Getting to Boston

So much has happened in the past few days! For now, I think I'll write about our travel to Boston and our first night on the East Coast.

JJ and I both love airports. Maybe it's because of the people watching? How important you feel dragging a suitcase along behind you? Feeling like you are going on vacation? For whatever reason, we both love airports a lot. Except for the TSA. That part, not so great.

I always stress about getting my laptop, shoes, liquids, and keys off of me fast enough to pile them in the little bins and push them through the scanner fast enough for the long line of people behind me. Inevitably, no matter how much you prepare, you always accidentally wind up putting your shoes (which should be alone) and your laptop (which should be alone) in together in the same bin, and then the TSA looks at you like you are a complete idiot. LIKE LAPTOPS AND SHOES ARE NEVER ALLOWED TO INTERMINGLE, EVER. 

Well, now the Sky Harbor Airport has incorporated one more unpleasant aspect to the whole security checkpoint nightmare. Yes, sirs and ladies, I introduce to you the full-body scan.

Or as I like to call it, the nakey-scanner.

And you betcha, this Thursday when we flew out, I got picked! See, the thing that annoys me is they don't even tell you what they are doing. Here I am, walking along, following instructions, and soon I'm in this photobooth thingy with my hands above my head. I share a knowing look with the TSA lady at this point. And I'm thinking, "I bet they are looking at me naked right now." But by then, IT'S TOO LATE. I already feel like cattle. Apparently, you can opt out of the nakey-scan, but typically they do a very vigorous pat-down to those people. So, now you have two choices: let a total stranger oogle your goodies, or be touched inappropriately. It's a lose-lose situation. Heavy sigh. 

Other than that, the flight was pretty uneventful (which is exactly what you'd hope for a plane ride). We got to Boston around 5 pm and got to the hotel, when I get a phone call from the car transport guy (you remember, Mr. Crazy), saying he will be in Burlington in 40 minutes. We have two thoughts about this:

1) HOOORAY! The car will be here, Mr. Crazy didn't sell it for scrap metal!

2) OHMYGOD we have to get to the Burlington Mall (predetermined drop-off point) RIGHT NOW. 

We find out the hourly shuttle is leaving in ten minutes. We run up to the room, throw (literally, throw) down our stuff and run back down the stairs to make it on the shuttle. Once we got to the mall, we had 20 minutes or so to burn, so we decided to walk around a little, do some window shopping.

Fast forward 90 minutes. Mr. Crazy is now saying he is "7 miles away" and he should be here in 10 minutes. By this point, we are literally both ravenous. We have not eaten in a little over 10 hours. We are no longer interested in looking at couches, or winter jackets, or anything else we might need for our life here on the East Coast. All the stores we walk into are somehow related to food.

In another 30 minutes, Mr. Crazy gets to the the mall, gives us our car, and lets us know, "Ohh, by tha way, you ty-ah...ez flat. No go. See, maybeh you go to Sears and they pump for you." That's genius! We are right next to a Sears Auto Center! Fantastic! Except, it closed fifteen minutes ago. Thank you, Mr. Crazy. 

We are both a little worried about the tires (it's actually not one flat tire, it's all four), we google for a nearby gas station or tire company. At this point JJ is pretty sure the rear tires will both need to be replaced. Unfortunately, we weren't able to find anything that was still open and the hotel is not even a quater of a mile away, so we just decided to deal with it in the morning and go eat.

And we did, and it was delicious, except for you know, the part where we saw mice scuttling across the floor in the dining room and the manager really didn't seem to care too much. But that's another story, another day.