DH & MIL should not travel together - IL. IN. KY. TN & WA, oh my! - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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DH & MIL should not travel together - IL. IN. KY. TN & WA, oh my!
I finally finished my WDW TR and now can begin this one. DD & I wanted a Disney Cruise but MIL refused. DH family has a reunion every year but he hasn't been in ten years so MIL suggested we all travel to Pigeon Forge TN for his families Reunion. That is what this TR is all about. The cast of characters:
Me, 52 - Mom of 2 daughters, Granny of 2 grandsons, wife, high school History teacher, optimist, avid book reader, like to go places but not airplanes and lived in Alaska 43 years!
DH - 50 - usually laid back kind of guy, lets me do most of trip planning because I like to although will offer his opinions when asked; pessimist, looking forward to seeing his extended family although a little aprehensive about spending so much time with mom in close quarters.
DD - 14, loves swimming, sunburns easily, likes shopping, wanted to see other grandma, (my mom lives in AK), not too excited about this trip.
MIL - 70, outspoken, retired nurse, Loves shopping, president of her condo association, lives alone in North IN. DD is only grandaughter.
Flying to midway, IL.
Saturday June 9th.
DH had to work, DD & I were home packing and hanging out. DH hadn't really been on a vacation out of state in a very long time and was excited. He had been calling all his extended relatives to see how many would be at the reunion. Saturdays are his slowest day and he kept calling me to see what we were up to and if the packing was done; basically driving me crazy. DH wanted to get hats from work for grandsons and also kept calling me about what type his work had and which ones he should get. Finally, he arrived home about 6pm and had a quick bite of dinner. My nephew came over around 7:30 to drive us to the airport, I gave him keys as he was taking care of our two cats while we were gone.
Here's a pic of Patches and Beauty.
DD was killing time by taking pics - here's one.
We were trying to get out the door and keep the cats inside, patches of course escaped and would not let us catch her to get her back in house. What a circus! DN said he would come back to our house after dropping us at airport to see if she'd come in then. So off we went. Got to airport to print boarding passes, now I had already chosen seats together but when we got our boarding passes DH was in row 16 or so and DD and I were in 30 something. So we went to ticket counter to figure out what was going on. Apparently I chose row 13 in picking seats and there is not a row 13 so the airlines stuck us separetly because it was booked with DH since he was flying back early and DD & I later. The ticket agent moved a single person and gave us a row together which was nice but what I couldn't understand was if the airplane did not have a row 13 why was it a choice in the seat reservation system? Go figure.
Our plane was leaving at 11:30pm . I cannot sleep on planes but this was the best price available. I watched episodes of Alias, to occupy myself. DD was watching something else and DH was reading. After about 4.5 hours I started to get antsy, and claustropic so DH let me out to go to Restroom, (just an excuse to move around and be a little less crowded) when I got back to seats, DH had moved to window, DD was in middle and I got the ISLE! They are so sweet, We landed in Denver for a plane change, our flight was late so we had to hustle a lloooooonnnngg ways to the next gate on no sleep. When I get no sleep I also have no brain function. We made the connection on a Air Tran ( I believe it's called) I liked this flight better. The seats were roomier, the attendants were very nice and one kept all the passengers entertained, he was hilarious. There were tvs in the back of each seat so we each got ours on just to have something to do.
We arrived at Midway airport around 8:30AM, found our bags and stepped outside into the hot, humid day. MIL was supposed to be picking us up. We didn't see her yet but thought she was running a little late or circled around so we found a clear spot to set our luggage and DD and I sat on the sidewalk. 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 45 minutes, no MIL. We did not bring our phones because only have a Alaska local carrier and roaming charges are outrageous. Neither DH nor I know MIL phone # by heart and with my brain not working I couldn't remember if I had written it down somewhere. I told DH I would call my mom collect and get MIL's phone number from her. So into the airport looking for phones. When I found them and figured out number to call for collect services, I heard mom answer but when the recording said charges would be $18.00 I hung up! What I didn't know then was that because I was tired when mom heard my voice and the call was cut off she thought she had messed up and lost the call and that we were in Denver (our connecting flight) and something was wrong. So mom called MIL to see if she had heard from us. MIL said if something was wrong we would call back and for mom not to worry since MIL didn't have to leave for the airport until 2pm because we were arriving at 3pm in the afternoon! The saga continues....
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Alaskan Mom aka Bonnie
Last edited by Alaskan Mom; 01-23-2016 at 05:44 PM..