It Started Early

Well, it’s 12:15pm (5:15pm England time) and myself, my sister, Mom and Dad are finally here at my aunt’s house. Doesn’t it figure that our flight was delayed by almost 2.5 hours? Some of our flight attendants were in Montreal and their flight to Toronto couldn’t leave due to severe lightning! Bah!

Anyhow, I thought I’d take complete advantage of my extremely visible cast and I got the airport staff to whell me into the airplane. My seat didn’t get much leg room, but I managed.

“Did you put this here? Did you move this?” said the curt flight attendant to my father. When he answered in the positive, the flight attendant promptly and firmly scolded him for moving the unlabeled emergency equipment from the overhead compartment over him and over to the one across from him. We obviously had no idea this was emergency equipment, but the flight attendant graciously and without us even asking repeated herself multiple times in a condescending manner, letting us know that it was NOT okay to move that stuff. Sheesh! SORRR-Y!

Ah, bad airplane food time. “Chicken or Vegetarian?” said the feisty flight attendant to my sister. Before she could even answer, I piped in and said “She has the lactose free meal”.

“Well, all we have is Chicken or Veggie”. At this point I’m already irritated and unimpressed. I specifically called the airline to tell them that my sister is lacrose intolerant. Feisty flight attendant unsympathetically told my sister that she’d check the back for a sandwich she could give her. What? A sandwich? So you’re gonna “look” for some moldy old sandwich that’s probably been sitting there for ages? Not impressed. Feisty told us that after she served everyone else, she’d look for something in the back for my sister. So in the meantime, my sister continued to starve as our flight was 2.5 hours delayed in the first place.

About 25 minutes later, Feisty showed up with a meal. It had Salmon and potatoes and other veggies. It also obviously had some sort of dairy-looking product slathered all over it.

“This is a staff meal. One of the staff is going to go without her meal” Feisty stated, as if she were waiting for a prize, a standing ovation, or some other form of adulation. “This isn’t acceptable. It has dairy on it. Is that dairy?” my sister asked.

“I’m not sure. One of the staff gave up their meal so that you can have it”.

I was sitting there trying to figure out what her point was. The fact that one of the staff “gave up their meal” meant nothing, especially since this meal still had some sort of unidentified sauce on it that the flight attendant couldn’t tell us definitively if it was dairy or not.

Still unapologetic, she and the suspicious salmon dish disappeared into the back.

Moments later, she reappeared with random fruits. My sister loves fruit and was slightly more content with that, but neither myself nor my father were at all impressed with the lack of meal or the lack of tact. She showed up later, now somehow knowing that my sister should have gotten the lactose free meal and she is not sure why it wasn’t on board. She assured us that she would call whomever and make sure the meal was there for our flight back. Thanks.

We slept a bit, and soon it was landing time. When we hit the ground, I got a buggy escort to baggage pick up. On the golf cart style buggy sat beside a delightful older lady. She was going to visit her sister. It would be the first time she’d seen her in 20 years! I wished her luck as I got off of the golf cart and she was toted off to another location.

My aunt was more than elated to see us. I’m still trying to get used to this “wrong side of the road” driving stuff. Tomorrow is my first visit to the dialysis clinic in London so wish my luck! (Watch me have trouble cannulating…then they’ll think i’m a big dope!) Oh please…let cannulation go smoothly!