FLYday

Day One: What a wonderful idea, this check-in the night before. Saves you trouble the day you travel, makes it easy to move - and lets you sleep in late because your mind thinks it's already vacation time! Which is, but we got to go THERE first. SHE is waking me exactly 30 minutes before we wanted to take the bus to go to the airport - thank god I put some extra time into this timetable as well! The meticiously planned 2-h-clean-up in the morning is done in 15 minutes. We will see, what ends up dying by itself in the fridge or elsewhere in the kitchen while we're gone (no, not the kitty, that one is in her luxury hotel. And no, not the turtles, they spent holiday with their breeder, family ties, you know...).

Okay, get dressed, brush yur teeth, take your hopefully complete handluggage. With the passports and all other travel documents. Which ME stored carefully in a pouch, a pink one, so it cannot get lost. I put it somewhere where I cannot forget it while doing the 2-h-last-minutes-things in the morning. Only that I had to skip a few steps, so where's the pouch? Breathe in, breathe out, count to 15. Got it. Let's go.

Out of the house, run to the bus, turn around four times because the kids forget something. Always check the door MYself, if its locked or not, sort of a control syndrom. You adapt those when you're alone with kids for a long time.

Get to the airport in time, make it through pass control okay, waving happily to all those who stand in line for checking in their luggage, waving with a grin to those who pass the long waiting line before immigration because we fly only Economy, but they do Buisness or even First Class. I know some of them, they are from home. Is everybody from Goldcoast going to the states? Hurrah! We are in the middle of a TRENDY trip!

Not trendy is the cabin of the Airbus we're flying. When was the last time, Airbus measured their passengers? We got the middle four-seater-row, but only No3 can stretch out her legs. One out of four. One out of four can only use the entertainment system, because the other three ones are broken and refuse to revive throughout the whole flight. So we take turns eight hours long in watching movies or playing games. There is no guarantied right of entertainment during the flight, I'm afraid, no need to talk to the air hostess, she doesn't know how to work that system anyway. Food is good though, the trendy - there we go again! - caterer Hiltl is cooking this month. No3 cannot stand the smell of any food throughout the whole flight, poor thing. Have to remember that on our trip, she needs to eat long before flight and enough so she won't starve 'till we get to destination.

Talking about destination: The way how Chicago comes in sight when you fly in is breathtaking. No matter if day or night, rain or fog, its majestic, its magic, its solid, its Chicago. My kind of town. It's been almost 30 years that I saw this for the first time. Never lost it's magic on ME. Reason for the trip is to share that with The Three Teenagers before they stop wanting to travel with ME.

Last time they made me wait at immigration for two hours with the kids, this time it only takes 45 minutes to walk through, they take fingerprints from ME and from SHE ("everybody older than 14, M'am"). If this is daily business, that Esta thing really helps. Our luggage is here too, lucky us.

Chicago, here we come! No: Here we ARE!