Atlanta: Travel

I got the e-mail that I made it into Encore this year, and that has lifted my spirits. At least it's something to look forward to in the month of June! So now that I've stopped pouting a little bit, I can start to think about vacation again.

Chapter One: Travel
Planes, Trains and Automobiles

We flew Spirit Air to Atlanta, thanks to their notoriously cheap fares: sure you have to pay for snacks, drinks, and checked baggage, but you're not going to find a cheaper flight!

I was starting to freak out because I hadn't been able to print my boarding passes online the night before or the morning of our flight. When we got to the airport, I tried again at an automated kiosk and still couldn't print them. Thankfully, the lady at the desk had no trouble. I thanked her and we headed toward security. As we walked away, I laughed because the agent had circled information on my boarding pass and not on Scott's. Ha! I'm special!

"Special" is apparently a synonym for "selectee." As we got through security, I got taken to a special line (they let Scott come with me) where my bags were x-rayed, opened and swabbed for mystery chemicals. I meanwhile was walked through the metal detector and then frisked. I couldn't believe that some strange woman was squeezing my armpits (no, not boobs... though I may have just blocked that part from my memory) and patting me down. It was mercifully quick, and I was reunited with my stuff and had my shoes on before Scott did! He missed the whole episode.

Then I spent the next two hours sitting at the gate being pissed off and traumatized. As much as I'd like to believe that it was the suitcases, I know that my "random" selection was made before we even got to the airport. That's why I couldn't print my stuff from home. My immediate reaction was something along the lines of, "the TSA reads my blog...and isn't a fan!" And when two TSA agents showed up at the gate (the woman already wearing her rubber gloves), I nearly threw up. I was so thankful to get out of Orlando.

Aside from a pilot who was sort of a dick, a little lap-sitter who kicked my seat the whole time, and a sweaty man in the seat next to me who asked to borrow my cell phone, the flight was quick and easy and we made it to Atlanta only 1/2 hour late. In Atlanta, we managed to navigate through the airport to the train station, buy our round trip tickets from a machine that gave change in $1 coins, and get on the train with almost no difficulty. We got off the train at the correct stop and made it to the hotel with a 5 minute walk.

The area in a one-block radius of the station was very ghetto, but I never really felt unsafe. And for the remainder of our vacation, we walked everywhere. I love that about cities.

We took the same route back - walked to the train station, train to the airport, etc.

Atlanta airport security seems to be more efficient than Orlando. I was surprised, since I never really thought of Atlanta as more than a hub. We made it through security with no special surprises, but I did make an observation: it's probably best to not wear your bedazzled shirt to the airport. Those little baubles are going to set off the metal detector, leaving your husband to deal with your four children and all of the bags by himself. And he's not going to have the common sense to get out of everyone else's way. And people may or may not feel bad when they accidentally bonk one of your children with their carry-on bag, bouncing their head into the plexi-glass wall behind them.

...not that I know any of that from personal experience!

Our flight home was an exercise in tolerance. There was a group of five drunk loud lesbians who thought the rest of the plane was amused by their shouts to each other. Really, most of us wanted to strangle them. I know it wasn't just me and Scott - there were other people talking about them at baggage claim.

Oh yeah - baggage claim! Because the flight was full, the airline asked people to voluntarily gate check their wheeled suitcases. Well I didn't want to pay to check the bag, but was perfectly happy to not have to deal with the overhead bins, so I passed my bag over to them. The highlight of our travel day was seeing our suitcase come onto the carousel, Scott go to grab it, and me yelling, "YARGH! Tis my luggage!"

No one was amused but me... but I laughed all the way to the car!