My Arrival Part 1

After 22 hours spent waiting for, and riding in planes, trains, and buses I am finally in my dorm in Utrecht. In regards to the travel, the confusion began even before leaving the US. Human assistance with both baggage and check-in at SFO was almost non-existent: when all was said and done, we wasted more than half-an-hour in both correct and incorrect lines waiting for help. After successfully checking-in, the next hurdle to overcome was a seemingly unsurmountable security line stretching all-the-way back to the bag-check lines I had been in before. After the next epoch of line-waiting had elapsed and I was finally through security, my next issue wouldn't arise until the flight to Chicago.

Having escaped the torment of SFO and realizing that I would not have to face the debacle that is the TSA again in the foreseeable future, my spirits were high. Soon after boarding my Chicago-bound flight I acknowledged a growing pressure in my bladder. When I fly, I prefer either the isle seat for easy access, or the window seat for a nice view; in this case I was at the window. The constant flow of people boarding made made it difficult for me to reach a bathroom before we took off, and my problem was only compounded by the arrival of my seat-mates, two elderly men. I resigned myself to wait until take-off for my much-needed relief. Three hours and forty minutes later I sat praying for a quick taxiing. Both of the gentlemen beside me had fallen asleep after turning off their hearing aids. I rushed off the plane as fast as was socially acceptable and finally found relief. While in Chicago I faced few of the scary realities I encountered while at SFO. My only surprise came when my plane boarded earlier than expected.

After getting seated I was greeted by a young mother and her baby who soon sat down next to me. Curious about how I could physically make it out to the aisle past my car seat prison, I decided that the best course of action would be to simply step onto the baby to reach the proper position to vault myself over the mother. Before I had time to act, a flight attendant came by to inform the woman that imprisoning me was against FAA regulations and the baby was granted a reprieve from her fate at the bottom of my shoe. Thanks to a poor global economy, most of the airplanes seats were unoccupied upon take-off and as soon as the "fasten seatbelt" sign turned off I was able to plant a flag in a whole section of seats and claim them for myself. Thanks to plenty of leg-room and seats to spread out onto, I was able to ignore the paucity of available in-flight entertainment...

My illiterate roommate walked out of a fire door and set of the alarm. It has been around twenty-five minutes and still hasn't ceased ringing so I'm just going to leave. More to report later.