The malaria pills give me insomnia which is a gift when you have no time to sleep. It seems that I spent most of the four weeks preparing for my trip by shopping and the final two days I had to deal with the multiple bags of unopened travel items as a consequence. The day before departure was spent downloading and uploading files, messing about on the computer, being sure that if some Indian pickpocket made off with my passport, I would not be stuck on the side of the road at Mahamallapuram crying into my cup of lassi. By 1:00am, I began emptying my warehouse of pills into little manageable travel sized containers, not realizing that I should have brought every precious ounce of the pepto bismal. From 2:00am to 5:00am, I didn’t take a second to sit down and breathe. I packed, packed, packed like a demon on speed. I was sweating, I was cranky, and I was completely disorganized. Even the Eagle Creek packing cubes that I bought? No time to mess with that crap. It just got tossed into the luggage along with the clothes it was supposed to contain. My plan to fit everything in one bag? There is no such plan.
We arrived at the airport around 6:15am, moderately late for check-in on an 8:30am flight, but still the earliest of my travel group. This was a blessing as all 4 million San Antonio citizens decided to show up at the airport at 6:20am.
I had to pay through the nose to have an extra bag checked-in and paid via my one and only credit card. Oh, the adventures that resulted.
The incompetent excuse of human flesh that was the flight receptionist mis-keyed in my credit card number and, as a result, my card was denied. And some idiot excuse of security apparently built a process in which such credit card denials would result in the airport taking away the credit card from the customer. From me. The flight receptionist took my only credit card away from me as I was headed out on a 6 week international trip to India. Can we take a moment to appreciate the absolute absurdity?
And she was a total incompetent excuse of human flesh, no joke. Her computer told her to take away my credit card and whatever the computer says must be done, well, it must be done. That woman has obviously never watched the Matrix or she would know that we are supposed to overthrow our computer overlords for the greater good of humanity. And so she walked off with my credit card and had it locked up in a safe room behind the desk. She refused to help any further.
I then spent 15 minutes with another woman at the desk trying to get my credit card back. She called in to check about my credit card, but I think the multiple menu prompts finally got to her and she returned my credit card to me without explanation.
A nerve-racking bit of entertainment, all in all.
I don’t know why, but we flew from San Antonio to Los Angelos for 3 hours in a Canadian-operated plane. I don’t know if I’m allowed to judge all Canadian planes just by this one, but I like to make broad generalizations. Thus, I must unequivocally state that all Canadian planes are tiny. They are built in miniature, like children toys. I bet the Canadians also manufacture clown cars. And while we all try to fit inside of them, the Canadians just sit back and laugh and laugh and laugh.
I slept all the way into Los Angelos.
And so, I’ll post what I’ve written for now. Way more very soon.
