Flight: Chigago to London (Part 2)

We are flying over Canada now, which really makes me wish I had a window seat. I've never been to Canada so I'd like to see it. Even though I'd probably just see fluffy white clouds, I'd at least like to try. I'm flying over the Canadian mainland over/north of a big island that kind of looks like Cuba. I'll have to pull up a map with places labeled to find out where I am. (The internet tells me that "Cuba" is called Anticosti Island and that I was in the vicinity of Baie-Johan-Beetz in Quebec.)

Dinner was chicken marsala with some brown gelatinous blob that I assume was supposed to be the mushroom. It was hot though, so I can't complain. The pasta underneath was tasteless so I skipped most of it. I ate the entire dinner roll because, you know... Bread. =D There was also a brownie that I shoved into the seat pocket in case of stomach grumble emergency. I promptly forgot about the brownie and wonder if it's still there.

I'm still irrationally afraid of airplane bathrooms, but at least this one has some nice philosophy soap. Or at least it's in a philosophy bottle, because the stuff dries my hands out like crazy. No way people pay $30 for lotion that dries you out. The lock in the one nearest to me is a little jammed because some lady walked in on me while I was washing my hands. I'm glad it was only a little awkward instead of a lot awkward.

I watched Warm Bodies on my iPad before dinner came because the tiny screen in my seat back is so old that I don't know how to work it...

Chicago - O'Hare

The coolest thing about Chicago is that there is a dinosaur skeleton in the B concourse. It's a surreal thing to see when you're getting off of a plane. It's next to the Field Museum Gift Shop, so it has a logical reason for being in the airport... It's just not something you see every day.

Another weird thing about O'Hare is their crazy space age toilets. They have plastic similar to Saran Wrap around the seat that you can replace by waving your hand over a sensor. Self-covering toilet seats are a first for me. Definitely the wave of the future! I've also noticed after looking back at my entries from France that I write a lot about public bathrooms (I even have a tag for it on this blog). But it's all a part of the experience, right?

After a quick walk to the C concourse (thankfully in the same terminal), and some much-needed food from Mickey D's all that's left to do is sit and wait. A 3-hour layover sounded good at first because you won't feel rushed -- but it's a lot of time to kill. I walked around the C concourse with Kelly (my seatmate from the Charleston flight).

I accidentally bought Airborne Plus Energy instead of the regular stuff and it's making me crazy jittery. The Coke with lunch probably didn't help much either! I'm going to try to sleep on the flight because we land at 6am London time. I don't think I'll make it a whole day after all this sitting and waiting around. Walking around the airport was a great idea because that's the only exercise I'll get in today. I am not looking forward to 8 hours of sitting on a plane!

Charles de Gaulle Layover, Part 1

(what I assume is about 6am France time)

The plane landed early (joy! An even longer layover!), around 5am France time. Paris was so pretty because it was all lit up in the dark. Breakfast on the plane was an egg and cheese biscuit with raisins (yuck) and OJ in one of those little containers the water came in. The man next to me was polite, but not nice, and he smelled a little bit when he put his arms up (which thankfully he didn't do much once we were settled). The guy in front of me had the highest voice I think I've ever heard coming out of a man's mouth. The old guy next to me was apparently going to Marseilles with a bunch of his old guy buddies, and the guy in front was going to Barcelona to study opera for 5 weeks. Seems like I just attract voice majors wherever I go! He is a sophomore and loved laughing at his own statements every 5 seconds. Not his own jokes, just statements. My opinions on the Paris airport are going to be written in the form of a letter to a friend, who asked for my opinion on de Gaulle.

Friend --

The Paris airport (well, Charles de Gaulle anyways, but no one really counts Orly) is beautiful architecturally from what I saw of this terminal in the dark. The walkways from the plane are metal and glass, which is way better than those beige boxes they have in America. But that's where the niceness ends. The carpet inside when we got off was a garish red (not what you want to see at 5am), and the people movers are so slow I was walking faster than the people on them.

I had to go through security again and they made me throw away the wine and Coke I saved from the plane. Their bins are more like cafeteria trays than bins, and every electronic item has to be in them. This was not good for me, because I had to hold up the line getting various devices from both my purse and my backpack.

There's no gate on my ticket or on the screen when I get in, and the dude I ask about it is of course a complete a-hole. When I finally find the one screen in the whole airport that has my gate number on it, I find myself in the most ghetto terminal in the whole place. The chairs are mismatched orange and burgundy (vomit!), and I was the only soul here at 5am.

I decide to go to the bathroom (which of course is all the way at the other end of the terminal from my gate -- there's only one) and discover it only has two stalls. Two! The doors make this creepy Haunted Mansion sound when you move them, and the toilet seats are round and impossible to cover. The flush buttons say Presto, and I'm pretty sure that's Italian. And they get mad at me for not speaking French! I brushed my teeth and washed my face so I'd feel human again and they have this contraption that looks like a paper towel dispenser only with some kind of cheap cloth hanging out. I think: cool! Cloth paper towels! (even though that doesn't make sense, you know what I mean) and I go to grab one to wipe my face on. Only it doesn't come off. It comes out where paper towels normally come out, hangs in a loop, and goes back in the other side. I don't have anything to wipe my face on, so I just use the front of it and leave it hanging there. Another girl comes in shortly after and pushes some magic button to make it advance forward so she can wipe her hands on some new cloth, but I think she got some of where my face was. How unsanitary is that? You're using the top of an already used paper (cloth) towel! Oh, and on further inspection, I still couldn't find the magic button.

You know how else I know my terminal's ghetto? It's on the ground! I think I'm going to have to take a bus to the bitty airplane when it gets here. It's also ghetto because the pretty raised terminal apparently has its bathroom right above my head. Every time someone flushes, I hear it. Joy. So my opinion, if you haven't figured it out already, is that Paris blows. Well, the airport anyways. My 5 hour layover wasn't long enough to do anything good.

And another reason to avoid this airport: a can of Coke is €2. That's like $3... For a can!

Flight: ATL to Paris

I don't know what time it is because my cell phone's off and I don't have a watch. The movie system on the plane is messed up and they have to keep restarting it (much to my dismay). We had gotten about halfway through 17 Again with Zac Efron and I was getting into it when they restarted it the first time. Now I'm watching the beginning of that Disney "Witch Mountain" remake for the third time. I want to see the end of the grown-up movie!

I've also just had the best airplane food I've ever had. It was pasta in a cream sauce with vegetables (which I left on the side), a little salad with Italian dressing (had a few bites and it was wilty so I didn't eat the rest), a roll with butter, Monterey Jack cheese and crackers, a cookies n creme brownie, and water in a little container with a foil lid (like a yogurt cup). It had a little maple leaf on top. Only the Canadians would come up with something like that. The little plastic silverware were adorable, if cheap. And I got complimentary white wine to go with my pasta! I've already had a Coke, and we get breakfast in the morning too. They just came by to see if I wanted coffee, tea, or water and I still have almost all my wine and half the little container of water left. Talk about service!

When I started writing, we were over Rhode Island and it really does resemble a boot. Now there are so many clouds that I can't see anything but white. I used the airplane bathroom for the first time since freshman year of college and it's not nearly as bad as I remember. Maybe this one's bigger, or I'm not as claustrophobic anymore.

Back to my wine and movie now!

ATL Layover, Part 2

I've walked back to the A terminal after breaking the seal in T (and again in A, even though you can't technically break it twice). I've stationed myself in the neighboring terminal so I can sit in front of the Cinnabon in case the drunk munchies strike (and even if they don't, I still want one!). I spent my remaining time in T talking to the bartender and Afghanistan man about international drinking ages. I spent $11 before tip on the margarita (that's almost a pitcher at La Ha... highway robbery!) and didn't realize until after I left that I added wrong. Now she's gonna think I'm an idiot. Or a drunk.

I realized while I was walking over that I've flown in and out of ATL as many, if not more, times than I've flown out of Charleston. I think that's odd. I'm a big hater of the ATL bathroom sinks too. They squirt out enough water to wash a third of one hand and then stop so you have to wave your soapy, partially wet hand around like an idiot until it will squirt again. They need to recalibrate those things.

I'm going to either read or watch TV on my iPod until I get the Cinnabon craving (yum!).