Home for the holidays, the finale.

I made it to the airport safely on Saturday, in spite of the, er, questionable driving conditions.

I saw many cars in the ditch but not until the last 15 miles or so; roads were pretty good before that. Happily, I was NOT one of those who slid off the road.

Andrew's flight was originally scheduled to land at 1:40 pm on Saturday. When I left home, the NWA website was giving 2:14 pm as its projected ETA. By the time I got to the airport, 75 miles later, that had changed to 3:12.

Wait. Let me tell about my preparations for the journey and probable wait at MSP.

Since the weather was so bad I thought it likely that, a, I would have to sit at the airport for a l-o-n-g time, and that, 2, there would be heaps of travelers whose flights were delayed or canceled. Thinking ahead, I considered the possibility that the airport concessions would run out of food. No food = not good. So I packed some provisions.

From the left, we have most of a loaf of artisanal sourdough bread, sliced lengthwise and buttered; a container of calamata olives; a container of white cheddar cheese cubes; the remains of a bag of pecan halves; a Honeycrisp apple (manna from heaven, especially when combined with the cheese); and a bag of dried apricots. I also threw a couple Clementines into my food bag. Mmmm, food.

The airport was appropriately decorated. This stunner greeted me as I walked from the parking garage to baggage claim. (Cursing Mama, this one is for you.)

The baggage claim area of an airport on the last Saturday before Christmas is an excellent people-watching venue. Let me show you them.

Lots of hustle and bustle.

Starbucks had a constant long ling. I partook of a small cappucino. And a brownie.

There was interesting hair.

There was a reindeer sweater, moving fast.

There were interesting shoes.

The [extremely blurry] platforms on the left were at least 3" high and were being worn by a nerdy-looking twenty-something male. The cowboy boots on the right, were matched by their wearer's headgear:

The western wear would not be at all unusual in Denver or Albuquerque or even Dallas, but in Minneapolis? Distinctly odd, especially since the guy wearing them looked like an authentic cowboy, one who had been hustling bovines for a good 50 years. We don't get so many of those types in the Twin Cities.

Note: Clearly, I was Kinnearing like mad. The essence of Kinnearing is Not Being Noticed, so using the flash was out of the question. Hence, the many extremely blurry photos. Sorry about that.

This family group was waiting across the hall from me.

Remember them; you will be seeing them again.

A close-up of the arrival screen:

Waitwaitwait some more.

There were a few dressed like this:

Several greeters had made banners to welcome their loved ones home.

Translation, for those of u who do nt spk txtng: Welcome back home to Minnesota, Ashley! Love you, Your parents. Ashley, when she appeared, was wearing a Kappa Alpha Theta shirt and had the sorority girl walk. I was disappointed; I wanted Ashley to be deserving of such love and expectation. Maybe she was, but I doubted it. She seemed more like a privileged suburban yuppy puppy to me.

Benny's extended family and friends were waiting to greet him:

Benny turned out to be typical college kid in jeans and backpack, beloved of his family and happy to see them.

This one was the best. *Someone* had dressed up special to greet her babylove.

I never did see who she was meeting, but this was the scene that greeted [presumably] him:

"BABY I missed you! WISCONSIN is 'cooler' than CALIFORNIA!"

All together, now: Awwwwww. (Sorry if that sounded snarky. I don't mean it to be; the whole thing was actually very sweet.)

The crowds surged and ebbed as flights arrived, and the family group continued to wait.

There were lots of these kinds of scenes.

This couple was waiting. She was a little on the short side; he was extremely tall.

When their arriving person got close, they did this:

Can we get another Awwwww! Thank you.

Speaking of kidlets, check out this little guy.

We had a suit like that for Andrew once upon a time, too.

Someone else dressed up just a little.

This couple caught my eye.

Apparently one fur coat is not enough for some people.

The family also continued to wait.

One member of the group never stood with the rest, instead strolling around in inappropriate shoes. Remember the blizzard raging outside? I bet her toes were cold.

One kept himself amused by recording the busy-ness of the airport.

I had it all over him. Pretty darned impossible to Kinnear with a hefty camcorder like that.

Tragically, I never got to see who they were waiting for.

All through the afternoon Andrew and I kept in touch by phone and text message. He told me that, because of the slowness and incompetence of the desk crew at JFK, the plane lost its take-off slot and had to sit on the taxiway for over an hour. They flew west to Minneapolis and had to circle for awhile because they had lost their landing slot. Then the airport closed, and they flew back eastward a bit to refuelv and de-ice in Madison, Wisconsin. And sat on the tarmac there for another hour or two.

Eventually the arrivals screen read this:

and then this:

The Powers That Be were extremely concerned that the people who were waiting for this flight -- that was was already nearly six hours late -- knew exactly at which minute it would touch down.

He finally arrived (Safely! Yay!), the concessions did not run out of food, and we hugged and greeted each other. We met up with Matthew and Maggie for pizza. It was so late and the roads so bad that, even though it had stopped snowing, we stayed the night in Minneapolis. On Sunday we all went out for breakfast, and Andrew and I ran errands.

Here is how much snow we got:

and this was the scene today:

All is well.

Comments

I was once at an airport when a guy greeted his girlfriend with a roll of paper from a dot matrix printer. He let it unroll slowly, and it said (one word per page) will. you. marry. <-- (arrow pointing to the guy). She shrieked and flew at him and knocked him over, and every crabby ass person in the whole area gave them a standing ovation and more than a few of us wiped away a tear or two. It was pretty great.

Posted by: Carrie | 22 December 2008 at 04:32 PM

awwwwwwww. (seriously) awwwwwwwwww!

What a great adventure. Your snack pack would serve as a perfect secret pal prize. Thankfully Mr. Sophanne doesn't notice the price difference between "Mannah from Heaven" and "Gala" apples. We could be seriously great food sharing pals. What I'm wondering is how many kinnears you tossed vs. how many you posted.

Posted by: sophanne | 22 December 2008 at 04:35 PM