Delayed

I hate blizzards. No joke. Big Blizzard in Chicago = Erin goes to Sydney TOMORROW. I should be half-way to San Francisco right now, not back in Georgetown watching The Colbert Report rerun and pouting about it. My lil' bro is looking at a second day off from school (you wouldn't believe how mild the weather has to be for him to get off school: it was just raining today!) and I am not looking at the Rocky Mountains from 30,000 ft. Like I said, I'm pouting about it.

We drove all the way to Louisville to be told that my first flight was so delayed that I'd miss my connection in Chicago. And all the airlines were up the same creek, so I couldn't hop a flight on another airline. I will say that the booking agent was very helpful, and did his very best to get me to Sydney today. This is on top of the freak-out that was last night, after I got a call saying my flights had been cancelled (I rescheduled, and then this happened).

The bright side of all this is that now I know one of my bags is 4 lbs. over the weight limit of 50 lbs., so now I can remove the many offending items. I do not want to open those suitcases! I've got them packed so tightly I'm a little scared it's more like a time bomb than a vessel of my wardrobe. When I went last time (4 years ago now) I got 70 lbs. per bag! I would've been doing very good by those standards.

To illustrate, a phone conversation between my mom and dad while Mom and I were at the ticket counter, as follows:
Dad: So, is she freaking out?
Mom: Well, she doesn't have any fingernails left.

I had plans. Lots of them. And nothing worked out. And I know that I have to take it as it comes, and that there are things beyond my control, and that I am incapable of following my own advice. It didn't feel real. It didn't feel like it's actually going to happen. Like I was going to Sydney in real life. And when I finally allowed myself to really get excited (right after I checked in, but before the ticket agent told us the flight to Chicago was delayed and I'd miss my connection), it all gets put off.