Home for the Holidays

We made it home on Friday after four unsuccessful days on standby. It's great to be home! We've got a busy schedule this month, but who doesn't?! I ran a 5K race in Jefferson yesterday, and after the race we went out for Mexican food with my parents. We're headed to church this morning, out to lunch with friends, then back home to pack for a visit to Sherwood's family. We'll drive to DC to pick up Sherwood's kids, then the four of us will fly to FL to spend four days at Disney; we'll fly back to DC on Friday and continue our drive north to NJ to visit the rest of his family. We might make it up to NY to visit one of his sisters, and we thought if we make it all the way to NY, we might as well keep going to RI to visit my extended family. But we might be too tired for all that driving. We'll see how we feel. Regardless, it's nice to be home for Christmas!

Stranded in South Africa

Sherwood and I have been stuck in South Africa since Monday. We're flying on buddy passes with Delta, and it seems (even when they have empty seats available) that cargo is more important than passengers. We, along with 18 other people, tried to fly out on Tuesday night, and despite the fact there were seats available, Delta choose to leave all of us stranded to put more cargo on the plane. I was talking to one passenger at the airport last night who paid full price for his ticket and almost didn't make it on the plane. Since the flight was overbooked, and his travel agent hadn't assigned him a seat, if everyone who purchased a ticket had shown up, he would have ended up waiting to fly out for another 24 hours. He told me his dad's company used Delta to ship a suitcase, and they paid $20,000. No wonder they won't let passengers on the plane, suitcases are much more lucrative!

We've been spending our days reading, playing solitaire, and watching movies, and we take our guest house's shuttle to the airport every night in hopes of getting on the plane. They're telling us it doesn't look likely for us to get out of here until Monday. Yesterday, they told us Sunday looked okay. We're not sure what they've got going on, but I haven't been impressed with Delta--although I must say, the individual movie screens in the back of every seat are a nice touch. I might be willing to sell out to the cash machine in the future if they continue to provide individual entertainment, on demand, during the 16 hour flight between Johannesburg and Atlanta. On second thought, maybe not.