and to think I used to get excited about snow in Chicago! Not anymore, let-me-tell-YOU!

I was scheduled to fly from Indy to Chicago back to Tokyo this morning, but the weather gods frowned on me and I'm "back home again in Indiana..." I wish I could say it had been that easy, but alas... today was a really awful day. We sat at the gate for hours waiting for a runway to clear in Chicago, until it looked like I would miss my connection to Narita. Hoping that the Japan flight would also be delayed, I got in line at the desk to check whether I should board or not. Unfortunately, the ladies at the United desk were having a very bad morning. There was a borderline psychotic man with several other adults flying to Hong Kong- who was pitching a fit about the delay and stalking the check in attendants, completely oblivious to the rest of us who needed some attention. The UAL folks were doing everything they could but in the end, they were understaffed and didn't call security on the psycho before he shot their nerves - they were doing way too much at one time and blew it. I didn't even get to the front of the line before they called final boarding and in my panic to decide whether to run for the plane or not, I overheard the UAL worker say to another woman on my flight that there was "no way" we would make any flight to Japan today... or tomorrow.. maybe not until Thursday.

sigh. So I relaxed and went back to waiting patiently to see if we could get our luggage back. It took forever, but I finally got myself booked on what promises to be the Longest Possible Way to Japan: I will (hopefully, with breath held and fingers crossed) be flying out of Indy at a mind-numbing 6:10 AM tomorrow- to Washington Dulles (which in case you aren't geographically minded, is the complete opposite direction I want to be going). Then, just to have one-last-chance to spend all my dollars... I'll be flying from Dulles on to JFK International in New York... where, if I am lucky, the Chicago storm will have peetered out, allowing me to finally board a very long flight to Tokyo. If that is actually how it all goes, I will be delighted.

Of course, meanwhile, they couldn't get the bags off of the plane in time and they ended up going to Chicago. No one really has been able to tell me how I will ever find them... could be a long week. And to round out the day, by checking the information online, turns out my flight from Indy to Chicago made it to Chicago by 4:30 (which means they sat on the runway for 4 hours) and the flight to Tokyo didn't leave until 6:30. So, had I jumped on the plane I would be most of the way home by now. How dissappointing!

The good news is I got to go to church one last time tonight and the Packers and the Colts both won!!