The last few days at home were a whirlwind of a whirlwind. All the last details needed tending to, I had a photo shoot at Keck all day on Friday so I was editing photos, burning disks, mailing disks, etc. and I moved out of the studio with help from Chris, Jeff and Kyle on Saturday. We finished up Saturday night so I went home and crashed. I should note here that the weather had been unseasonably warm, and as my fabulous helpers were driving off Sunday night, I had gotten a chill. I was quite happy to notice that more January-like weather had returned. Or so I thought.
I woke up Sunday morning and got busy. I needed to finish my photo editing and get a couple of disks in the mail, so I was working on my computer and noticed I didn't quite feel right. All these nights of not sleeping well and the stress of relocating my life was catching up with me. But about an hour later the tell-tale signs of a fever were rearing their ugly heads, like Fluffy, the three-headed dog; chilled, flushed and my skin felt funny. Great. I took my temp and sure enough, I've got a low grade fever. I can't believe that I'm this close and now I'm getting sick. Panic set in as I wondered how sick I was getting. If this is the extent of it, I'm getting on the plane. But what if this is merely the beginning of a knock-down, drag-out fight with a virus that has me wretching and reeling? That 0.05% chance also keeps rearing its ugly head! I'm not sure if I should let the fever do its job or knock it down so I can function. I decide that I don't have time to worry about being sick, so I start downing the ibuprofen. It is a wonder drug I tell you! It knocked out the symptoms within 30 minutes and I was back to getting busy.
Sunday and Monday morning was laundry, packing, making phone calls and sending emails, cleaning up the house and cleaning out the cabinets and refrigerator, setting timers on the lights and the last few trips to the store for small items deemed necessary at the last minute. I had scheduled a private van to take me to the airport. It wasn't much more and it was worth not having to leave home at 8:30 am for a 6:30 pm flight! And what about that fever? It showed up again, but I figured if ibuprofen could make me feel great for a day, it could make me feel great for another day. I packed two small bottles jammed full of my precious elixir in tablet form; one for the suitcase and one for my carry-on. I also took some in the morning for good measure and carried on.
I had two suitcases, and had prepaid for the extra one so I got 20% off! Both were under weight, but just barely. That was fun - I packed the suitcases, then weighed them. But I had to weigh them by stepping on the scale, noting my weight, then step on the scale again and note the difference in my weight. These new scales are a bit of a pain, apparently a 50lb change in someone's weight whilst standing on the scale does not compute in the scale's tiny computer brain so the tiny computer brain emits a feeble "fault". So the two-step process was necessary and I don't mind admitting that it was awful seeing how much I weighed so many times! Nichole, our fabulous travel agent says not to worry, I'll lose 20lb just from all the walking I'll be doing, so I'm hopeful I won't be seeing those numbers again.
Anyway...I kept adding things to the suitcases until I felt it was too close to going over. I already had everything I needed, so the additions were things I wanted, like coffee and a coffee grinder! And I took things out of my carry-ons that could be packed instead to lighten the load a bit. So finally I was packed, the house was ready and hoo-boy, look at the time! It's 2:30! Almost time to go!
The van arrived at 2:45 pm and he called to say he was here. Strange...I was looking out the front window and there was no van. So I wander out the front door and there he is - 2 doors down. Hm. I sure hope he knows were LAX is.
The ride was interesting as the van driver, while nice, was a serious chatterer and I pretty much know his life story. He's a former rock star who now works for Disney as a musician, travels all around the world for Disney AND drives people to the airport. He has two daughters, twins, both in college - one in Russia and the other in ... I forgot, somewhere in Europe. And he's been sober for 23 years now. Nice guy, and it turns out he did know where LAX is. I got all of that info in about 20 minutes, since the rest of the 40 minute ride I was chatting with Rosie on the phone.
We arrived at the Air France terminal, and I was very nicely dropped at the curb with more bags than I could handle; two huge suitcases, a rolling camera bag/carry-on and a laptop carry-on cleverly disguised as a purse. And a coat, because it might be cold on the plane and it will surely be cold when I arrive in Paris. Yay! Smarte Carte is only 10 feet away, so I left all my bags unattended on the sidewalk whilst I snared a carte for ONLY $5 and was able to carry all my stuff. I was quite early so check-in was smooth (except for the part where the Air France agent had no idea how to process my prepaid extra baggage!), security went smoothly (except for the part where I had to remove my shoes, my coat, the laptop from my purse, and every item from my camera bag, using about 20 bins and then put my shoes back on, and repack all my carry-ons...oops I mean my carry-on and my purse, with only 2 hands and a snarly person behind me) and I made it to the gate with about an hour to spare. Phew!
The fever? It came back at about 4:30pm. Fluffy lets me know when he's around, so I downed some more ibuprofen before getting on the plane. Are you also wondering where the photos from this great adventure are? The cameras were packed and there was no way I was going to attempt a security violation in the airport. No way. No how. I wasn't on the plane yet and I wasn't going to give that 0.05% chance of a no go a better chance by being obviously sick or pointing a camera at things that shouldn't have a camera pointed at them!
Finally it was time to board, and I kept looking around thinking, this isn't going to be a full flight. I was right! I had reserved the aisle seat in a two seat row, thus limiting my physical interaction with persons unknown to a minimum. Smart me. As luck would have it, no one had the window seat, so I had a two-seat row to myself. I stayed awake through dinner (meh) and was watching "The Kids Are Alright" (meh) when my eyes got very heavy. So I settled into a sort of modified fetal position and slept. Really. I mean I actually fell asleep on the plane. I have NEVER fallen asleep asleep on a plane before. This was good! I woke up about 2 1/2 hours later to visit the toilet closet (I'd call it a bathroom, but using the word room is truly a misnomer), and noticed again that Fluffy had returned. I took more ibuprofen then went back to sleep. I woke up about 3 hours before landing so I got about 6 hours of sleep. That was a true bonus! I think though, that I didn't LOOK like I got 6 hours of sleep.
We land, I'm one of the last people to get off the plane but I know it doesn't matter because I have to get through Passport control before I can collect my bags. I walk down the jet way, down very long hallways of Terminal 2, and get into the passport control line (5 minutes), then down more hallways to baggage claim. I'm still there before the bags come out, so I stake my claim on prime baggage collection real estate and alternately watch for my bags and look for Ron through the glass walls separating baggage claim to the outside world.
Oh! There he is! Without a care I abandon my prime baggage collection real estate and I rush to the glass wall. I'm smiling laughing half-crying I'm so happy to see him! We touch hands through the glass wall, like an inmate and her visitor. We tried to talk but it was difficult to hear through the wall. So after a few minutes I wandered back to retrieve my bags and then make the long trek to the exit. Ron was waiting for me right outside the exit and once again I abandoned my bags in an airport. We hugged and kissed and hugged some more. After a few minutes we realize we are a bit of a spectacle so we gather all my bags and move on. It was a short walk to the train, and Ron came prepared with all the right tickets. We took RER B to T3 to T2 and then walked the short distance to the hotel.
Ron gave me a quick tour of the hotel room, I organized my stuff a little (not too much because we are leaving the hotel on Friday and it is now Tuesday) and then we went for a walk. We walked from the hotel to the corner where our apartment is, we walked around the neighborhood a bit and I got to see firsthand what everything looked like! It was pretty exciting. We then headed back towards the hotel and had dinner in a restaurant nearby. Dinner was so-so; the restaurants in the area around the hotel cater to a lot of convention-goers, so it is a little expensive and not great. No matter, it was better than airline food! I was fading fast, so we headed back to the hotel. Even though it was too early to be going to bed, I succumbed and headed into jet-lag proper! I didn't care. I was very happy to be there!
Reunited, and it feels so good
Reunited, 'cause we understood
There's one perfect fit
And, sugar, this one is it
We both are so excited
'Cause we're reunited
Hey, hey
Sorry! I couldn't resist a little Peaches and Herb. Once I wrote the title of this post, that silly song has been running through my head!
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