The Trip!

Okay, so we are here! The journey was interesting and there are a few tidbits that I’d like to share. First our friend Russ who is watching Kaiser took Francesca and I to the airport. It was great. Apparently while I was in the bedroom doing one last vacuum, Russ asked Francesca if she would promise to be a good girl while traveling with Mommy. She was! I guess she didn’t want to disappoint anyone—but she really is a good traveler anyway.
Our flight to Atlanta was delayed, but we made it. The flight to Roma was interesting. The Oklahoma University Women’s basketball team was traveling on our flight to play some bball in Italy and Greece on a whirlwind 10 day tour. They were a great bunch of women! One disturbing incident also occurred. When we were half-way across the “water portion” of our flight many flight attendants raced down the aisle to a window seat about 8 rows ahead of us. Then there was an announcement, “If there are any medical doctors on this flight will you please report to row &*$^A.” Immediately people began to stand up and gawk at this woman who was evidently having a medical emergency. I even noticed people from the higher paying end of the plane using the mid bulkhead restroom to look on. Fortunately there was a doctor and fortunately the woman walked off of the plane on her own. It was frightening. I was more concerned for the woman and scared that we would have to make an emergency landing. I have to admit that even though others were gawking, I first looked to where the attention was going, then slowly began to scan everyone else and their behavior. I guess car wrecks and airplane emergencies are part of our morbid fascination as human beings.
We had a 5 hour lay over in Roma. Francesca and I met an Italian couple who had missed their connection in Roma to go to their home in Trieste. They had already been traveling over 24 hours from Sydney Australia visiting a child and grandchildren. They spoke good English so we were able to carry on a conversation. One of our conversation topics actually turned to the lack of customer service that the couple experienced upon missing their flight. I found that to be rather interesting since I complain about that as well but thought it was only a phenomenon in the US.
Once we arrived at the Ancona airport. Our luggage was there, Joe had hired a driver and was there, and we drove to our humble apartment in Jesi.