Red Eye

I think you’ll all be pleased to know that when we flew out of Utah, I did not have a cold.

You’ll also probably be sympathetic to know that Baby Sister did have a cold. Poor baby! Apparently the Obnoxious sisters can’t go to NYC together unless one of them has a cold.

Anyways, just like last time, we flew out on a Tuesday night. Unlike last time, we had a layover in Charlotte. I’d never been to North Carolina before, and I was excited to go. It’s fun to go new places, even if it’s just for a brief layover where I never leave the airport. Over the years, such layovers have allowed me to drop by Atlanta and Chicago.

Because we were planning to stay with Older Sister, I had my pillow in my carry-on bag. Not being sick and having a cushy pillow to rest my head on meant that I was way more comfortable than I was last time I flew East. Last year, I couldn’t sleep a wink on the flight. This year, I slept about three out of the three and a half hours of the first flight. That was good, because my body really needed it, but sad, because there’s something really pleasant about flying at night. I didn’t get to witness that pleasure.

When I woke up, I for some reason had a bloody nose. I was also super disoriented. I was momentarily convinced that I was Little Sister and Baby Sisters’ chaperone and that I was accompanying them to London so that they could “come out” into society. It seems I’d been reading too much Georgette Heyer.

The disorientation remained. I kept being weirdly elated that I’d slept for three hours. I started composing a blog post about the flight in my head, but I only came up with this single sentence:

"I had to keep reminding myself that sleeping three hours on a three and a half hour flight is a) no great accomplishment nor b) a sufficient amount of rest."

Disoriented Awkward Mormon Girl thought this sentence was the height of good writing and hilarity. Oriented Awkward Mormon Girl is not so sure.

We disembarked and briefly experienced the experience of Charlotte.

A few things about Charlotte:

1) The water in the drinking fountains was, well, not-so-good. This is something that Charlotte has in common with Atlanta. (What’s up, the South? I think you need some new drinking water. Or at least Southern airports do.)

2) I was sooooo hungry so I made my first purchase of the trip! I bought a chicken sandwich at an airport restaurant called Bojangles. (No relation to the tap dancer...that I know of.) Sadly,, even though I said I would like mayonnaise, there was no mayonnaise on my sandwich. It’s a testament to the quality of the Bojangles’ sandwich that the chicken turned out to be moist enough to eat without mayo.

It wasn’t long before our second flight arrived. We hauled our luggage on board and took our respective seats. The three of us got to sit together on both flights, three seats in a row, so that was cute. On this particular flight, I had the middle seat. The middle seat is awkward because, like the aisle seat, there’s nowhere to rest your head, but unlike the aisle seat there isn’t at least the benefit of not having to step over anyone to use the restroom. But the middle seat is nice in that, if people you know are sitting on either side, you’re basically sitting in a sandwich of social comfort. You don’t have to interact with strangers or nothin’. If the person on the aisle is accommodating enough to order your complimentary in-flight drink for you, then you don’t even have to talk to the stewardess. Or steward, as the case may be.

Baby Sister was not accommodating enough to order my in-flight drink for me, but otherwise the flight passed in an ordinary fashion. At around 10:00 am, we landed in LaGuardia. It was time to show New York City to Baby Sister!