Date: 2007-01-01
To: #65-Planes Trains & Automobiles....Oh...& the ER
Miles today: 0.0

Well Happy New Year everyone! It's 2007!! It's 2007!!! Whereas I'm back at work tomorrow and it seems the holidays are winding down, there's lots of stuff to write about, so I'll start with my trip to Oklahoma, where I traveled to see my family at Christmas. To kick my first entry of the year off...here are a few tidbits of info about my travel preferences:Fact A: I don't care for flying because you check all of your rights (as a U.S. citizen) right along with your baggage and can be treated like a criminal for looking at the wrong person the wrong wayFact B: The only thing I dislike more than flying is riding the busTrain #1:So it's December 23, 2006, Saturday morning. I'm happily sitting at the Amtrak station awaiting my first of 3 trains that I'll take to Oklahoma City. I'm supposed to arrive at 8:30 a.m. the next day (Christmas Eve).My train arrives and we're on our way to Chicago. Besides the normal *getting stuck behind a freight train and slowing down to about 5 mph/dead stop at times* and *some type of satellite/receiver malfunction* on the train, we arrived in Chicago just fine and only about 30 min. late. I don't care, I'm in no hurry and it sure beats dealing w/the airport.Train #2:Hopped my second train in Chicago, after a 3 hour layover. They have a nice train station in Chicago. It was packed w/people and screaming kids though. This train is super nice...dining car, curtains, comfy seats....all the bells and whistles. I dined w/3 complete strangers and come to find out, one of the women I dined with knew someone I knew! Small small world. It was really cool zooming along and seeing everyone's Christmas lights and decorations as we passed each town. One house could have rivaled the Griswald's home on " A Christmas Vacation." It was awesome! We pulled into Kansas City at 10:00 p.m. My next train was to depart at 12:40 a.m.Train #3: (or so I thought)So I'm in the Kansas City train station...it's approaching midnight and I noticed that less and less people are around...the lights are getting turned off, the cleaning people are out and the Amtrack ticket people are pulling down the cage in front of the ticket window. Confused (because I would have thought more people than me and this other lady w/her son were catching the next train), I went up to the Amtrak ticket people and asked if they'd be announcing when the 12:40 a.m. train arrived. They looked at me like I had suddenly sprouted an extra head or perhaps all of my teeth had just fallen out and dispersed on the ticket counter. They go, "No, there is no announcement, there are no more trains tonight." I go, "What?....I'm supposed to catch a train at 12:40 a.m." They go, "Where are you headed next?" I go, "Oklahoma City." Then...the unthinkable happened........The Amtrak employee said, "Oh....there is no train service to Oklahoma City, you'll be catching the BUS from here." *******************EXCUSE ME?????? DID YOU JUST SAY BUS????****************Ummm....nowhere in my reservation process did it bring my attention to the fact I'd be doing the overnight portion of my trip on a bus! So at 1:00 a.m. on Christmas Eve morning, sitting in a dark train station with one other woman and her son, the Jefferson Lines bus pulled up and we started our trek through the night. To put it bluntly...it sucked. I'm not sure if it was the guy across from me that snored so loudly that the bus vibrated, the woman behind me that had so much crap in the seats that I couldn't recline my seat that 3" that allows one to experience blissful bus comfort, or the person 2 seats back that was coughing up a lung the whole night, but needless to say, I didn't sleep. Alas....we did finally get to Oklahoma City, I called my mom and Rachael (who had flown in a few days earlier due to only having 4 days off work) and they came to retrieve me. As soon as I got to my mom's I got online, found a killer deal on a one-way flight back to Detroit w/Southwest, called Amtrak to cancel my return trip and as my great luck would have it, my refund was exactly the same amount as the one-way flight. I was NOT riding the bus back to Kansas City on my return. So, end of story right? Wrong.....it only got more unreal.It's Christmas Eve, Rachael and I go and get lunch at our favorite burger place, Sonic, that we can't get in Michigan. Then, I decided I needed to take a nap if I was going to have the energy to deal w/my niece and nephew later. So I slept for a few hours and woke up at 3:00 p.m. My sister and family were due at 4:00 p.m.I got up and my stomach just didn't feel right. Thinking it was because I was just exhausted, I decided to just let my stomach have its way so I'd feel better when company arrived. Well....let's just say my stomach was just beginning its protest. I got SO sick SO suddenly. The family showed up, I'm trying to act all "normal" while having to run to the bathroom every 10 minutes to puke. It was horrible!!!! So after 7 hours straight of this, not being able to keep any liquids down and realizing I was getting dangerously dehydrated, my mom and Rachael took me to the Emergency Room. I was sporting my Merry Grinchmas PJ bottoms and the doc confirmed that he'd seen several people that day w/my symptoms, which he described as "violent vomiting," but he said it would only last 24 hours. So, 2 bags of fluids via i.v., a serving of demeral (which made me feel like I was a complete nut), and 3 hours later, my mom and Rachael were carrying me to the car to go home finally. It was about 2:00 a.m. Christmas morning. Rachael flew out that afternoon, and my mom proceeded to nurse me back to health the next 2 days. I'm thankful for having Rachael and my mom there and I'm so thankful the flu didn't hit 24 hours earlier when I was on the bus! So although the trip was less than ideal, there does exist a silver lining to the cloud. So this is enough rambling for this entry. Rachael and I have not celebrated our Christmas yet (an executive Chef lives at work this time of year), so we're doing that today. I'll be posting on the gifts Santa and company delivered later. I can't believe in 2 months and 9 days I'm leaving for Georgia. I sure hope this feeling I have in my stomach right now isn't the flu revisiting...probably just my nerves!