Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by McMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.------------------------------
I give up on "Not Me Monday." I have many things I'd like to post for "Not Me Monday," but my Mondays are usually totally swamped with getting back to "normal" after a weekend. Our weekends seem to fill up quickly with family activities, and it's almost a relief to have things back to "normal" on Monday, the day that most people seem to dread. They have normal jobs. I do not.
So I'm just doing a "Not Me" post--any day. Since I had such interesting (I think so, anyway) and funny incidents on our Florida trip, I want to post them now, even though it's already Wednesday...and we went on our trip more than two weeks ago. (Oh, yeah...I'll try to post more pics about our Florida trip soon, hopefully before the girls graduate from college.)
This is not the first time I've flown with a child...but it's the first time I've flown with children (plurality being the key point here) and it was much, much different. First of all, Liesl was 9 months old when we flew to El Paso for my nephews' baptisms. And while it was not a direct flight, it was still immensely simple to fly with one child, and a small one who was taking two naps a day at that (she napped during the majority of ALL FOUR FLIGHTS when we did our El Paso trip. I actually read my book during each of those flights. Dear Lord, I did not know how good I had it.) And while I did not kid myself into thinking that traveling with two children on direct flights (no connections, woo-hoo) would be in any way easy, and while I spent oodles of time preparing activities and diversions in order to avoid getting my entire family's seating arrangements downgraded to the wingtips (read: outside the plane) in mid-flight; I sort of thought we had it handled.
Boy, was I dumb.
So here goes, my "Not Me" incidents:
Between strollers, laptop computers, violins, diaper bags, and other paraphernalia, we did not have seven pieces of carry-on luggage (or eight, if you count Ava) when we approached the TSA checkpoint. And when we got there, I did not jostle my violin case, which had our metronome in the outside storage pocket. And as a result, the metronome did not start to "tick….tick….tick….tick…." as we approached the security lines. Upon raised eyebrows of the TSA officer, I did not fumble nervously with the zipper of the case, jostle the metronome dial in the process, and cause it to speed up: "Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick…" And when I started to get REALLY nervous, I did not hit the dial all the way to the right, thus speeding it up still more: "TICK!TICK!TICK!TICK!TICK!" And the TSA agent closest to us did not reach for his gun.
My husband did not threaten to abandon me due to the above embarrassment.
On the way home, at the Fort Meyers airport, I did not cause the security alarms to go off at the TSA checkpoint due to too many hairpins stuck in my fabulously fashionable (ha) messy bun. I did not subject my baby to being meticulously patted down by a kind, but quite thorough, female TSA agent because I just happened to be carrying her when I walked through the metal detector. My father, who had taken us to the airport and escorted us as far as he could, did not stick around to watch me (and Ava) get frisked in order to find immense humor in this situation.
TSA did not put me on their "most wanted" list after the metronome/hairpin episodes.
Upon arriving to our gate for our return flight, my children were not 2 out of the 25+ very small children--half of whom were screaming--waiting to board the same flight. Noticing the *horrified* looks of all the childless people waiting at the same gate, I did not find their obvious dismay upon discovering who their flightmates were--and how loud they were--VASTLY amusing.
My children were not amongst the whiniest, most obnoxious children on the flight. And if they had been--which they weren't--they did not alternate their strident outbursts with each other to make sure that Tom and I (and, indeed, all other passengers within a 7-row radius) never had a moment's peace during the 2-1/2-hour flight.
The (obviously childless)crotchety old fart elderly gentleman in the row in front of us did not oh-so-subtly (!!!) refer to me as a "Moo" when our LOVELY, DARLING, ANGELIC <*cough* *cough*> children got slightly (!!!!!) out of hand. As a result, I did not even consider encouraging Liesl to kick the back of his uptight wife's seat repeatedly for half an hour, all the while singing, "Helloooooooooooo, everybody, so glad to see you...hellooooooo, everybody, so glad to see yoooooou," a few decibels higher than was really necessary. No way, not me.
Don't get me wrong: The trip was great fun. Florida was wonderful. The flights were, all things considered, handleable (is that even a word?). I mean, nothing's easy with two tiny children, and I have fewer tiny children than many of my friends do. But think of the last flight you had, by yourself or with companions who are chronologically-mature adults: You got to watch out the window undisturbed, if you happened to have a window seat. Nobody was kicking your tray table from the underside, thus launching your Diet Pepsi into the laps of everybody in your row. (You probably weren't tempted to ask the flight attendant for a shot of vodka in said Diet Pepsi.) You didn't have to stand up and make all the passengers in your row stand up too so you could(awkwardly) change a diaper in mid-flight on your seats, because the changing table in the plane's restroom is a joke. Nobody looked at you in disgust when that diaper turned out to be of the very fragrant poopie variety. (Hey, people, suck it up and deal with it: Kids have to poop too, you know.) You actually got to READ the book you packed, and had a rational discussion with your companion--or you chose NOT to have a discussion of any kind--without having topics such as poopies, pretzels inserted in facial orifices, or barf bag puppets come up. (Yes, I realize having "barf bag" and "come up" in the same sentence is a pun. Totally unintended.) You didn't have to quell your flight companion's urgent desire to shriek "HAPPY LANDING!" four hundred and twenty-seven times when the plane touches down. I mean, really.
So I'm just doing a "Not Me" post--any day. Since I had such interesting (I think so, anyway) and funny incidents on our Florida trip, I want to post them now, even though it's already Wednesday...and we went on our trip more than two weeks ago. (Oh, yeah...I'll try to post more pics about our Florida trip soon, hopefully before the girls graduate from college.)
This is not the first time I've flown with a child...but it's the first time I've flown with children (plurality being the key point here) and it was much, much different. First of all, Liesl was 9 months old when we flew to El Paso for my nephews' baptisms. And while it was not a direct flight, it was still immensely simple to fly with one child, and a small one who was taking two naps a day at that (she napped during the majority of ALL FOUR FLIGHTS when we did our El Paso trip. I actually read my book during each of those flights. Dear Lord, I did not know how good I had it.) And while I did not kid myself into thinking that traveling with two children on direct flights (no connections, woo-hoo) would be in any way easy, and while I spent oodles of time preparing activities and diversions in order to avoid getting my entire family's seating arrangements downgraded to the wingtips (read: outside the plane) in mid-flight; I sort of thought we had it handled.
Boy, was I dumb.
So here goes, my "Not Me" incidents:
Between strollers, laptop computers, violins, diaper bags, and other paraphernalia, we did not have seven pieces of carry-on luggage (or eight, if you count Ava) when we approached the TSA checkpoint. And when we got there, I did not jostle my violin case, which had our metronome in the outside storage pocket. And as a result, the metronome did not start to "tick….tick….tick….tick…." as we approached the security lines. Upon raised eyebrows of the TSA officer, I did not fumble nervously with the zipper of the case, jostle the metronome dial in the process, and cause it to speed up: "Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick…" And when I started to get REALLY nervous, I did not hit the dial all the way to the right, thus speeding it up still more: "TICK!TICK!TICK!TICK!TICK!" And the TSA agent closest to us did not reach for his gun.
My husband did not threaten to abandon me due to the above embarrassment.
On the way home, at the Fort Meyers airport, I did not cause the security alarms to go off at the TSA checkpoint due to too many hairpins stuck in my fabulously fashionable (ha) messy bun. I did not subject my baby to being meticulously patted down by a kind, but quite thorough, female TSA agent because I just happened to be carrying her when I walked through the metal detector. My father, who had taken us to the airport and escorted us as far as he could, did not stick around to watch me (and Ava) get frisked in order to find immense humor in this situation.
TSA did not put me on their "most wanted" list after the metronome/hairpin episodes.
Upon arriving to our gate for our return flight, my children were not 2 out of the 25+ very small children--half of whom were screaming--waiting to board the same flight. Noticing the *horrified* looks of all the childless people waiting at the same gate, I did not find their obvious dismay upon discovering who their flightmates were--and how loud they were--VASTLY amusing.
My children were not amongst the whiniest, most obnoxious children on the flight. And if they had been--which they weren't--they did not alternate their strident outbursts with each other to make sure that Tom and I (and, indeed, all other passengers within a 7-row radius) never had a moment's peace during the 2-1/2-hour flight.
The (obviously childless)
Don't get me wrong: The trip was great fun. Florida was wonderful. The flights were, all things considered, handleable (is that even a word?). I mean, nothing's easy with two tiny children, and I have fewer tiny children than many of my friends do. But think of the last flight you had, by yourself or with companions who are chronologically-mature adults: You got to watch out the window undisturbed, if you happened to have a window seat. Nobody was kicking your tray table from the underside, thus launching your Diet Pepsi into the laps of everybody in your row. (You probably weren't tempted to ask the flight attendant for a shot of vodka in said Diet Pepsi.) You didn't have to stand up and make all the passengers in your row stand up too so you could(awkwardly) change a diaper in mid-flight on your seats, because the changing table in the plane's restroom is a joke. Nobody looked at you in disgust when that diaper turned out to be of the very fragrant poopie variety. (Hey, people, suck it up and deal with it: Kids have to poop too, you know.) You actually got to READ the book you packed, and had a rational discussion with your companion--or you chose NOT to have a discussion of any kind--without having topics such as poopies, pretzels inserted in facial orifices, or barf bag puppets come up. (Yes, I realize having "barf bag" and "come up" in the same sentence is a pun. Totally unintended.) You didn't have to quell your flight companion's urgent desire to shriek "HAPPY LANDING!" four hundred and twenty-seven times when the plane touches down. I mean, really.
Now, again: I have fewer children than most of my friends. My friend Colleen flew with her THREE children to LEBANON, for Pete's sake, and loved it and can't wait to go back. Nobody arrested her for cursing in public and she still seems quite calm and sane. Really! I saw her yesterday and her hair--and her kids--are all intact. So why were we so flippin' exhausted from our flights alone? It was chaos, I tell you.
Plane ride humor aside (and it is VERY funny to think about...now), we had a terrific time in Florida. I will post photos shortly, I hope. I would love to go back--preferably when the girls are old enough to haul their own gear (and their own butts) around the airport themselves, but we did have a truly wonderful time.
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