Coming in for a Landing...

New York City, New York --
San Francisco, CA USA

January 14, 2008

After watching Bret Favre and his Green Bay Packers dismantle the Seattle Seahawks on the Times Square JumboTron we decided to check out the news and the weather for the following day. The big story was the upcoming snow storm that was bearing down on the east coast and dumping 4”-8” of snow by Monday morning—the commute would be a mess and the airports messier. We brushed-it-off, at first, but the more the local weather forcasters talked about it, combined with my history at JFK, we decided to call the airlines and see if we could change our flight. Since we have another flight on Tuesday morning, pre-paid hotel reservations and the island of Koh Phi Phi calling our names, we didn’t want to miss our flight out of New York on Monday and create a domino effect on the final two weeks of our journey.

It was 11:00 PM when I called United Airlines. They could get us on an 11:00 AM flight out of JFK the following day. We jumped out of bed, packed our clothes, and instead of spending another day exploring New York; we would be on our way to San Francisco.

Since I mentioned it, I guess I better come clean. My history at JFK is horrendous. I try to avoid JFK at all costs. At one point I think I missed three straight flights, came close to missing another two and have sat on the tarmac as the snow came down. Marc was used to the panic call during my trips through JFK with my voice quivering, telling him I was going to miss my flight. With this in mind, we didn’t want to take any chances.

It was strange being back in San Francisco, especially for such a short period of time, but it was even more bizarre being back in our place. We walked into our home, but it didn’t really look like our home. We unpacked our stuff, almost like we were in a hotel, and basically moved back in. It was strange washing clothes and putting them away in drawers instead of in our backpacks.

Today was only a small taste of life back in the real world; a life of laundry, cleaning and being responsible. I think we’re ready to get back, but we are both pretty sure we’ll miss it after a few months.