Monday, July 6, 2009
We got up at our daughters condo in Washington DC at about 5 AM so she could drive her mom and I to Dullas Airport in Virginia to catch our 8:20 am United Airlines flight. It took about 45 minutes to get to the airport and I got one last look at the Capitol Dome, the Washington, Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials as we headed out of town on a freeway. We passed the rebuild side of the Pentagon and I got a view of the rows of graves at Arlington. We got to the airport and we gave our daughter final hugs and said good by. We then got into a long line at the United ticket counter to check our bags and get our boarding passes. I normally do this on-line but our daughter does not have a printer at her home. We then got into another line to go through the TSA security. We got to our boarding gate about 15 minutes before they started boarding and I then got into a third line at Wendy's to get some breakfast. The fourth line was to get on our flight from Dullas to San Francisco (SFO). We got good seats together with my wife the the window seat and I the isle seat. (only 2 seats on each side with three in the middle) The first movie on the flight was "Duplicity" with Julia Roberts about industrial spying. It was faily good and I had not seen it before. After the movie I read my book "Gods and Generals" about the first years of the American Civil War. The 5 hour plus fight arrived on time in San Francisco(SFO) and we had a 2 hour plus layover. We got some lunch at a nice restaurant we ate at on our trip back from Europe two years ago. The one we had breakfast at after spending the entire night at the airport. We than board our flight to Medford, Oregon and we both had isle seats across from each other and made it back to the Jackson County/Medford Airport we had started at 13 days earlier. We then took a cab home (It was cleaner than the ones in New York City and Washington DC) Everything was fine at home and we unpacked. Our cat was at first angry we had left her so long but soon warmed up to us and wanted us to give her a lot of attention. My wife's brother came over every day we were gone to see she had food and spent some time with her so she wouldn't get too lonely. We had a great trip and enjoyed being with our children but it is always nice to come home. I hung the two small framed posters of the Broadway musicals "Mamma Mia" and "South Pacific" in my "movie room" I had purchased from a street side vendor in New York City on our last day there. I then placed the bust statue of George Washington I bought in DC on the book shelf with my Thomas Jefferson bust. What with the time change it had been a long day and it was nice to sleep in our own bed.
We both want to thank our daughter for putting up with the "old folks" and our quirks for 13 days. She was a wonderful host and showed us a fabulous time and was very patient and kind.
