FREE DRINKS

Number two son, Weston, has spent the last year at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville KY, working on a Master in Divinity degree (On a related note, the ole Ranch Hand needs as much prayer as all yall can muster).

Number one Mom, Mendy, has spent the last year concerned about number two son's welfare. Therefore, she and I safaried to Kentucky last Friday morn to "check on stuff".

Arised and got to shinin' early that morn with significant imbibement of water and coffee. Stopped on the way to the airport and got a large Coke. At the airport got bottled water (gotta stay hydrated don't you know)( there is a point to this enumeration of liquid) Embarked from Austin Bergstrom Airport early Friday morn with a "short" stop at Dallas Love Field to change planes.

Upon arrival at Dallas learned that the connecting flight plane was delayed due to bad weather. No big deal.

Then plane was delayed further, then further. No big deal. Plane finally arrives, but passengers told that the jetway was malfunctioning so all should move to a different gate to board. No big deal.

Boarded the plane at different gate and settled into the seat for takeoff (and waited and waited and waited). Finally pilot comes on intercom and says that the "APU (???) is on the fritz" and the technicians are looking at the electrical problem" and " we should be in the air shortly". (WOW that makes me relax and "settle into the seat"?) "Technicians are scurrying in and out of the pilot cabin and all look worried)(I'm probably starting to look a bit "worried" myself)(either that or I gotta pee like a baboon)(REMEMBER ALL THE MORNING LIQUID?!!!!)

Finally, the motor thingy pushes the plane away from the gate (and then the pilot over and over and OVER runs the flaps, etc. in and out on the wings (this ain't doin' nuthin' for my nerves or my bladder??)

Mr. Pilot comes on the intercom and says, "I ain't jest perzactly satisfied that the 'lectrical problem is fixed so we are going back to the gate for more analysis (count me in favor of that!)

(See more worried looking by the expert "crew", well they look more like Wright City alkies (and they wore kinda ragged clothes)(not confidence inspiring) than technicians, as they scurried in and out of the pilot place)

Finally, we git pushed back out and the pilot (being a good pilot) runs them flap thingies back and forth a bit (AND THEN BACK TO THE GATE)

Senor pilot then says that our plane just ain't up to standards today and when:

1. they can find another plane and
2. find a gate to park it at and
3. find some of the antique/obsolete plastic boarding passes to give us we will:

Leave this plane and get into another flying death trap (actually he may have not said those last few words, but I was thinking it quite loud)

OK, we sit our butts (and my 58 year old bladder there a bit more) and then finally they say that another peachy keen (flyable???) plane is on the opposite side of the terminal and all we need to do is form a conga line and hot foot it to the other side and, "sit in the same seat you are in now". Yeah right! (notice they didn't announce no damn bathroom break!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Finally we are in the air to Louisville. Now, with inevitable timing, we are diverted to St. Louis for a "brief" stop (imagine my airline confidence, and bladder size, soaring about now).

Them airline cabin attendant folks are generally purty accomodating. After the FOUR HOUR GOSH DANG DAMN delay in Dallas, they wasn't just giving out a minature bag of peanuts per passenger, they were handing out plastic containers with near bout 100 bags each (and the adult beverages was without charge: FREE DRINKS)(Imagine my joy, they are administering free alcohol and if I take one sip my bladder will explode labeling me for eternity as some kind of sicko terrorist?)

But all is not lost as my bride (by now a basket case of fear/nerves) asks for a Bloody Mary. The obliging stewardess places the drink on her tray while the plane is still ascending to gain altitude and thus at a backward angle. Now see the drink starting to slide toward my bride's lap and the ever alert stewardess grabbing the drink just in the nick of time as she yells, "STOP" (while leaning over me). Now see the entire plane (maximum load) stopping and looking at me as an obvious hijacker that the stewardess was trying to thwart. Now see me (very redfaced) and the stewardess trying to convince the crowd that all is well???/ (DAMN, some days ya just wanta stay in bed).

OK, trying to RELAX now (except for the bladder part) so M orders second Bloody Mary as her fear of flying is beginning to lose its edge a bit? The drink is placed on the tray and promptly consumed by my nervous companion. Then M turns to me with some pearl of wisdom to impart, and then rapidly turns back to her container filled with ice and promptly "slaps" it into the lap of the passenger to her right. (OK, relax frankie, relax (except for the bladder!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

I know this is the longest BLOG on record, but what I got to tell just gotta be said, OK?

We get to Louisville (without me peeing on myself) and see at the airport that for the first time ever an earthquake hitting 5.2 on the Richter scale has hit Louisville that morning (with more quakes expected) and "stuff" has been falling off of buildings??????? (Holy Crap!)(Also noticed that gasoline is $4.68 per gallon, but not sure that the quake is related to that?) (We checked into the second floor of a damn tall hotel)(and I'm wondering if in a quake you want to be on the bottom and crawl out of the rubble, or on the top floor and ride the bricks to the ground)(more bladder complications?)

Well, we survive that first day and start the second. Weston has class so we ease over to Frankfort Street to enoy a latte at the Heinie Coffee shop (I couldn't make this up folks). Naturally my aging bladder has to visit the water closet/toilet. The "facility" is on the second story of this gozillion year old building and the stairs are steeper than a ladder. Get up there and do my business OK. Walk down the "ladder" safely to the bottom, well almost. About two steps from the bottom I miss a step and fall face first on the floor and bust my mortal "you know what" and peel all the hide off my knees (and embarass the crap out of myself in front of the crowded coffee shop)(Wayne, where are you when I need to drink coffee in a more private setting?)

Finally get through that ordeal and bride Mendy says that the "spider" bite that she got a few days before is "throbbing" "swelling" and generally being a pain in the (actually it was her calf). I look at that puppy and immediately know that the hospital emergency room is our next visit.

Three hours later (after minor surgery, heat treatments, a prescription of a recuperation regimen)(did I mention trying to convince a Kentucky Walgreens pharmacy that we really do have insurance and a legitimate "drug" account in the backwoods frontier of Texas) we are back on the streets ready for just about anything (our butts went to the hotel and gratefully went to bed at 6:30P while M's leg throbbed like the Titanic going down for the last time!)

Sunday was good. We went to a 100 year old German bakery in downtown Louisville and got fresh pastries, coffee and milk for three for $5 (wow). We went to a 14,000 acre forest preserve south of Louisville and saw awesome blooms, trees, hills etc. and we toured the Jim Beam Bourbon Distillery where they had storing/aging over one million barrels of whiskey (Gene Waller heaven I'm thinking?)(IMPORTANT: They don't allow no "samplin'" on Sundays)(good policy, unlucky for me)(imaging me having bad luck on this trip??) Lastly we went to a nice seafood restaurant on the banks of the Ohio River (where they charged me $3 to park in their damn parking lot to eat in THEIR restaurant?????)

Today rolled around and we mounted our (trusty?) Southwest Airline steed and hit the sky's to soar/motor/glide triumphantly homeward to Austin.

Take a bathroom break or whatever, but come back to read this last part:

The beautiful bride and I started out via SW Airlines with a stop in Birmingham. On landing in Alabama, our former aircraft carrier pilot/fighter jockey/naval aviator "stuck" the landing and gave us a nice jolt to awake the drowsy. After landing, a gentleman seated at the wing emergency door held up the small plastic sign that is over the door that says, "EXIT", and noted that it fell off the wall when the plane bonked the runway. (I think some of my teeth loosened when that dude slammed us into the concrete to land?)

After being on the ground for 30 minutes waiting to "continue SW flight 2021 to Houston Hobby", the pilot appears from the cabin, picks up the cabin attendant microphone (this can not be good news as the pilot is just a voice that we NEVER see connected with a face???) and tells us that due to the "EXIT" sign falling off he had to file an equipment failure report with the FAA and wait for the feds to "analyze" the report, give approval to a proposed action plan, and authorize further flight of the aircraft after repairs were certified (AND WE THOUGHT GROUNDING DUE TO FAILURE TO INSPECT AIRFRAMES WAS AN ISSUE!).

After another 20 minutes the pilot reappeared and announced that the FAA had approved "replacing" the exit sign, but that a replacement "part" had to be located and a "qualified technician" had to be found to effect the FAA mandated repair (friggin' federal gibberish for just sit your ol' butt bladders in that seat and suffer)

OK, in about 15 more minutes a kindly looking gray haired gentleman (like me, except for the kindly part) appears wearing a tattered jumpsuit with a (worn looking)(junkyard) 4"X12" white plastic strip with the words "EMERGENCY EXIT" (not just "EXIT) in red print.

Guess what, that puppy is too big to fit in the sign frame over the door. Our esteemed "technician" then whups out what looks like clear plastic packing tape and slaps a few pieces on the sign and places it above the door. Said sign falls on the floor before he can blink. (Mr. "t" is not inspiring the confidence we world travelers so richly crave?)

"Technician" disappears and comes back with, yep, good ole american DUCT TAPE (have the airframe engineers heard about this yet?)

This story ain't over.

Mr. Technician puts duct tape on the ends of the sign and puts it over the door. Sucker falls off. Mr. T then puts tape on the top and bottom of the sign, puts it over the door, and DAMMIT, it falls off again (we are at about 90 minutes on the ground now).Finally, the repairman holds the sign with one hand and puts a long piece of duct work across the middle of the sign (obliterating the lettering) and extends the tape to several inches on either side. I was sure he was going to leave it that way as a practical solution, but after looking at it for a bit, he took a blade and "carved" out enough of the middle of the duct tape to more or less see what it said.

We finally were allowed to take off (and immediately after takeoff the duct tape came loose all around the sign as if to give a "bronx cheer", but kept the bandaid sign on the wall until we landed at Houston Hobby)

If I'm lyin' - I'm dyin', but before they let anyone off the plane in Houston, TWO (2) techs came on the plane and began to analyze the sign "problem". OK, am I stupid or does SW/FAA have their priorities a bit askew?

Did I mention that SW Airlines gave us free booze on the flight to austin to "atone" for the (well as this is a somewhat family oriented BLOG, I will not call this for what it was.)

Just remember to never look a gift horse in the mouth or a think a FREE DRINK ain't without its requisite ration of pain?

(And I'm startin' to think that only birds wuz mean't to fly anywho?)