Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Welcome to Denver, here's your shovel

As you can imagine by the title, my return to Denver for winterbreak was marked by the worst snow storm the Denver metro has seen in almost four years...Just my luck, the onset of the storm coincided with the arrival of my flight into town. In chronological order, here's how the day went.

-Flight from boston to new york
-Delayed on ground in new york for 2 hours to fix leaky valve from airplane bathroom (I guess a working deucer is probably a top priority, but it's annoying that we have to sit on the ground for 2 hours while the problem is fixed... I could have gone to Duncan donuts or something in the meantime...stupid jet blue.
-Normal flight (window seat- which is cool because it's the window, but sucks because I'm 6'1), but the kid next to me is a total asshole about moving out of the way when I have to go to the bathroom. I could tell he was going to be a craptastic neighbor when I got on the plane and he didn't even get out of his seat to let me by, he just lazily turned his body, and I had to squeeze by his legs. I tried to be brave and drink the complementary water and tomato juice without disposing until landing in denver, but it just couldn't wait. Guy gives me evil eye when he sees I'm trying to get out, then proceeds to evil eye me when I get back to my seat. Sorry, dude...you didn't have to pick the middle seat when you booked your ticket.
Anyway, back to the story.
-Land in denver in driving snow, runway is effectively a sheet of ice. I have to give the pilot credit for a job well done here...when I got a look at the condition of the runway, i began to mentally prepare myself for the inevitable skid off the runway. But, the guy was calm and collected, and we landed just fine.
-Landing was the easy part, however. We begin the taxi process to the gate only to stop for 50 minutes (FIFTY) as ground crews plowed a path from the plane to the gate. The best part about the taxi wait was that I had to go to the bathroom again, but neighbor's evil eye keeps me in my seat (as if he was daring me to try it).
-I get my bag from baggage claim about 45 minutes after pulling up to the gate, and set off on the journey home with my paps. A drive that should normally take about 20 minutes takes an hour and a half. Whiteout the entire way, and a stubborn dad who refuses to let other drivers in front of him. At one point, some douchebag in a pickup started to cut him off, and he braked to make sure the guy didn't hit him. when the guy stopped too, my dad blazed forward and you could hear the sound of the two cars grinding against each other as my dad passed. He effectively said fuck it, and we kept driving. I admire my dad for that one, funny guy.
-We got home, and I didn't leave for 2 more days, as the snow cut off contact with the outside world. I got to shovel the driveway when the snow stopped, 3 hours of back breaking fun. That was my welcome back to denver...

I will be posting more, and the posts will be much shorter. Had to get the story of my arrival off my chest.

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