Trip Recap

Greetings all ... Day Two going swimmingly thus far, I'll probably post again later but as promised now, I wanted to recap some of the ups and downs (and side-to-sides) of my trip over in a little section I like to call, "FlyLights."

First off, while checking in at Logan, I was actually bumped up to an earlier flight to Chicago. Rather than leaving at 7:03, I was to leave at 5:23. Great news at the time, but thanks to delightful Boston wind, rain, sleet, hail and meteors (probably), the 5:23 ended up leaving at 7 o'clock anyway. On the plus side, I did have the pleasure of waiting in the terminal with a delightful group of Irish Iowans in town for the weekend's St. Patrick's festivities. The miserable weather they encountered during their stay did nothing to mar their natural Midwestern charm, nor their ability to buy local generic Irish merchandise of all sorts including shirts, hats, socks and buttons with JFK's face on them (they had just come from the Kennedy Library). Funny people, great accents and super nice; they made the wait much more tolerable.

The flight to Chicago was uneventful, though I was impressed with the plane we took. The Boeing 777 is basically a modern realization of Howard Hughes' "Spruce Goose" and had three distinct cabins: First Class A, First Class B and everybody else. In total, 261 people boarded the plane, most of whom flowed with me into steerage. After walking about a quarter mile to my seat, I found myself sandwiched between two other passengers, neither of whom said a word; must've been the weather. I then proceeded to sleep through about half the flight.

Upon arriving in O'Hare, I walked around looking for a directory and soon learned that this particular airpoint was probably the biggest one in the universe, as International Terminal was a ten minute walk and five minute train ride from my present location. During my trek through the facility, not a one deep dish pizza joint. When I got to the terminal, I had to settle for an Italian beef sandwich from some crappy chain. The sandwich wasn't bad, but I really wanted some pizza ... sigh. After I checked in, I sat down for a while to an episode of everyone's favorite vicodin-addicated TV doctor on one of the DVDs Mother gave me before I left. I actually had to cut Dr. House short because I stopped it so many times to listen to the announcements over the intercom (the patient, played by LL Cool J, ended up living).

I could probably write an entire blog on the actual seven hour, forty-five minute flight from Chicago to CPH, but I'm going to dinner with Coach Varst shortly, so here are the key points:

1) Scandinavian Air (SAS) is greatest airline ever. Period.
2) I had an aisle seat and was fortunate to have no one else sit in the middle row with me (Leg room FTW).
3) My bottom > SAS seats.
4) The inflight movies weren't NEARLY as good as the inflight meals (really good).
5) There was a guy with a tattoo on his arm that read "Skin Head" around some weird symbol.
6) My bottom > SAS seats.
7) The turbulence over Nothern Canada was better than any roller coaster ride.
8) The plane broadcast camera views both in front and below the plane, not that I could see anything at night.
9) My bottom > SAS seats.
10) Slight edge goes to Iron Age album as my favorite of the music I bought before the trip (check them out).

That's all for now, as Coach Kelvin has just arrived. Maybe more to come later.