYC all over the place. Some nice ladies and a gentleman who were flying to Atlanta after a missions trip to the Ukraine kindly lent me their cellphones to call my mom, so that I could let her know about the change in my flight plans. Finally, I boarded my plane and flew to Cincinnati. I got my luggage, met my mom, and we picked up my sister from her apartment at the University of Cincinnati on our way home.

Nothing much happened yesterday--our city's fireworks were last night, which I attended with my mom and my cousin. Unfortunately for me, I fell asleep on our blanket halfway through, and missed the grand finale! Today I'm off to visit my kids and former co-workers at the pre-school I worked, then to the dentist, then to dance class to get ready for the Celtic Festival at the end of the month. I miss all of my Prague friends, but it is so good to be home!