Miss me??

I'm baaaaaaack!!!!

I had a GREAT time - so first up, thanks a million Shauna and Jim, I had a ball and am more in love with Charleston now than ever!! I demand you find me a nice Southern boy to marry so I can move down there forthwith....

Was a bit of a trauma getting down there, in part my fault and in part idiocy on the part of airline staff in general. And customs.

Friday morning my flight was at 7am. I was informed that leaving at 5am would be fine, so I booked a taxi for 4.50am just in case. I set my alarm for 4am (bathed and pretty much packed the night before, so not much to do...). I then panicked and decided to set it for just before four. I awoke from a bizarre dream to the sound of a buzzer...it was 4.55am, the taxi was slightly late and I err...was still in bed. Turns out I'd forgotten to change the hour along with the minutes and had set the alarm for 4.56am....d'oh!!! So I ran around panicking, dumped the last few things in my bag and jumped in the taxi.

I made my way to the Delta checkin. It was quite confusing, but I found the right line. After queueing for about 30 mins and with one other person in front of me, we were informed that our line was now first class only and we had to join the back of the other queue


!!#$%$@#@!#!!!@

so anyway, I finally got through, only had carry on luggage, so made my way to US customs. Only one person ahead of me - woo hoo!!! So I got up to the chap who proceeded to give me all kinds of grief the like of which I've never experienced before about what I was planning to do in America, what I was doing in Canada, why I had an Irish passport...I was probably there for about 5 minutes (time now was 6.30am, plane leaves at 7am.....) before he told me I had to fill out some form - he pointed to 4 boxes I had to fill in and the time we spent arguing about why exactly I couldn't fill it in there and then instead of going to some table and getting back in line I could have probably translated the bible into irish, but anyway - so I go fill out the boxes, get back in line, smile my best smile at some hard nosed chick who promptly turns the form over and points to the other four boxes and back I head to my table. I finally fill out all boxes, get through customs and then queue again to get scanned (time check: 6.47am). It takes a few goes before I am beep free, at which stage my shoes, cardigan and belt are no longer on my person. I also had the indignity of the french canadian requesting that she touch the area around my jean button/ zip...after which she had a good feel of my bra fastener area (all which I'm trying to do the job of my much needed belt), much to the amusement of the guys in line behind me.

Finally made it to the boarding area and was the second last person on the plane. I sat in my seat hot, flushed, stressed and very aware of the fact that I hadn't showered that morning. To the cute guy that sat next to me who also had to put up with my jerking awake and drooling (why lord, WHY?!?!?!) I can only apologise!!!!

Still, it was ALL worth it. To those of you who haven't been yet, make it a priority. Charleston is a great place - full of history with a nice slow pace of life. And great seafood :-)

So - what did I miss??