Tune-Out

Miraculously my mom and I escaped from Atlanta right before the big snowstorm of 2011 hit.  We were scheduled to fly out to California on Tuesday afternoon, but the weathermen were predicting that the storm would hit Sunday evening.  So mom, being the determined woman that she is, promptly called Delta and switched our flight to Sunday afternoon.  We were confirmed on the flight but were not assigned seats.  Being not-too-frequent flyers, we didn't exactly know what this mean.  We now know it means the airline overbooked the flight and you don't actually have a seat.  Well we got to the airport extremely early (since we brought 9 week old baby Lukas along with us), checked our bags and proceeded to the gate.  The flight didn't "open" for check in until 45 minutes before the scheduled departure, but mom got in line 20 minutes earlier than this and just stood there.  So she was first in line to be assigned a seat.  Or so we thought.  We learned that there were 7-8 people confirmed on the flight but seatless.  We were two of these people.  The gate agent told us that we'd just have to wait and see.

So we waited.  They began boarding the flight and still we waited.  About 10 minutes before the flight was scheduled to leave, the our names appeared on the "cleared" list, which meant we had seats!!!  I went over the gate agent  and she told me that she bumped us up to the top of the list to get seats since we had a baby and my mom had been so kind even given the situation.  So thanks to the random stranger at Delta, we got our seats on the plane and left for California.  Lukas slept almost the entire flight 5 hour flight.  He is becoming quite the world traveler.

We arrived in California around 3pm PST, just as the snow storm hit Atlanta.  Since Sunday, the city has more or less shut down.  Schools have been closed, grocery stores have been without food and car wrecks are on every corner - or so I hear from Mr. Cob and the internet.  I haven't actually seen any of the footage on TV because my brother (who we are here visiting) doesn't have a TV.  And it is amazing.  I have not missed the TV once since we have been here.  In fact, I love not having a TV.  You are forced to spend quality time with the people around you and talk.  I don't miss the shows I usually watch or the seeing the news.  It has been great to tune-out this week.  While I know that I can't convince Mr. Cob to get rid of the TV (he has to watch his Cubbies, even if they're losing...), I at least want to have a big family without a TV in our next house.  I want a space for family and friends to congregate where there is no distracting TV.  For now, I'll enjoy the rest of our trip tuned out.